Star Light, Star Bright is a fun folk song to teach kindergarten, first grade, and second grade elementary music students about sol and mi or quarter and eighth notes. Although the song is quite common, these lessons are not. Make sure you read down to the extensions so that you get all of the ideas… Continue reading Easy + Fun Ways To Teach Sol + Mi With Star Light, Star Bright
Tag: first grade
Little Silver Moon : a Chinese Folk Song Lesson for Quarter Rest
Do you ever find a folk song that you didn’t know existed, but once you did, you couldn’t believe you hadn’t ALWAYS had it? That is how Little Silver Moon is for me. I discovered it at the beginning of this year, and I am now obsessed-- and so are my second graders! Little Silver… Continue reading Little Silver Moon : a Chinese Folk Song Lesson for Quarter Rest
The Best Movement Activities For K-1 Elementary Music Lessons
If you want your students to be engaged, you need to have movement activities in your classroom. Movement allows students to feel things in their bodies, get the wiggles out, and be actively engaged in the lesson. In this post, we’re talking about 10 of my favorite lower grade movement activities. This is certainly not… Continue reading The Best Movement Activities For K-1 Elementary Music Lessons
Free K-1 Music Lesson: The Tick Tock Song
You know those songs that you find and you are not sure if your kids will like it, then they love it? That’s how the Tick Tock song was for my classes. I thought it looked/sounded cute, but it was a HUGE hit! My kids wanted to keep doing this song over and over and… Continue reading Free K-1 Music Lesson: The Tick Tock Song
Free Music Lesson: Grizzly Bear
Teaching dynamics in your elementary music class? Then you need to teach your music students the song Grizzly Bear. This song is one of the main reasons that I decided to do a bear and mouse unit for my kindergarten and first graders this year. We did Grizzly Bear, Hickory Dickory Dock, Mouse Mousie, We're… Continue reading Free Music Lesson: Grizzly Bear
Christmas Rhythm Composition with K-1
When it comes to rhythm, especially in the younger grades, some things are easier to teach than others. Making rhythms that match songs-- easy. Repeating rhythms-- easy. Even reading rhythms-- easy. But what about improvisation and composition? That's a little harder. I talked about improvisation and how I set that up in my Rain v.… Continue reading Christmas Rhythm Composition with K-1
Free K-1 Music Lesson: Beat v. Rhythm with Soul Music
If you have been reading my blog for any amount of time, you will know that I love to teach students about different kind of music. We do tons of listening activities with music from all different places. This is partially because of my personal teaching philosophy, and aided by the program that my students… Continue reading Free K-1 Music Lesson: Beat v. Rhythm with Soul Music
Free K-1 Music Lesson: It’s Raining and Que Llueva
Do you want to know something? I love Hispanic heritage month. I love all things multi-cultural, and Hispanic Heritage month gives me the perfect excuse to do a lot of Spanish songs, Spanish dances, etc. My students are not Hispanic, and I am enjoying being able to expose them to different things through music. For… Continue reading Free K-1 Music Lesson: It’s Raining and Que Llueva
Free K-1 Music Lesson: Singing Voice v. Talking Voice
Kindergarten music. It is so much fun. And so terrifying. As I allude to in this post about teaching rhythm, I felt a bit apprehensive my first year about teaching 4 and 5 year olds EVERYTHING about music. I mean, these students come in and don't know anything. We have very few students who attend… Continue reading Free K-1 Music Lesson: Singing Voice v. Talking Voice
Free K-2 Music Lesson: A Train Jazz Lesson
All month, I have been sharing Jazz resources with you (since April is Jazz month!). I shared ideas for incorporating jazz and a jazz lesson on the song Blue Skies (which includes scarves!). This week I have another jazz lesson on the song A Train. Now, if it is not April, do not panic. Jazz… Continue reading Free K-2 Music Lesson: A Train Jazz Lesson