Showing posts with label visual. Show all posts
Showing posts with label visual. Show all posts

Monday, July 30, 2018

Using Primary Music in Other Callings


Pioneer Sunbeams sing as they walk.
Confession time: I haven't been a Primary music leader in years. I've forgotten how many years, actually. But Primary music is so much a part of me that I take it wherever I serve, so I don't feel as if I've ever left! I wanted to share with you a few examples of how I've used Primary music to help me in other callings. 

If Primary music isn't your current calling, I hope this gives you some ideas. If Primary music is your current calling (as I expect is the case for most of you!), then please consider whether this post could be useful for your friends and ward members. Then feel free to share the post, so as to fill the world with more music. :)

Seminary


I love using Primary music in seminary! Here is a short list of ways I've had it work well.
  • Take a month and focus on Primary songs for the opening hymn.
  • Ask them their favorite Primary songs, and ask them what gospel truths they've learned from them. See my post on this activity here.
  • Have them write their own verse to Book of Mormon Stories or Follow the Prophet, as a way of sharing which scriptural personalities they connect with. See my post on this activity here
  • Bring in Maori sticks to learn the memorization song for your current book of scripture. (For example, The Books in The Book of Mormon). Sharla has a great post with a video of how to use Maori sticks. It's complex enough that my seminary students loved it!
  • Show a video of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing a Primary song in General Conference. Here is one of my favorites, "He Sent His Son." I have done this numerous times with different songs to help the Spirit testify of a principle we're learning.


Course 12/13 Sunday School


Youth Sunday school might seem like a harder stretch for using Primary music, but remember, the point isn't to make Primary music fit. The point is to help the youth think about the principles, feel how important they are, and then want to live them. Primary music is fantastic for helping accomplish those objectives. Here are some ways I did that with my 12- and 13-year olds.
  • Show a video of the Mormon Tabernacle Choir singing a Primary song in General Conference, as described above.
  • Bring in Primary song books and have the students find a song that teaches the principle you're learning.
  • Write their own verse, as described above.


Sunbeams


Ok, guys, I've been in this calling for one month now, and I have to say, this has got to be the easiest calling for including Primary music! The manual already gives suggestions of songs almost every week, so all I have to do is choose a way to make the songs really engaging. Hint: most of the time the children won't sing with you, but that's okay. :)
  • Sing "Families Can Be Together Forever" while the children put together 4-piece puzzles of pictures of families. (Full post on puzzle pictures here.)
  • Sing "Pioneer Children Sang As They Walked" while the children wear simple costumes and walk around the room. (See the picture above. Aren't my Sunbeams just the cutest?!) Stop and do appropriate actions when the song talks about Sunday activities. 
  • Sing "I Am a Child of God" while using hand scarves.
  • Sing "I Love to See the Temple" while the children put pretzel sticks on the outline of a temple. Bonus: snack time with a purpose! 
  • Or choose another activity with any song the manual suggests. 

I truly love Primary music for the way it helps me feel the Spirit. No matter the age of my students or the setting in which I teach them, I want them to be able to feel the Spirit in every class. Primary music is one way we can help them do just that.


Happy singing!


Thursday, March 8, 2018

"If the Savior Stood Beside Me"-Helping Children Connect with the Meaning Through Actions


I love the song, "If the Savior Stood Beside Me" (find it here). It has a pretty melody, and the words are peaceful and hopeful. I find it challenging, though, to help my Primary learn all the words. This activity helps the children take part in the memorization experience by coming up with actions to represent individual lines of the song. I would only do one verse in a given week, but if the kids show they really like the activity, you could review the following week and then add on the next verse.

Preparation


Learn the song really, really well. Then, think about the size of your Primary. How could you best divide the verse, so that each row or class could be assigned a line or two of the song?


Presentation


Ask the children, with their teachers' help, to come up with an action or two for a line of the song, which you will assign them. Start singing the song, walking by each row and pointing to them when you sing their line. When you finish the song, repeat--again walking by each row and emphasizing their line, so they can hear the words again.  

When each group has had enough time to create an action, ask them to show the whole Primary. Sing just one line, and then copy their action. Sing that one line again, asking the whole Primary to perform the action with you. Repeat for each group, and then put the whole thing together!


Benefits


This activity taps into several different learning styles:

  Movement:  The obvious. They get to do each action.

  Visual:  The children get to see each group perform each action.

  Words:  The children have to listen carefully to the words in order to create their actions. Also, for younger children, having something concrete to represent the lyrics is especially helpful.

  Cooperation:  Each class/row has to work together to choose an action, and then the entire Primary has to work together to fit the actions to the entire song.



Happy singing!


Looking for more?      
The above activity would be great with lots of songs. See my post here, where I used it with "Did Jesus Really Live Again?" 

Sunday, December 17, 2017

Singing Your Way Through the Christmas Story


Let them help with kid-friendly nativity sets
There are more beautiful Christmas songs than we have time to teach in our Primaries. And let's face it, we don't have time during the holidays to think of the perfect way to teach all of those songs, anyway! Here is a super simple idea to get your kiddos some exposure to a song they may not know. Bonus: it takes almost zero prep time. ;)

What You Need


-Several kid-friendly nativity sets with separate pieces (ideally one per class)
-A song that lists several of the figures in the story of Christ's birth. "The Shepherds' Carol", "Picture a Christmas", and "The Nativity Song" all work well.

Modeling the Activity


First, model the activity yourself (or with one of your own children, if that works for you). Have your pianist play just the melody line while you start singing the song by yourself (or some kids can join in if they know the song). When you reach the point in the song where a figure is mentioned, take that piece out of a bag and set it up on a table in the front of the room. For example, here's "Picture a Christmas." Add each piece when the bolded word is reached.

"Picture a stable in Judea. Picture a sacred, silent night.
And can you hear the angels near, and see the star so bright.
Picture a little baby Jesus, think of His life and works so dear..." etc.

Ask if anyone would like to help you this time, and then repeat with a few responsible children in front of the Primary.

Involving the Entire Primary


Ask if anyone else would like a turn, and then go over your rules briefly. Have teachers supervise their classes at stations around the room with tables and nativity sets, and tell the children they have 30 seconds to decide which classmate gets to hold which piece. If there are not enough to go around, tell them you'll repeat it so everyone gets a turn. Then start singing again!


This activity will not fill a whole Singing Time, but that's okay. It gets the children out of their seats, and it gives everyone a turn to participate. 

Happy singing!



Looking for more?          
For some other posts about Christmas ideas, try chimes or a full Singing Time plan with a sampling of Christmas songs.

Friday, June 30, 2017

"The Wise Man & the Foolish Man"--Teaching more than just the hand actions


Pictures can add meaning to this action song.
The song of the month is "The Wise Man & the Foolish Man." We all love it, but isn't it kind of simplistic? And, it doesn't really take a month to teach, does it? This song is great because with the repetition and hand actions, children learn it really quickly. It would be easy to leave it at that. If, however, you take the opportunity to explain a few eternal truths, you can help this simple song really strengthen the faith of your children.

All I really do to teach eternal principles with this song is 1) bring a picture or two and 2) pause and explain. You can do variations for age with junior, senior, and even nursery. Actually, I love bringing this explanation and song into nursery the same month the older siblings learn it, as it's a great way to encourage gospel learning as a family.

Bring in a picture or two


Kids love stories. (And so do I!) You can tell the children that today, you'll be telling them a story, but you aren't the one who told it first. Who did? Show them a picture of the Savior teaching, and let them fill in that blank. (In the picture above, I used The Sermon on the Mount by Carl Heinrich Bloch, found in the Gospel Art Book on p. 39.) For nursery, you may want one picture for each child to hold.

After you sing the song through, you could show a picture of crashing waves and rocks, or a rainstorm by a house. (In the picture above, I used a photo from the inside cover of the July 2015 Ensign magazine, but you could find or draw your own.) Some children learn best through visually connecting with what they're hearing.

Pause and explain


Then you could ask, "Why does Jesus care where we build our houses?" Keeping in mind the age group you're teaching, you can help them understand that the song is a symbol for what Jesus really wants for us. He wants us to be strong when there are hard times, just like the house can be strong when there are hard storms. 

Sing the song again, and then older children may enjoy thinking of what the storms, sand, and rock represent spiritually. In this way, they can connect at their level with a song we usually categorize as being for younger children.



Happy singing!


Looking for more?  For an explanation of these symbols:        , visit my page on the 8 learning styles.

Sunday, April 30, 2017

4 Good Ways to Recognize Bad Ideas--a Guest Post


I'm pleased to have a guest post today by Bryce, a long-time Primary music observer (and my husband). I love how he shares his perspective. He just says it like it is!   -Michelle



Repeat after me--being on Pinterest does not make it credible.
Bad ideas are everywhere.  They saturate the news, Facebook feeds, your kids’ every action, and even lurk in the dark recesses of your own mind.  Some are easy to spot, like mixing household chemicals into explosives that produce lethal chlorine gas without proper ventilation in the room.  Others are a little subtler, like choosing a primary music activity set that doesn’t teach or engage the kids in your primary.  So how do you spot these bad ideas?  I’m not a professional, but I’ve sat in enough singing times to recognize a few trends:



1.      Does the activity support only one learning style (or none at all)?

Sharla Dance, our go-to expert on all things music teaching, classified childhood learning as fitting into eight basic styles: physical action, words, visuals, nature (whatever that means), spiritual, logic, cooperation & teamwork, and… wait for it… music. Check out her blog here.

Each child in your primary class benefits from one or more of these styles.  Because every star is different and so is every child (I dare you to read that without singing it in your head), you’ll need to include multiple learning styles within each activity.  I recognize that there’s a school of thought that it’s okay to address only one learning style per activity, so long as you have multiple styles in the overall music time. Those people are wrong.  That’s just how it is.

The prime example of a bad idea—one of the worst ideas you could possibly do—is to simply draw names from a hat and make the kids sing it. (This includes derivatives like flipping over pictures on a chalkboard and singing the song underneath.)

The problem here is that this engages none of the learning styles.  For example, there’s either no visual reference or the pictures are too small to be seen from the back of the room. Having one kid from the primary come up to draw a song leaves everyone else sitting still, so there’s no motion element. The word learners aren’t given any associations or interesting connections to make in order to internalize the lyrics. Even worse, blindly flipping cards or drawing songs replaces logical progression with chaos, making the whole experience deeply uncomfortable for logic learners.

Some people learn best through natural processes--like natural selection.
Always focus on teaching kids the way they need to learn—not based on the first Pinterest board you find on Saturday night.  No matter how cute the board or bucket for the activity may be decorated, do not be deceived, those people are trying to lead both you and the kids you teach down to hell.

Let me repeat: If you structure singing time around drawing songs from a hat, you should be darned to heck (because let’s face it, actual hell might be a little extreme).

2.      Does the idea offer variety?

Anyone who’s ever had kids knows they have short attention spans. However, those with older kids or whose children are freakishly patient may have forgotten just how short this attention span really is.  I’ve seen goldfish with longer attention spans than my own children’s.  So unless you’re practicing some sort of witchcraft or hypnosis to keep them riveted, you will need to switch activities several times.

Along those lines, be very sure to mix up which learning styles you’re using each time.  You could involve four learning styles in every activity, but if you never engage the kids who really need to learn through logic, then you’re a horrible person (albeit not as horrible as the ‘hat’ people) and it will be all your fault when the child apostatizes later on.

When switching activities, keep focused on your core learning.  People seem to default to a singing random wiggle song, followed by an unrelated main activity.  Instead, try choosing what you want the kids to learn that week and structure several short activities around the theme to engage them from a variety of learning styles.

Yes, teaching this way takes more effort and planning, but that’s just part of the cost of magnifying your calling.  If you think that load is too heavy, remember that you could have been called as Primary President.

3.      Is the activity exactly the same for both junior and senior primary?

While the trunky 11 year-olds in senior primary may have the same attention span as a new sunbeam, their actual needs couldn’t be more different.  If the activity you come across online is identical for both junior and senior primary, leave a nasty troll-ish comment and move on.

In one ward, I saw a very well-intentioned music teacher try to engage the junior primary by sitting them in a circle and having them do a complex wood-block clicking pattern, complete with passing the blocks left and right as part of the pattern.  Half the kids didn’t want to share their blocks (surprise there), and the other half couldn’t figure out which way was left.  In this music leader’s defense, she really is fantastic but was just having an off day.

4.      Does the idea support on-the-fly adaptation?

There’s an old saying from some philosopher guy with a Latin-sounding name that goes “It is a bad plan that admits no modification”. If this ‘fantastic’ idea you found on the internet doesn’t allow you to adapt on-the-fly, then it’s probably a bad idea.  If the kids aren’t responding well to the activity, then adapt your lesson immediately.

The hapless music leader in the previous example responded quickly to the kids and adapted her wood-block patterns to their skill level, shortened the activity, and then moved on to the next one that engaged a different learning style.  Nice recovery!


Here’s what a good example looks like:


Let’s say that I need to help junior primary children learn the lyrics to Book of Mormon Stories.  Most of them can’t read, sit still, or focus on anything for more than a minute at a time. Challenge accepted.

My first thought is to use Pinterest.  Then I think better of it.  I hate Pinterest. A lot.  Instead, by expending a little mental effort, I come up with a plan that involves…

1.       Multiple learning styles: I decide to use a visual to help create a memory trigger for the lyrics and engage visual learners.  However, just slapping some laminated pictures on the board only engages the visual learners (assuming they can even see it from the sides or back of the room). I need to get the visuals to the kids. So I prepare bookmarks with a picture of the story on one side and a key phrase from the verse on the other.  One learning style, though, isn’t enough, so I add elements:

If you don't learn to recognize bad ideas, you
may not be able to recognize good ones either.

I engage the motion learners by getting them out of their chairs for the whole singing time.  As I sing the verse a capella to the kids, each class sits cross-legged in a small circle.  Their teacher will have a Book of Mormon with a picture bookmark inside for each child.  The kids take turns leafing through the Book of Mormon to the page with the pictures inserted.  When they find it, they can take one to keep in their own scriptures.

The collaborative learners can be engaged by helping their classmates recognize the words printed on the back of the bookmark—a key phrase for the verse.  If we’re working on the Alma verse, my key phrase would be “Alma was rebellious, and he fought against the light”. As they learn from their peers and teacher, they can join in singing that phrase with me each time I repeat the song.  The word learners are also engaged by having a specific phrase that connects their scriptures, bookmarks, and the verse of the song.

While all this is going on, I continue singing the verse on ‘loop track’.  To keep the interest of the music learners, I can alternate between singing the full verse, whistling softly, and omitting words to keep things changing enough that it doesn’t fade to the background.


2.       Variety: As kids get their bookmarks, I keep them engaged by giving them new directions.  If we’re doing the Alma verse, I use it like a wiggle song.  When I sing “fought against the right”, I have the kids stand up and throw a couple punches into the air—specifically where another child is NOT standing.  When I sing “an angel came”, they stand imperiously, and stretch out their hand as though speaking emphatically.  When I sing “struck before his brethren”, I instruct the kids to collapse to the ground, as though unconscious.  This will get a bit loud as they moan and wail dramatically.  Remember: the noise is part of the kids getting invested in the activity; it’s okay.

Notice that I just transitioned activities here but never had to announce it.  They blended together and kept the kids focused on the song they need to learn.

3.    Different for junior and senior primary: I’ve focused my plan here on junior primary, but were I to adapt this for senior primary, I would get them out of their chairs to come and get the bookmarks first.  Their next task would be to find the place in their scriptures where the bookmark should be placed. (With some guidance, of course.)

As they looked up the scriptures, I would also get the kids to alternate whistling along when I sing and then sing words as I either leave blanks or start whistling.

And yes—they still get the death scenes.  I’m pretty sure the eleven year-olds will even pantomime burning one of their own at the stake.

3.       Adaptability: This can easily be rearranged and tweaked to fit the kids’ needs.  For instance, we can start with the pantomiming activity and then migrate down to sit in circles.  We could even skip finding the bookmark in the scriptures portion and hand them out, asking the kids to tell their class something they know about Abinadi as I hum or sing in the background.  As they get their bookmarks, I could even have the pianist play the verse in the background while I dramatically summarize the story of Abinadi for them.  The possibilities are nearly endless.


And I didn’t draw a song name from a hat.  Not even once!

-Bryce



Looking for more?          
Check out a description of each of the 8 learning styles mentioned above.