Little Leaves Are Falling

I LOVE this little song.  I have always loved how isolated do is at the end and have used it as kinesthetic preparation for that melodic concept.  However, last year I took inspiration from Tanya LeJeune to add some new movement to it.  This new movement really helped my second graders be able to sing it as a round.  Granted, we didn't do it as a four-part round, but they did get up to three parts (first year in a new school, I thought that was pretty good!)

Here's the song:

These are the leaves I use:

I found them at King Soopers (our local Kroger store) a couple years ago.  They are so realistic looking but surprisingly durable for the $1.00 that I paid for them!  They are fabric and we use them in kindergarten and first grade for Down Down, Yellow and Brown  so they've been prepped in "leaf etiquette". :)

Formation: standing circle, leaves on the ground in the middle of the circle and every student holding a leaf or two in each hand with arms raised and hands above their heads. 

Action:

1. "Little leaves are falling": with one hand, in a conducting like pattern, have the leaf (or leaves) in that hand float to your side, still holding onto the leaf.
2. "Falling everywhere":  with the other hand, do the same movement as the first phrase.
3. "Making all the tall trees": slowly raise arms up high above head, still holding onto the leaves.
4. "Look so very bare":  students either float their leaves to the ground, still holding onto them, or they can let them freely drop with their "branches" (a.k.a. their arms) still above their heads.  
1. The first way is a great physical prep for do: they actually touch the ground on the last and lowest note of the song.
2. The latter is a lot of fun visually as it looks like leaves falling from the tree, but if not prepped right can be a classroom management nightmare with students diving for leaves. 
5. Once your students have mastered this, try it as a round! :)

Another thing we do with this song is use the leaves on my felt staff board.  They are able to write out the so so so la so mi & so so so la so patterns on the staff, using the leaves for note heads.  Visually, we are also able to talk about the mystery note: that it is lower them mi.  Using the leaves, we show that one of the critical attributes of the mystery note is that it is a skip lower then mi.

Happy leaf singing!

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Ghost of Tom

This is a great round that I'm sure you're familiar with.  It's perfect for this time of year because it's fun to sing around Halloween AND (more importantly) it gets the kiddos singing in 4 parts:

Here's a movement activity I do with Ghost of Tom to encourage independent singing in this round and I've found it makes singing the round in 4 parts more successful.

Formation: standing circle

Action: 

Phrase 1: walk counter-clockwise in the circle, stepping the half note.

Phrase 2: walk clockwise in the circle, stepping the half note

Phrase 3:  turn in place 360 degrees, stepping the half note.

Phrase 4:  in place, lowly sink to a crouching position.

Once students have learned the song and these actions and can perform is as a group (lesson #1), we make two concentric circles (lesson #2).  One circle is assigned to start first.  This circle starts singing the song with the movements and the other circle waits until the moving circle is finished with the first phrase to begin singing the song from the beginning.  When the starting circle starts singing the second phrase, the second circle comes in on the first phrase.  As the round completes, we switch parts so that the starting circle is the circle that comes in second and the circle that came in second is the starting circle.  During later lessons we add circles until we have 4 concentric circles.  Visually, it's fun and the kinesthetic movement really helps the students with phrasing, independent singing and being able to successfully sing this round in 4 parts.

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My Poor Hand is Shaking

I feel that it's important in a good lesson to have areas of concentration and areas of relaxation.  The areas of relaxation in a lesson are so important.  They allow students a chance to move, release some energy and regain focus.  These are sometimes in the form of a singing game, other times in the form of a movement song. 

One of my favorite movement songs to use with my preschoolers and kinders is My Poor Hand is Shaking.  I learned this from Susan Brumfield during my level I Kodály class back in 1999.  It's a tried and true favorite. . . and it's a lot of fun (for both the student and the teacher.  Really, what's cuter then watching those little ones get their wiggles out?!).

2.  My poor elbow. . .
3.  My poor shoulder. . .
4.  My poor hips. . .
5. My poor knees. . .
6.  My poor bottom. . .
7.  My poor head. . .
8.  My whole self. . .

Action:  Children sing the song while shaking one hand, then stopping suddenly at the end (I usually grasp the shaking hand with my other hand, thus "stopping" it.)  After the hand stops shaking, the elbow starts shaking and the song continues.  This repeats through each verse until the very end when their whole bodies are shaking.

Have fun, this one gets the giggles going too! :)

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