Playing instruments is one of the most favorite music classroom activities. Just as you would take time to warm up your voice, these simple traditional songs and patterns give students a chance to warm up their playing skills by investing 5-10 minutes each class period and by focusing on posture, technique and style. By using the Sing-Along Guide, you can easily choose from the 30 warm-ups (in specific keys, chord progressions and/or patterns) which you choose to develop and utilize as accompaniments to the 25 traditional songs (also included). Students who struggle with beat will greatly improve as they begin with simple one-chord patterns where they learn to feel and hear the pulse and gradually progress to adding body percussion, additional parts and then instruments.

traditional Anglo/American and African American singing games for children.

Grade level: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, p, e, i, t.

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A lively collection of musical and non-musical games featuring both old favorites and some newer ones.

"Part songbook, part research text, this work is perfect for families to share together or for young scholars who seek to discover an important piece of cultural history."— School Library Journal, starred review From Newbery Honor winner Patricia C. McKissack and two-time Caldecott Honor winner Brian Pinkney comes an extraordinary must-have collection of classic playtime favorites. This very special book is sure to become a treasured keepsake for African American families and will inspire joy in all who read it. Parents and grandparents will delight in sharing this exuberant book with the children in their lives. Here is a songbook, a storybook, a poetry collection, and much more, all rolled into one. Find a partner for hand claps such as “Eenie, Meenie, Sassafreeny,” or form a circle for games like “Little Sally Walker.” Gather as a family to sing well-loved songs like “Amazing Grace” and “Oh, Freedom,” or to read aloud the poetry of such African American luminaries as Langston Hughes, James Weldon Johnson, and Paul Laurence Dunbar. And snuggle down to enjoy classic stories retold by the author, including Aesop’s fables and tales featuring Br’er Rabbit and Anansi the Spider. "A rich compilation to stand beside Rollins’s Christmas Gif’ and Hamilton’s The People Could Fly." —The Horn Book "An ebullient collection.... There is an undeniable warmth and sense of belonging to these tales." —Kirkus Reviews, Starred

Includes such songs as "Bobby Shaftoe" and "Lavender's Blue," and games such as "The Noble Duke of York" and "Pick a Bale of Cotton."