Beehive Messages friend, Stacey, shared with me these really cool ideas for Music Time. I think you will enjoy these especially if you are looking for some creative ways to teach songs to Nursery aged children or Jr. Primary.
Idea Number One from Stacey:
A huge hit with my Junior Primary is what I have named "Walter Wiggle Songs". Walter is a worm that can't stop wiggling and needs to sing to help him stop. The songs are obviously from the ACTION section of the Children's Songbook. This is so popular that I now give the children a choice between selecting a song from the board that goes along with my weekly presentation or doing a "Walter Wiggle Song". I have a bag with a picture of Walter on the outside and inside the bag are smaller pictures of Walter with a wiggle song attached.
Idea Number Two from Stacey:
Right now in addition to teaching a song of the month, I am introducing new songs from the Children's Songbook each Sunday. When I say a new song it just means they haven't sung that song in the time that I have been the chorister. I find that they enjoy singing different songs even if we only sing it one time that week. I love visuals aids and use them every week. Just this past week I found a wooden circle with a smiley face on it at the dollar store. Both my Nursery and Junior Primary loved touching, holding, and guessing what song we would sing that had something to do with a smile or happiness, etc...
Idea Number Three from Stacey:
This is my version of what I call Singing Sam the Slinky and felt hearts. Singing Sam has helped many hesitant Sunbeams come to the front of the room and hold Singing Sam knowing to only lift Sam up out of the box when the children are singing well. I glued the slinky to the bottom of the box and added eyes to the top, and music notes around the box with his name.
The felt hearts I made were going to be primarily used for Nursery and Junior Primary. One day...the Senior Primary asked me why they couldn't use the hearts. I told them they could if they wanted to and every single one of them eagerly wanted a heart (even our tough 11 year old boys). The children hold the hearts as we sing songs with the word love in the song or title. If the song has the word heart we place the felt heart over our hearts when we sing the word. If we sing the word love we hold that heart in the air when we sing the word. I then take it one step further and have the children follow my directions with the hearts. I say something like: hold the heart in your palm, touch the heart to your forehead, touch your knee, put the heart next to your own heart, rub your cheek with the heart and kiss the heart good-bye. These extra steps help the children relinquish the heart without a commotion and the Nursery children know that our singing time is over and they wave good-bye to me until next week. It sounds a little silly, but it really is effective for our younger children.
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