All about my life

I love anything that makes students motivated and comfortable to sing by themselves. Being brave to sing alone needs to be celebrated!   Children love stickers and also love when people are proud of them. I thought my students would really appreciate a sticker that celebrates their accomplishment and they could wear it for others to see!  I created a simple template for sticker labels that I will be printing off for my kiddoes. Yay for singing by yourselves! Click HERE  for these free labels!

I was inspired today by Emily over at  Mrs. Q's Music Blog . She created very functional and cute barred instrument labels! Check out her labels! I decided to create my own labels to match the fonts, boarders and colours in my room right now.  I decided to go without colour so that I can just print onto coloured card stock. Click  HERE  to print the FREE labels for yourself!

I was so inspired the other day by my good friend Renee over at  The Reading Corner . She found some really great dollar store finds!  So good, that I decide to take a little trip to Dollarama myself! Here's what I found! 1. Mini Hockey Nets.    My brother was obsessed with mini sticks growing up! I have many students who are also hockey lovers. Wouldn't it be fun to make a hockey target shot game out of these and have rhythms hanging as targets? Oooooo the possibilities! 2. Cd Cases I thought I would adapt my Note Name Battleship game to fit into a CD case! Neato! I was looking for folders for that purpose and found these instead!  3 for $1! Woot woot! I'll try it out and let you guys know what happens :) 3. Stylus Pen  I totally copied Renee on this one! I bought a stylus for my new iPad too! Two bucks baby! 4. Ice Cube Trays! I am most excited about these! Yay! At first glance they just look like ice cube trays, big whoop. But just wait! T...

Have I mentioned that I love summer? I love summer. I love summer.  I LOVE SUMMER!!!!! But seriously, I do.  One of the best things about summer is being able to listen to live music outdoors! Here in Manitoba we have quite the list of outdoor music festivals, with my favourite by far being the  WINNIPEG FOLK FESTIVAL .  There are 8 stages of wonderful music to choose from! I took the entire festival in once again this year, and also camped where it took place, at Bird's Hill Provincial Park. What a great five days of music, dancing, friends, food, and the outdoors. And all of that to enjoy in such a warm, friendly and positive environment.  A beautiful structure that extends above the trees was created this year as a meeting place. I can't wait to share stories back at school and hear which students had a chance to get out to the festival. These conversations always lead to great discussions about local/Canadian artists. I love to create listening act...

I love games and so do my kiddos! During the month of June, I included this fun game in our primary centre rotation. BUSTED! What you need: A container of some sort. I used empty Lysol wipe containers. Coloured tongue dipressers. I got mine from Michaels. A thin permanent marker that you will write rhythms with. Don't forget to include some BUSTED sticks! I did 1/5 eighth notes, 1/5 quarter notes, 1/5 quarter rests, 1/5 half notes, and 1/5 Busted!. I made a nifty label! For the upper elementary ones that I will do next year, I think I'll make a vertical label... Put all of the sticks inside the container, with the rhythm side of each stick at the bottom. And voila! Your game is ready to be played! Click HERE  for the game instructions and HERE  the FREE printable label!

Hello y'all! I am in summer mode- full force! My week has been bike rides, beaches, cocktails, soccer games, visiting, yummy meals, cleaning, and FUN!  And now on to blogging! I always loved the cute signatures I have seen on fellow bloggers' posts and have been jealous. More time in the summer means more time to update and make changes to my blog!  I found a great tutorial by Mrs. Stanford. Check out her amazing teacher blog  HERE . It took me five minutes to create a signature and embed it into my posts! Wohoo! Signing off,

I love doing all sorts of vocal exploration with my kiddoes!  "The Squiggle" by Carole Lexa Schafer is an oldie but a goodie. It's a story of a girl who find a string and creates different shapes and creatures with it.  I read it with the little ones (K or grade 1) and we vocalize the shapes or "draw them with our voice".  After the story, students create their own shapes with a skipping rope or draw them on the board and we try singing their squiggles! Find the book on amazon  HERE  for under $7.00! After presenting the activity this year I also showed 2 videos that reinforce high and low. The videos show excellent visual representation of sound, such as the squiggle activities do. - Steph