A Song in a Bag

Nat asked if I ever used props for songs that the kids know, or just when I teach new songs. I got the props together for Popcorn Popping, a song they already know really well so they weren't expecting what I did. It was a big hit! In fact, there was applause, that's never happened before. One of the teachers told my husband I was "the Master". Anyway, doing it at home wasn't nearly as exciting as watching the kids faces while I did this. This was their big reward for learning a song today - I taught "Lift Up Your Voice and Sing".

Little Pioneer Children hunting chips for fuel

Thanks to my fabulous brother Nat, and his clever ideas, i'm making Buffalo chips for singing time. Not real chips of course but something the kids can actually gather. The chips appear in the Little Pioneer Children song and I love to explain to the kids what chips are and how they were used. Finding real ones would be impossibly difficult (and a little gross) so my brother invented a recipe.

Making Buffalo Chips

Make a recipe of salt dough. I then poured it into a big bowl. I added very dried weeds that I had torn into pieces. I also added a few cups of coffee grounds that were donated by Starbucks (apparently all you have to do is ask and you get them free! although they didn't seem super excited that I was using it to make "poo" if I ever go in again i'll just say it's for the garden).

I also added some lentiles and oatmeal and mixed them up. It looks pretty bad in the picture, and smelled like the dried dill and coffee grounds and salt, not very appealing.

I sort of shaped them into nuggets and placed them in the backyard. I figured the sun would pull all the moisture out of them by early afternoon, Nat baked his in the oven.

This is how they looked after a few hours of desert sun (it's about 113 degrees today).

I am going to have the children gather the chips as we sing. I have this great apron that my mom made when I was a little girl and I often pull it out in July for pioneer occasions. It is a small apron that converts to a bonnet using only two buttons. It's perfect to put on the bonnet, talk about pioneers and collecting chips and berries, then take it off, tie the apron on and I have the perfect place to put the chips as the children gather them.

Guess the Song

This week I wanted the kids to guess the song. I made up pictures for the Jr. primary that they could use to guess the song. I backed the pictures with cardstock so the kids couldn't see through to the next picture since they were in a stack. Some were easier than others but it was still really fun. They loved that the Book of Mormon was for Scripture Power and we sang it twice. It worked out perfectly with Sharing time because that was about scripture study, so we sang it again before dismissing for class.

For the Sr. primary I made clues for each song. Things like the scripture reference, who wrote the words/music for the song, and clues about the content or principles. They were a lot more challenging but I was pleased to find that they enjoyed the challenge.

It's July! Time for fun songs!

Okay, I know i'm a little behind. It's been a holiday weekend and even though we didn't go anywhere I have no idea how the time passed so quickly and how so many dishes ended up in the yard. Somehow though, I managed to find the time last week to get the next three months scheduled.
I don't teach songs for the program in the summer, we are in year round school and the kids are in and out all summer long and I just feel like summer is the time for review. Each song for the program is now scheduled to be sung twice a month. This way it stays in their minds and we still have time to sing lots of fun songs during the summer. I have mostly incorporated them into opening and closing songs, but also reverent songs.
The kids had a blast singing the Patriotic Songs again this week and I let them take their booklets home. They asked to sing "It's a Grand Old Flag" three times! I love to sing it so it was wonderful! We also raced Brother C. at Popcorn Popping - he beat me again. Honestly, I just don't know anyone with fingers faster than his.
We had two kids who are moving this week (it's always devastating and I love them dearly) and the President said that we were going to sing a goodbye song to them. I looked at her blankly. Goodbye song? Okay, I do hello, welcome, birthday, baptism, etc., but goodbye? What's a goodbye song I asked? Apparently, it's when you let the child choose their favorite song. I can do that. They chose the Snowman song - naturally because it's July. So what is a goodbye song? Because I still have no idea what I would have picked. Maybe Onward Christian Soldiers? Maybe Nephi's Courage? Home? Sing Your Way Home? Help!

Patriotic Songs

It's almost the 4th of July (almost refers to the fact that there is only one Sunday left before the 4th). I like to sing patriotic songs with the kids. This year I made 30 little quarter page books with songs out of the primary book, the Hymn book and also two personal favorites "You're a Grand Old Flag" and "I Love my Land". There are seven songs, which is about perfect for Senior primary, we'll have time to sing all of them. I also have a few dozen flags that they can wave, although I mostly use these for Jr. Primary. With the younger kids we'll probably only do one or possibly two songs, we'll wave flags and sing "My Flag".

I thought about putting the words to the songs on posters but I do that a lot and the idea of little books just seemed so different. At Christmastime I had them singing out of the Hymn book so I know they can do it, and it's nice not to do the same thing every time.

Recently I have not been able to find the original file, so I have remade the books.  This time they are half-page.  When you are putting them together remember to put the Star Spangled Banner in the center of the book.  It is the only song which takes two sides.  I am trying something new here, a google doc, so hopefully you should be able to access it and print it out.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GD7fro0SOj0S9JXwwG2qgUd-goE5YxUmBjt4qNxHZmo/edit?usp=sharing

It's Fathers Day! It's Fathers Day!

Today I asked Brother Gibson to come in to singing time to help out. Although his wife had him in a fabulous shirt and tie, I had him put on a dollar tie from the D.I. We went through I'll Seek the Lord Early and they sang it, but not really great. So he held up his hand and kind of showed how they sang it about so good, about an inch. They didn't know I was going to cut the tie, so they were surprised when I whipped out the scissors and snipped off the end of the tie. His daughter looked a little upset, so maybe next time I should give some kind of warning. Still the primary kids got the hang of what I was doing and they sang their hearts out. After each song he would show how much he thought it was worth based on how well they sang until we had that tie cut off just below the knot. Then we sent him off to Sunday School with plenty of giggles from the kids. He was kind enough to come back for Sr. Primary with another tie and we did it all over again.

Shannon suggested next year we tell the kids that it's fathers day, and he shouldn't have to wear an ugly tie, so we would sing well so that we can cut that tie off and put on a nice one. Sometimes doing the activity is the best way to learn. So we managed to sing I'll Seek the Lord Early a whole bunch more times today, plus some fathers day songs (by the way they sang like angels in Sacrament Meeting) and then I let them pick fun songs. I shouldn't have been surprised, but about 5 of them asked to sing Book of Mormon Stories while running laps. Not on Sunday. So we did I hope they call me on a mission, Golden Plates, Jesus wants me for a Sunbeam, A Child's Prayer, etc. What a fun Fathers Day, next week: Patriotic songs.

I'll Seek the Lord Early

I taught I'll Seek the Lord Early at the Primary Activity yesterday. I took those Scotch sticky hooks and put them on either side of the room, then I ran a rope across the room about my eye level and hung the pictures from them. It made it really easy to see the visual aids, they weren't wiggling and I could point to them as we went along. The kids picked it up really quickly.

The theme of the activity was Dads. I had fifteen minutes with each group and after we had sung this song a few times, plus some Fathers day songs, I wanted to do some fun activities that we can't do on Sundays. We have two doors in the primary room that lead into the same hall so we did laps jogging and singing Book of Mormon Stories. We sang Follow the Prophet, spinning on "the", and jumping and clapping on "prophet". We did Do as I'm Doing leaping and clapping and moving around. It was a serious workout for me, I did it with all five groups. It was so much fun.