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Ah Spring! The birds are chirping, the weather is warming up, and the kids are CRAZY. Seriously. They are ready for summer– and we are too! So here are some of my favorite Spring music lessons to keep you elementary music students engaged through testing season, Spring Break, and the end of the year madness.
Because we’re almost at the end of the year– right?!
Some of these will be Spring specific, and others focus on elements of Spring, like animals or gardens. Some are for older students and some for younger; I’ll specify who I like to use them with for each one!
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Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks
There are some lessons you start using your first year and love– and this is Spring music lesson is one of those!
Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks by Mussorgsky is one of mine and my students’ favorite listening pieces– which makes it a great music lesson for Spring!
We use this to work on form. The form of the piece is AABA.
First, we start by using our hands. I tell them that each hand is a baby chick. We pull one hand out for A, it goes all around, then goes to sleep. Then it comes back out. Then the other one, and so on.
Then we add actions– we tiptoe around the room like little baby chicks on A and stand still and lean side to side on the B section. Don’t forget to let them go to sleep between each section!
You can also add instruments– I like to use egg shakers on the A section, then we put them down on B.
If you’re feeling really crazy, you could also use a parachute– do little tiny shakes on the A section and go in a circle on the B section.
Best with grades K-2.
I have a whole lesson pack, which makes teaching this lesson really easy! It includes all of the visuals that you need as well as some printable activities.
Los Pollitos
Since we’re on the topic of chicks, I like to pair the Spring music lessons of Ballet of the Unhatched Chicks and Los Pollitos.
Los Pollitos is a Mexican folk song that talks about the little chicks.
We start this one off by me singing and the students copying the actions. Then I go line by line and have the students guess what each of the lines means by the actions– they can usually figure most of them out.
I also have this super cute pop up book that you can sing along with. The kids love all of the hidden pictures! I got it on Amazon– you can grab it here!
Best with K-2.
Spring Matching Games
One of my favorite Spring music lessons is independent or group work. This includes centers, group work, group composing, and more. And of course– matching games.
Matching games are some of my favorite centers and independent work all of the time, and during Spring I like to use the Spring sets– bunnies, eggs, and shamrocks.
Each set includes different concepts such as treble clef, bass clef, piano, instruments of the orchestra, rhythm, recorder fingerings, and more.
You can purchase them in my TPT shop!
Frog in the Meadow
Frog in the Meadow is a fun sol mi singing game that gets kids up and moving– and just in time, because in the Spring the kids tend to get crazy.
This game is similar to Cut the Cake if you’ve played that one before.
Here’s how to play:
- One person is the “frog” in the middle. They close their eyes and spin around while the group sings. They also have their hand pointed out.
- At the end of the song, whoever the frog is pointing to stands up with the person next to them. The frog “cuts” them. The both run in opposite ways to around the circle.
- The frog stands in the empty space where they were with their hands out. The first person to make it all the way around the circle and tap their hands is the winner and the new frog.
Since this game is more complicated, I would say to use it with 2-3.
Here’s a video to help you see it better.
I use Frog in the Meadow to practice sol mi and/or quarter rest. This year I used it to present quarter rest!
You can use the lesson pack from my TPT shop to help with the visuals, presenting sol and mi or quarter rest, lyrics, rhythm, game directions, and more.
El coqui
Since we’re on the topic of frogs, let’s talk El coqui.
El coqui is a Puerto Rican folk song about a coqui– a little frog native to Puerto Rico (although apparently invading Hawaii, and they aren’t happy about it) who has a ribbit that sounds like “coqui”.
This song is really cute, and I typically teach my kids just the chorus because the only word is coqui.
They use their fingers to move high and low to match the melody of the song.
There’s also a clip of a frog singing this on Dora, which I would highly recommend for Spring music lessons.
Kearu No Uta Ga (Frog Song)
And one more frog song– this time in Japanese! This Japanese folk song has some hand motions, which I learned from the Youtube video below.
- Line 1: Make fists, then spread fingers out on beat
- Line 2: Hold hand to each ear one at a time on beat
- Line 3: Hands and feet in, then out on beat
- Line 4: Walking with arms pumping to beat, then claps on the last 3 “gwa!”
You can also do this in a round, which means that you can spread it across different grade levels! That means you can use it for multiple music lessons for spring.
John the Rabbit
John the Rabbit is a call and response song about the rabbit coming and eating all of the vegetables in the garden.
You can sing through it, and then have students come up with different vegetables that the bunny can eat. You could even have students take turns solo singing the different things that John is going to eat, and the class responding with “oh yeah”.
Then you can add instruments! Use boomwhackers, xylophones, pianos, or whatever you’ve got in your room to play on the repeated “oh yeah” part.
This is a simple way to have kids practice with a new instrument, since they only need to play one note.
Spring by Vivaldi
No Spring music lesson would be complete without a mention of Spring by Vivaldi. I’ve been trying to teach second grade all of the different Seasons, and really help them learn about the string family (although we missed last fall!).
If you try to figure out the form, it would be ABACADAEAFA, although that is a lot of sections for a three minute piece.
For this one, I like to do a movement activity:
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
- B: Pretend that you are a bird flying around the room
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
- C: Hands back and forth like a conductor
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
- D: “Quick feet” to match the accompaniment
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
- E: Spin one way, then the other
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
- F: Lean side to side
- A: Tap shoulders to beat 4 times, then legs to beat 4 times
Rain, Rain (+Tap Tap Boom Boom!)
We can’t discuss Spring music lessons without talking about Rain, Rain Go Away. This classic folk song has quarter and eighth notes and sol mi and la (I’ve seen versions of just sol mi, but we’ve always done la).
The first thing that we do with this song is practice steady beat– we put the beat all over our bodies. Then, we will change the name in the song to be one of the students in the class– and that student gets to choose where we keep the steady beat.
Then we add the book Tap Tap Boom Boom. This is a cute book about a huge rainstorm, and it has a lot of onomatopoeias. After reading, we compare tap-tap to eighth notes and boom to quarter notes. We read rhythms and make up our own rhythms using the activities in this Spring music lesson on Teachers Pay Teachers made to go along with the book!
Shop Tap Tap Boom Boom lesson.
Que Llueva
Along with Rain Rain, I like to use Que Llueva. This is a Spanish nursery rhyme.
My favorite thing is to teach it to them with the actions in English, and the next time they come in to sing it in Spanish and watch how confused they are. Then I teach them the Spanish words.
I use this with first and second graders, so I find it sometimes helps to teach it in English first, then Spanish, this allows them to figure out the melody and rhythm before adding in a language they don’t know.
Here are the actions we use:
- Que llueva: fingers moving down like rain
- Rana: Fingers and thumb together to make a “frog” that hops
- Pajaritos: Flap wings
- Luna: Hands together in a circle moving up
- Sí: Nod head
- No: Shake head
- Caiga: fingers moving down like rain
You can also switch out the animals, so instead of doing frog, you can do turtle (tortuga), llama, monkey (mono), etc.
Then we improvise! We take the words “rain” and “llueva” and relate them to ta and titi. We sing the song, and then they have 8 beats to make a pattern with rain and llueva. (Note: I like to start by having them repeat patterns first, that way I can tell them they can use one we’ve done before if they want to.) Then we add egg shakers!
And check out the whole lesson here.
Closet Key
Closet Key is one of those songs I’ve heard people talk about, but never used until recently. All I can say is that I wish that I had started sooner.
This is a singing game for upper grades, and they love it. I used it with my 5th graders and they have been all about it– even those who are reluctant to sing after two years virtual.
For this game, one person hides the “key”. (I’ve been using a ruler.) I have them leave a piece sticking out so that we can find it a little bit more easily.
While they hide, one person has their eyes closed. This is the finder. After the key is hidden, they walk around the room and try to find the key.
The class helps by singing the song quietly when they are far away and loudly when they are closer.
This is a simple do re mi song, and we used it to play on the keyboards!
2, 4, 6, 8, Meet Me at the Garden Gate
The last of our Spring music lessons is 2, 4, 6, 8, Meet Me at the Garden Gate. This is great for younger students (you could go as high as third grade).
We do a clapping activity with this one.
The original clapping activity is to have students tap their legs, then partner’s hands to the beat. We usually start with that one, then get harder.
- Line 1: Pat legs, the partner’s hands to the beat
- Line 2: Clap the rhythm
- Line 3: Walk in circle around partner
- Line 4: Pat legs, the partner’s hands to the beat
Since it is all ta’s and titi’s, you can also use it to practice rhythm with your littles!
Check out the lesson pack here.
Have you used any of these Spring music lessons?
Let me know (or let me know which one I missed!) by sending me a message on Instagram @beccasmusicroom
Happy teaching!
Becca
