Food Rhythms

Someone somewhere posted this great guide that uses food to teach rhythms, I don't know where it originated from, but I love it!

I was thinking that sometime this summer I will pull it out to have a "Rhythm Picnic". I think I will put down a checkered tablecloth and a small basket or make a basket poster that I can make a slit in and reach into. Something like this:

Inside the basket, whether real or paper, will be these fruits (cut apart from the chart) to draw out and practice their rhythm. I think the kids will enjoy doing something different.

Oh What Do You Do In The Summertime?

This last summer I was called as Primary Chorister again! I was so excited!! Best calling in the church! Since then, I've been taking pictures of things to share but never took the time to post them! I need to learn how to do it from my phone. I remembered another chorister using these posters for the song "Oh What Do You Do in the Summertime" years ago and loved them. When I was chorister last time, I just gathered some props for them to use. This time I was determined to make my own. I borrowed this set and got to work. I changed a couple of them and got my set all drawn and my kids were helping me color them. Somehow before finishing the last couple of posters, we ran out of steam and I never finished them! I will for next summer and I will post them but in the meantime, I thought you might enjoy seeing the posters that inspired me. They LOVE using these posters and we especially get a lot of giggles when a boy is one of the girls, so funny!

Update: I finally finished the posters last summer (they took FOREVER!!) and loved using them! Here are my versions:

Campfire

I love this little campfire someone made for the kids for Pioneer Day!  They turned off the lights and sat around the campfire to sing.

The campfire was made out of flickering LED candles and tissue paper.

Another option is to purchase a campfire cut out. I like this option because it folds flat and doesn't take a lot of room in my bin.

Here's one that I found on Amazon:

Pioneer Songs

Today we had a really fun day singing Pioneer songs.  I put the names of the songs on the back of Pioneer cutouts from the churches old figure sets, any Pioneer figures would do, I used the family members (dad, mom, older boy, older girl, young boy, young girl), a covered wagon (The Oxcart) and a scenic one (Westward, Ho!).  I told the children that I had brought some Pioneers with me that wanted to hear some songs about them.  For each song, I called a volunteer to come up and pick one, if it was a person, I pretended like the person "whispered" to me what song they wanted to hear and then we sang it. 

To help keep the songs fun we added some fun ways to sing them.

Little Pioneer Children - Jr. Primary - I had them gather berries, gather "chips", hear, see etc.,
Pioneer Children Sang As They Walked -  It's a given on this one, we "walked and walked and walked" through the rows of chairs.
Update: I have since copied this idea that someone made and I have a child hold each part of the song.

The Handcart - Jr. Primary - I had them stand and push or pull whenever they heard the words.
The Oxcart - We sang really slow and had the teachers do a fun idea I read on The Ordinary Adventures of a Primary Chorister, they were oxen and mooed while we sang, it was so funny!  The kids loved it.  It actually sounded pretty cool!
To Be A Pioneer -  It's such a fun song to split and sing against each other.  It's our favorite!
Westward, Ho! - I made two signs that say "Westward, Ho" on them.  I split the singers into two groups and have two volunteers hold the signs up when it's their groups turn.  It helps the song move along.

(We sang Pioneer Children Were Quick To Obey in Sacrament Meeting, so I didn't use it in Singing Time - See flipchart.  I haven't learned Covered Wagons yet, maybe next year.)

Update: Last year I tried something that I will be repeating this year. I wore a blouse, long skirt and a pioneer bonnet. We sat in a circle around a fake fire to do our singing. (see post on Campfire) The kids really enjoyed it!

Pioneer Children Were Quick To Obey

Our Primary children are singing this in Sacrament Meeting today.  I could only find one partial flipchart besides one that you have to pay to subscribe to the site.  So I made my own and here it is.