Thanksgiving Sing a Story

I found this on Camille's Primary Ideas (she has a lot of great ones!) and I really love it and want to keep it for future reference. It's a story book where the children sing Primary songs to go with each piece of the story of the first Thanksgiving. Really clever. Here's the link to her page: http://www.camillesprimaryideas.com/2012/11/thanksgiving-sing-story.html?m=1

Stuffed Turkey

This is one I REALLY wanted to do this year, but I was super short on time to teach Christmas songs before the ward party, so I didn't. Next year though! I also found this online and have no idea who to credit, but it's a very fun idea. Basically, you make a turkey body out of a paper bag and the legs out of smaller paper bags. You "stuff" the inside with slips of paper of songs you want to sing (you could also put ways to sing them).

Pumpkin Patch

I did this activity for picking a song this past fall. It was super easy! I placed stickers with the numbers 1-5 on the bottom of some decorative pumpkins (you could use mini real one too, or hey large ones too! ha ha!) I placed them on a sprig of fake greenery and voila! Pumpkin Patch! Then as they picked one, I just looked on my list to see which song corresponded with the number. You could also write the actual song on the sticker or on some tape.

I'm All Made of Hinges

I saw this idea on the FB page for Primary Choristers and LOVED it. The kids did too! I was able to use it for both Jr. and Sr. Primary and Nursery! Win-win-win! I told the children that we had a special guest that day, "Bro. Bones". I had him "dance" for them and then put him in a funny position that we all mimicked as we sang, then I changed it to another funny position and we'd sing again. It was really fun. The first picture is the one I saw on FB, the second is my adaption. Super easy to make with a stack of small ribbed paper plates, brads, glue and a marker. I just printed the words in sections, cut them and glued them on.

Song Chooser Visitor

One thing that works really well in choosing songs (especially in Nursery) is to invite a "visitor" for singing time.  When I first started working in Nursery it was wintertime, so I invited a stuffed snowman similar to this one to choose our songs:

Sometimes I would do a voice for him and have him talk directly to the children, other times I have him whisper in my ear.  The little kids LOVED it!  I have penguin one for winter too.

You could adapt this for any season. I brought a Leprachaun for March and a bunny for spring.
I went to the local $ store and purchased a few puppets a ladybug, a bee, a frog etc. for summer (although I haven't used them yet because we have our Primary Chorister coming in now.)

You could easily find a scarecrow or pumkin or something for fall.  Really fun!