Oh Where, Oh Where Has My Little Dog Gone?

This book elaborates on a simple and favorite childhood song. The dog's owner scolds him and the dog runs away. He goes on a grand adventure and decides that home is the best place for him. Adoring, cute and a lot of fun to sing!

Old MacDonald Had a Farm

An oldie, but goodie! This is a great one to start with when a group of kids is just getting comfortable with you. They all know the song, and want to participate with the familiar. But let's face it...this song gets a little boring, right?  Here are a few ideas to make the song more interesting for all:

1. Bring a bag full of Little People farm animals. The kids can take turns pulling animals out of the bag. If kids are too shy to come up to take an animal out I usually bring it around to them. It gets them warmed up to the idea of interacting with me.

2. Change the wording a little to say "Old MacDonald had a band. E-I-E-I-O! And in that band he had a horse. E-I-E-I-O! With a clop-clop here..." Pull out the musical instruments and let the kids accompany the song. Here are ideas for farm animal noises:
Horse...with a clop, clop (Use a wooden block with a stick, or two sticks together)
Cow...with a cling, clang (Use a cow bell or a triangle)
Cat...with a scritch, scratch (Use wooden blocks covered with sand paper)
Snake...with a shake, shake (Use an egg shaker or maraca)
Bird...with a tweet, tweet (Use a recorder or other high pitched instrument)
End with "and in that band EVERYONE played, E-I-E-I-O" and then go through all the noises you've played thus far (with a clop, clop here and a clop, clop there; a cling, clang here and a cling, clang there, a scritch, scratch here...)

3. Gather as many farm animal hand puppets as you can and let the kids BE the animals.

There are lots of fun things you can do with this song. It lends itself well to after-song-time crafts, too.  Be creative and let me know what YOU do with this song!

Animal Week (Again!): I Went to Visit a Farm One Day

The number of verses to this song is limited only to the number of farm animals the kids can think of! I love two things about this song: Kids are eager to suggest animals and to tell you what the animals say, which gets them creating their own verses, and the kids sing the animal noises back to you, which gets them started on solo singing. I usually have them sing the proper pitches for the animal sounds (they're MUSICAL animals!), and the kids then begin to learn pitch memory. Here are the lyrics for the first verse:

I went to visit a farm one day,
I saw a cow along the way.
And what do you think that cow did say?
MOO, MOO, MOO. MOO, MOO, MOO!

There are many YouTube videos where you can hear the melody of this song, and see verses that others have come up with. This is the one I see most referenced: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BeO3WxV35GE.

Often I will bring in pictures of farm animals, and if the kids get stumped but really want to be involved, I have them pick a picture. You could also bring in animal puppets and have them pick one out of a bag to sing along. There are a lot of fun things you can do with this song!

We're Going to the Zoo

I love this song! You can use it as a music and movement song before you share this book. Have the kids think of different animals at the zoo and what the animals might be doing. Make up your own lyrics for the animals they think of, and have them act out what the animals do. You can also have them act the song while you sing the book. The illustrations in this book are great! The illustrator captures the joy of going to the zoo and does a great job showing the animals acting their parts. This book promises to be fun for you and the kids in your life!

If I Were a Bird

Ann Moyle was the music and movement teacher at our local library before and after I did my 2 year stint there. She is AMAZING and created many of her own songs. This is one of her songs and I got permission from her to share it. I love the different take she has on this animal song. Instead of singing about the noises each animal makes, this song focuses on the movements they make. Here are the lyrics:

If I were a bird, if I were a bird,
I'd fly and fly and fly all day if I were a bird.

If I were a fish, if I were a fish,
I'd swim and swim and swim all day if I were a fish.

Here's the vocal audio file:


The kids love coming up with all sorts of animals and deciding what their movement should be. And of course, this is the kind of song we act out as we sing it! (Please respect her copyright on this. She would love for you to use it for your non-monetary experiences).

Animal Week!

We just celebrated two birthdays in our family. Both kids wanted a Wild Kratts party. We are so fortunate to live near a Wild Animal Rescue and Education center and they came and entertained our kids and their friends with fun animals like a Chinchilla, a fox, and Macaw, and many more. We had so much fun and I thought I'd continue the fun with songs about animals this week. One of the absolute favorites for ANY class I teach is Row, Row, Row Your Boat.

What in the world does Row Your Boat have to do with animals, you may ask! Well, I have taken ideas I've found on preschool websites, added a couple of verses of my own, and transformed this song into one of the funnest ever! Here are the verses (sung to the traditional tune):

Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream.
Merrily, merrily, merrily, merrily, life is but a dream.

Row, row, row your boat gently down the stream.
If you see a dinosaur, don't forget to scream! (Have them scream)

Row, row, row your boat gently to the shore,
If you see a lion (tiger), don't forget to roar!

Row, row, row your boat gently to the bay.
If you see a turtle, let's all shout hooray!

Rock, rock, rock your boat, gently to and fro.
Wibbly, wobbly, wibbly, wobbly, OVER the side you go!!


Before the first verse, have the kids grab a partner and sit on the ground facing their partner. Have them match their feet up (soles against soles), grab hands, and move front and back in a rowing motion as they sing this song. On the second verse (still rowing), have them think of animals that might make them frightened; on the third verse, animals that roar; on the forth verse, animals that they would be happy to see. On the fifth verse, change from rowing to rocking from side to side. When you say the word "OVER" have them tip all the way to one side and spill onto the floor, just as though they tipped out of their boat. This song is useful in many ways. It gets them feeling the rhythm of the song as they row, they get to create lyrics by suggesting animals to sing about, and they improve social ties as they work with a partner. Admittedly, this song takes awhile because so many of them want to suggest lyrics and the last verse almost always has to be done two or three times! I hope you all enjoy this favorite as much as I do!

A-Hunting We Will Go!

This book is great for winter! The two main characters are children, all warm in their jammies and getting ready for bed. While they are getting ready, they imagine all sorts of fun scenarios with their stuffed animals as they gather them together for bedtime. Each page is rich with many things to look at and so much going on that you could spend a long time pointing out all the fun things to your kids.

I Have a Little Snowman

This is a song that the youngest kids love! It allows them to act out the building of a snowman and is silly at the end, so it creates a lot of giggles, which I love! You could do this with older kids and teach them Solfege (Do-Re-Mi) in the process. It starts on Do and ascends the scale slowly. At the end, it quickly goes back down the scale and it's fabulous practice for getting their Solfege hands signs straight. Here is a youtube video that shows the hands signs for the Solfege scale if you would like to learn them: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s_pq9s9USmI . Here are the lyrics to this song along with the solfege symbols that correlate:


I have a little snowman. He is so fat and round.
Do                                            Re
I made him from a snowball I rolled upon the ground.
  Mi                                               Fa
I gave him eyes, a nose, a mouth, a nice warm scarf of red.
  Sol                                                         La
I put some buttons on his coat and a hat upon his head.
  Ti                                                             Do
Slowly, slowly melts the snowman!
Do Ti  La Sol Fa    Mi Re   Do

Play this audio file to hear how the song goes:


For the younger kids, here are the actions for the song: Start kneeling on the ground and form into a little ball. For each step up the scale get a little taller until finally at the end you are standing up straight with your arms in the sky for greater height. On the last line, melt from your highest height back down into the tiny ball you started with. Do this several times and experiment with tempos (fast and slow). I hope you have fun with this song!

Return from an extended Holiday...

Hey everyone! I am finally back and ready to go again. We got uber sick over the holidays and I am just barely recovering from a bout with pneumonia. The second round of antibiotics finally did the trick. I am so happy to be feeling well again! I thought I'd do some Winter songs for a couple of weeks in January. One of my favorite Winter songs is What Shall We Do When We All Go Out. There's a book by the same title that is out of print, but you can probably find it at your local library, eBay or Amazon. It features all summer things, and I took it and had the kids help me change the words. Here are the lyrics:

What shall we do when we all go out, all go out, all go out?
What shall we do when we all go out, when we all go out to play?

We will build a snowman, a snowman, a snowman.
We will build a snowman when we all go out to play
(We will sled downhill, We will build an igloo, we will all throw snowballs, etc.)

I have the kids act out the words they are saying and it's a great song not only for creating their own music, but getting some movement going. Here's a vocal audio file for the song: