Tag Archives: Music

Songs for Music Time (birth to age 5)

1 Reply

Whether you’re a librarian planning story time, a preschool teacher looking for new songs or a parent of a toddler who is tired of the same five songs, here are resources for learning new children’s songs.

The very best resources I know of are:

  • Tell Me a Story from the King County Library System – searchable collection of hundreds of videos of children’s librarians singing songs and showing the motions
  • Jbrary – two children’s librarians (Lindsey Krabbenhoft and Dana Horrocks) have created a huge collection of videos of children’s songs (with motions) and also have lists of favorite books, ideas for storytime, etc.
  • Sing with Our Kids, where Nancy Stewart has created a song library which includes lyrics and .mp3 audio recordings of lots of great traditional kid songs, and a collection of “Books that Sing” – picture books that you can sing aloud.
  • Jocelyn Manzanarez’s Circle Time Success on Instagram

And here are resources I have created that you are welcome to use:

And here’s why music time matters: How Music Benefits Early Learning.

Photo by Jelleke Vanooteghem on Unsplash

Circle Time for Toddlers

1 Reply

music-play-youth-musical-instrument-children-sports-sound-music-group-human-positions-music-garden-995658

I teach a parent-child class where the toddlers are 12 – 30 months in September. Each week, we do a circle time for music and stories. I tell the parents that not only does music have many benefits for children’s learning, and not only do rhymes and songs help teach language skills, circle time is also a chance for children to begin to practice key skills for kindergarten readiness: the ability to sit still, to listen to a teacher, to notice and do what the other people around them are doing, and to stop doing something when asked. (We do the shaker song every week, “oh you shake and you shake and you shake and you stop” and I talk about how huge this is for practicing impulse control.) My secret agenda is that teaching parents things to do with their children builds connections. Plus, of course, circle time is fun!

At the beginning of the year, I make sure parents know that their children will not yet be good at sitting still and paying attention for the full circle time, but the more we practice, and the more we model that behavior for them and encourage them to try, the better they’ll get. At the beginning of the year, circle time is about 10 minutes long. By the end of the year, it’s 20 – 25 minutes.

I always go in the same order each time, just adding more pieces to each segment as we go along. That way the children learn the ritual, and are better able to participate because they can predict what will happen next.

  1. Greeting Songs – each week we do the “I roll the ball to [name] song” and one other greeting song which uses the child’s name and gives each child a moment in the spotlight.
  2. Lap Songs – when we bounce children in a rhythm, it helps to instill rhythm in them at a fundamental level. It also helps to build their vestibular system. These songs are also super fun, and get lots of giggles going.
  3. Finger Rhymes – these teach a lot of vocabulary, and also teach children to notice patterns… “after dad says ‘with a one step and a two step’, he’s going to tickle me.”
  4. “Theme Activity” – I always have some small toys, puzzle pieces, or decor items tied into the theme gathered in my red gift bag. We sing “what’s in the red bag, the red bag, the red bag…” song. The kids come running over to find out. I give each one an item to take back to their parent – they talk about it together, then we do a few rhymes or songs that are related, then they bring them back to me.
  5. Book (we start these about halfway through the year)
  6. Shakers – we do the shake and stop song, sometimes some other songs, sometimes we turn on recorded music and dance and shake to the music.
  7. Active Songs, with or without parachute. Moving around the room in rhythm to the music is great at building coordination, rhythm, and large muscle skills.

I’ve gathered the ideas for my circle time rhymes and songs from many great sources. I have lots of favorite songs (here are links to lyrics and to videos showing hand motions). I have some favorite toddler books I share.

I have a full year’s worth of circle time plans for my toddler class – it’s organized by theme, and we do each set of songs for about 4 – 6 weeks. Themes include: fall, winter, spring, farm, zoo, stars, transportation, ducks, and beach.

For my science class for 3 – 6 year olds, we do two completely different circle times each week – opening circle teaches a rhythm activity, a discussion of the day’s topic, and a non-fiction book. Closing circle teaches a song, we read a fun imaginative fiction book related to the day’s theme, and we often do a group game to reinforce the day’s learning. You can find about 35 topics worth of circle time plans at www.InventorsOfTomorrow.com.

Do you have any great tips for how to help circle time go well, any favorite songs, or favorite resources for finding more ideas?

Great New Resource for Kids Songs

1 Reply

Let’s Play Music is a phenomenal resource!
http://www.letsplaykidsmusic.com/free-kids-songs-directory/

The site is developed by Sara Mullett, who has 15 years of experience teaching kid’s music classes. There are over 150 songs on the site, and for each, she includes lyrics, sheet music, videos of her playing the tune on a xylophone, circle time ideas including puppets, movement games, etc.

You can also follow her page on Facebook at www.facebook.com/personalisedlullaby, where she shares her own posts and also puts links to other helpful resources on the web.

For my other favorite resources for kids songs, look here, and for links to lyrics for, and videos of, my favorite kids songs, look here.

Great Resources for Songs for Kids

7 Replies

Each week in my class, we have a circle time where we sing lots of great songs that toddlers love. Here is my lesson plan for a full year’s worth of Circle Time for Toddlers.

Circle time is a lot of fun for the children in the room and for the parents, but beyond that, singing songs with your children helps your child to learn in many ways, and enhances your connections as a family. Singing builds:

  • Musical skills
  • Mathematical and spatial skills
  • Vocabulary
  • Memory
  • Connections to traditions
  • Emotional Intelligence
  • Attachment

Learn more about music and development.

Here are a few of my favorite resources for kids’ songs:

King County Library has videos of librarians singing LOTS (hundreds!) of classic children’s rhymes: http://kcls.org/content/. If you’re trying to remember any childhood song, this is a great place to look! They include versions in multiple world languages (e.g. Russian, Urdu, Spanish, Vietnamese…)

Jbrary is a YouTube channel featuring two children’s librarians singing songs and finger rhymes from library story times: www.youtube.com/user/Jbrary/videos.

Nancy Stewart has lyrics and audio recordings (.mp3) of lots of traditional songs, including “songs every child should know” and campfire songs: http://singwithourkids.com/song-library.htm. She also recommends books which include songs, or have rhythmic text that can be sung, to reinforce music and early literacy skills: http://singwithourkids.com/bookshelf.htm.

Nancy Kopman has lots of great songs for toddler classes and preschools.  https://nancykopman.com/learning-centre/#parents

Let’s Play Music was developed by Sara Mullett. It includes over 150 songs – each has lyrics, sheet music, a video of the tune being played on a xylophone, and activities / motions to go along with the song. http://www.letsplaykidsmusic.com

Math Songs: https://familymath.stanford.edu/activities/singing-together/

Music Connections offers some great posts on teaching rhythm and a steady beat to kids age birth to five: A Parent’s Guide to Beats and Rhythms, Developmental Progression of Steady Beat, and “Catching” a Steady Beat with Very Young Children.  This includes tips like: help your child experience steady beats by singing with them, dancing with them, or tapping on their knees in rhythm. When they’re doing repetitive movements, like tapping on something, sing or dance along in a steady rhythm that’s similar t o their rhythm. Have them walk or march to a beat.

Bounces, Lifts, Tickles and Rhymes for Baby. A nice collection from Storytime Shenanigans.

YouTube has a huge collection of animated videos featuring traditional and new children’s songs, in a wide range of languages. For example, if you look for alphabet songs, not only would you find countless versions of the traditional alphabet song, you’d find many variations in melody (like ABC Rap), plus many elaborate alphabet songs (Animal Alphabet, Alexander Alligator, etc.), you can even find several different songs each dedicated to a single letter of the alphabet. (Even Q has 8 or more songs!)

I prefer the other resources to YouTube personally, because many of the things on YouTube are so over-produced – too much visual stimulation, overly ornamented music, and sometimes just a frenetic cheerfulness (a la Barney) that can wear on me.

As with everything on YouTube, the quality ranges tremendously, and there are some that are frankly inappropriate for children; however, it’s worth searching through and finding some of the great ones and setting up your own playlist. I will includes links to some good ones on my “favorite songs” page. Most kids love watching the videos along with the song, but if you’d rather not expose your child to videos, you can easily find a free program online which will allow you to convert videos into .mp3 audio files. (I use YTD Video downloader)

More Music Resources

On this site, you can also find:

Rhymes and Songs from Circle Time

Leave a reply

Here are some rhymes and songs we’ve done in class in the past few weeks:

Ring Around the Rosie. lyrics and motions

Humpty Dumpty. words and variations; video

Round and Round the Garden (rhyme) words and motions – we use variation 3

A welcome song: “I roll the ball to _____, s/he rolls it back to me.”

Are You Hiding? Done to the tune of Frere Jacques: “Are you hiding? Are you hiding? Yes I am. Yes I am. Now it’s time to come out, now it’s time to come out. Peek-a-boo! Peek-a-boo!”

And the peekaboo puppet song, also to Frere Jacque: “Someone is hiding, someone is hiding, who can it be? Who can it be? Now it’s time to come out….”

Check out lots more rhymes and songs here. And learn about the benefits of singing with your child here.