Bonus Coloring Pages

With the coloring pages for the instrument book the kids are working on, I've been mainly thinking about introducing them to the instruments in the orchestra.  However, that is not always the case.  There are lots of really neat instruments out there that may not always be in an orchestra, if ever.  The first instruments we learned about were rain sticks and maracas.  We did not do coloring sheets for those, but if you would like to have them, here they are.

Maracas:

http://www.coloring.ws/t.asp?b=m&t=http://www.coloring.ws/countries/mexico/14.gif

Here's a link to a song on youtube that has maracas in it.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yYh3aTCW7nw

Rain Stick:

I will have to make this one and add it later.  Surprisingly enough, there are not really any clip art images of rain sticks online, so I will have to make one.

Coloring Pages

I realize that sometimes it is easy to lose papers your kids bring home from class, and sometimes they may not even make it home from class.  And, for a variety of other reasons, kids' artwork doesn't always have the longest life.  So, for your ease of mind, I am going to try to remember to upload the coloring pages for the instrument books the kids are supposed to be compiling.  That way, if you are missing a page, you can always print off another.

So far, we have only done the guitar and piano.

Here are links to the coloring pages I used for the piano.  We talked about the upright and the grand piano, but the kids colored the picture of the grand piano.  If you, or your kids, are feeling especially motivated, feel free to print off "pianocoloring1," color it, and add it to your musical book as well.

Upright Piano:
http://www.tlsbooks.com/pianocoloring1.pdf

Grand Piano:
http://www.tlsbooks.com/pianocoloring2.pdf

*Update: I have tried to find a way to upload pdfs of the coloring pages I make so you can just download and/or print them right from this blog.  However, I'm working on figuring that out.  The guitar does not print out very large, so perhaps hold off on it for now.  I will update this as soon as I get a chance to work on fixing it.

More Instruments

Sorry I missed posting last week.  Ideally I would like to post every week after class, but alas, it does not always happen.  Anyway, last week we learned about the guitar, and, as a little bonus, the ukulele.  We learned about some of the parts of the guitar: the body, bridge, neck, tuners, and strings.  We talked about how many strings the guitar has--6, although some have more.  The ukulele only has 4.  So quiz your kids on the parts of the guitar and let yourself be thoroughly impressed.  I can't believe how well they remembered today what we learned about guitars last week.

This week we learned about the piano.  We learned that there are black and white keys, and that there are 88 keys on the piano.  We talked about how there are high keys and low keys on the piano and the kids got to try playing them to see what they sound like.  Don't forget to keep your coloring pages the kids bring home so you can make a book of all the musical instruments your kids are learning about.

One last thing.  I introduced the kids to "do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do" today.  I know it's a bit advanced maybe for our age group, but it's something my daughter has enjoyed doing, and she is 3, so I thought I'd give it a shot.  It went surprisingly well.  I encourage you to play the "Do-Re-Mi" song from the "Sound of Music," and let them get used to hearing the sounds.  For now, I would just focus on having them get to the point of being able to shout out "do-re-mi. . ." etc., but eventually they may surprise you by learning even more of the song.  My daughter can sing most of the song when I hold up pictures for each sound.

There are so many fun things to learn and explore in music and we are loving every minute of it in our Merry Music Makers class.  So keep on coming and keep on listening and experiencing music in any way you can!

Halloween

Since Halloween is this month, we have been doing some fun activities with Halloween songs.  You can find a bunch of great Halloween songs for kids in my playlist.  They are the Wee Sing for Halloween songs.  One of the main songs we are working on learning is "5 Little Pumpkins."  You can look it up on the playlist, or you can just practice the words with your kid(s).  Here are the words:

5 little pumpkins sitting on a gate
The first one said, "Oh my, it's getting late."
The second one said, "There are witches in the air!"
The third one said, "But we don't care."
The fourth one said, "Let's run and run and run."
The fifth one said, "I'm ready for some fun."
Wooooo went the wind and out went the light,
and the 5 little pumpkins rolled out of site. (The kids roll over onto the ground here.)

This is a fun little rhyme to practice with your kids this month in honor of Halloween.

We are also starting to learn about different instruments.  Last week we learned about rain sticks and this week we learned about maracas.  Ask your kids about them and see what they remember.  You can also help our exploration of instruments by helping your kids be more aware of different musical instruments when they hear and/or see them.

Here are some fun videos about how to make your own maracas and rain sticks.  Try doing this with your kids so they can begin their own musical instrument collection at home.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUWVfsuSVFc

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=koD1J1nnwOw