Listening Skills If we listed all the skills that help learning, careful listening would be right at the top. Listening helps children follow directions; it helps them hear the sounds they will see on the page when they read; it helps them gather information. Like any skills, listening can be improved with practice. Some classroom materials and activities sharpen listening skills. *************************************************************** Songs help children hear and use phonetic sounds, especially songs with nonsense syllables. They also convey information. Have your children listen to a song with a story, then ask them questions about what happened. You may need to play the record again to give children clues. You can put words from the song on an experience paper. *************************************************************** Hap Palmer's records use music to teach basic skills, including the complicated skill of following directions. Children enjoy being able to successfully follow his instructions. They immediately recognize their own ability to listen and do. *************************************************************** MATERIALS NEEDED 1. Flannel board and flannel-backed labels (exercise, elephant (Edgar), experiment, egg, empty, enter, and exit) and elephant puppet 2. Experiment: egg, 2 bowls, salt, 2 cups of water, 1/4 cup of salt, and a spoon 3. Tunnel (small table covered with sheet) and two signs-enter and exit 4. Record. LEARNING BASIC SKILLS THROUGH MUSIC, Volume I "The Elephant" by Hap Palmer Note: As you finish each activity in this lesson, put the flannel-backed label on the flannel board as you say the word. *************************************************************** ATTENTION GETTER Sing or chant while doing various exercises (jump, twist, turn, etc.): "Exercise, exercise Everybody needs to exercise." *************************************************************** Poem:THE ELEPHANT (hold picture of elephant) I'm an elephant, as you can see. I'm big, as big, as big can be My tail is short, my trunk is long. My feet are big and my back is strong. -Lois B. McCue *************************************************************** ACTIVITIES Flannel board, elephant, and experiment. "I'm an elephant and my name is Edgar, and I like to do experiments. I'll show you one with an egg." *************************************************************** Experiment: 1.Put 1 cup of water in each bowl 2.Put 1/4 cup of salt in 1 bowl of water 3.Use spoon and place egg is fresh water 4.Remove egg and place in salt water Results: Egg sinks in fresh water; it floats in salt water. *************************************************************** Let elephant ask questions, such as: "What happened when the egg was in the fresh water? " "What happened when the egg was in the salt water?" "Where can you find fresh water?" "Where can you find salt water?" "Do they look the same?" "Do they taste the same?" "Do you want to taste the water (encourage each child to taste the water) "Do they taste the same?" *************************************************************** Tunnel Elephant talking: "I'm tired of experiments. I want to make a tunnel." (fix the tunnel) "My tunnel is empty. I'm going to enter the tunnel; now it isn't empty. I'm tired and I want to leave. I'm going to exit from the tunnel." Elephant asks questions, such as "What does enter mean?" "What does exit mean?" "What does empty mean?" "Do you want to enter the tunnel and exit the tunnel?" (let each child have a turn) Discuss labels on the tunnel. Let the elephant ask questions. Record. "Let's pretend we are elephants." Demonstrate. Play the record-"The Elephant" by Hap Palmer. Act out. *************************************************************** OPTIONAL FOLLOW-UP ACTIVITIES 1.Elephant Puppet. Materials placed on a special table for children to make their own elephant puppet. This would also have to be demonstrated by the teacher. The children could be encouraged to name their own puppet (Eddie, Ellen, Egbert, etc.) 2.Tunnel. Put the tunnel in the book corner, or some convenient area, where the children can enter and exit in play. 3.Egg Salad. Boil eggs with the children. Children can shell cooled eggs. (This is a good fine motor exercise) 4.Clay. Demonstrate how to mold an elephant. Have it lie down to support its weight. Allow elephant to dry for children to take home. *************************************************************** SPECIAL ACTIVITY: Egg Salad and Crackers For a group of one to three children. Materials: Egg salad (use your favorite recipe), crackers, placemat, plate, knife, pitcher, detergent, dishpan, sponge, bucket. The teacher demonstrates the activity. Have only enough egg salad for three crackers. The label encourages sight reading. The dishes to be washed are the egg salad dish, knife, and plate. The table should be cleaned each time. The towel should be folded. *************************************************************** Ff ideas: Finger Paint bags: put red paint, yellow paint and blue paint into a small ziplock (just a small amount of paint, get all air out, and make sure it is zipped properly)......let children use their fingers ON TOP OF THE BAGS to mix colors (children don't ever actually touch the paint)...when paint is all mixed, use as a writing tablet...children write using their fingers, then erase by rubbing the bag with their flat hand!! Fun fun fun *************************************************************** Filter flowers...fold a round cofee filter in half again and again until you have a small triangle...children dip corners into liquid biocolor or food coloring (or paint on liquid biocolor with a brush), then open. Let dry, then scrunch middle of circle together to form a flower...tie with a green pipe cleaner. *************************************************************** Folded things (I don't know what these are called, but we all made them in second or third grade...we put numbers on them and the flaps open up to reveal boys we liked or number of children we were going to have - do you remember???.....fold a square paper in quarters, open and then fold corners in - so you have a square again with 4 triangle shapes, turn over and do the same thing, then fold in half, and put them on your fingers.......you can open and close it - can anyone else explain this better????) The kids love to use these, and I make them for them (or let them make them if they can) and then they write numbers on the outside, draw picures on the inside, then under the flap write the letter that corresponds with the picture .......you can use addition problems and answers, pictures and words, etc.!!!!!! *************************************************************** Ff snack.....cut a piece of bread into three strips, form into an F and spread with frosting *************************************************************** Finger puppet theater...use a hard, stiff paper plate (like coronet). Cut a slit a little lower than the middle of the plate. Children use the slit to represent the ground level, and then they decorate with markers or paper to make a scene (grass, sun, house, tree, etc.). Use markers to make people out of one or two of the children's fingers, then the children put their fingers through the slit in the paper plate to do a puppet show *************************************************************** Fading pictures....Have children make pictures on dark colored construction paper using white copy paper (cut out shapes and have them tape the copy paper on the construction paper- I show an example using a sun shape, tree, and house) Have the children set the pictures out in the sun for a day or two, then bring them back in....have the children predict what has happened, and then let them take the copy paper off. *************************************************************** Friends *make a 4 page, heart shaped friends mini book ( _____ is my friend, ____ is my friend, _____ is my friend, I like my friends) *Take a picture with a friend, then draw something you like to do with that friend, and write three reasons you like that friend. (Mount all three pieces of this activity together on a large piece of construction paper) *Make a friends memory game...put each child's picture on a card, then each child's name on a card....use these to play a memory game matching pictures to names *************************************************************** Read Four Fur Feet Footprints: Talk about animal footprints and make footprints (I have a great student book to make called "Whose Tracks are These - the pages say something like "the raccoon was her (with raccoon prints), the deer was here (with deer prints), etc. etc., then the last page says, And I was here too (and we put our footprints on the page) *************************************************************** Talk about fossils and dig for fossils (see dinosaur lessons) *************************************************************** Here are a few suggestions to get us started on Ff: Fall - Books What Season Is This? - R. Workman (Wright Group) This is a very simple book and it is good to use with sentence strips in a pocket chart. Easy to do illlustrations by teacher or children. Fresh Fall Leaves - Betsy Franco Apples and Pumpkins - Anne Rockwell Why Do Leaves Change Color? - Betsty Maestro *************************************************************** We make leaf mobiles and hang them from the ceiling in the classroom. I run off construction paper patterns for different leaf shapes in brown, red, orange, and yellow. I also run off a large spiral on tan construction paper. The children cut out the leaves, 4 or 5 each, and cut out the spiral. They staple, glue, or tape the leaves to the spiral. *************************************************************** Frog On A Log from Wright Group comes with a tape and shows the life cycle of the frog. It is a catchy tune that the kids enjoy. *************************************************************** Fire Safety - Books The Fire Station - Robert Munsch Fire! Fire! - Gail Gibbons Fire Fighters - Robert Maas Firehouse Dog - Amy and Richard Hutchins I'm A Firefighter - Mary Packard I'm Going To Be a Fire Fighter - Edith Kunhardt The last four are Scholastic paperbacks. Inexpensive, I got them through SeeSaw Book Club. *************************************************************** Never Play With Matches (tune of Frere Jacques) Never, never play with matches. If you do, if you do, You might burn your fingers, You might burn your fingers, That won't do! That won't do! Never, never play with matches. If you do, if you do, You might burn your clothes, You might burn your clothes, That won't do! That won't do! *************************************************************** Five Green and Speckled Frogs song is a favorite of my K math group. The song counts backwards from 5 each time taking away 1 until there are no frogs left. The children make 5 frog finger puppets to demonstrate song. We also make frog masks and in the front of the class each frog jumps into the pretend pool and splish-splashes. *************************************************************** You can make a log out of a man's brown/black sock. (Put it on your arm) Make frogs out of green pom poms and wobbly eyes. Use velcro on the bottom of the frogs and remove the frogs while singing the song. The kids love this. *************************************************************** Art Activities Finger Painting Have children finger paint things that begin with F, such as fish, flowers, frogs, etc. *************************************************************** Feet Have each child trace and cout out the shape of his or her own feet. Use everyone's feet shapes to make the Big and/or small letter F for a display on the wall. *************************************************************** Movement and Games Feet Have the children explore all the movements of feet, such as walking, running, dancing, hopping, skipping, kicking, tiptoeing. If possible, have them do the activities with bare feet. *************************************************************** Freeze Call out movements for the children to perform, such as Walk, skip, hop, jump, waddle, etc. When you call "Freeze!" they must stop immediately and hold the positions they are in. *************************************************************** Alphabet Appetizer Funny Faces with Fruit Use halved oranges in the peel. Have each child carefully scoop out the insides of the orange, draw a funny face on the outside of the orange shell with a marker and then cut up the scooped out orange into bite-sized pieces and put them back into the shell.. You can add other cut up fruits like bananas, strawberries, pineapple, etc. *************************************************************** Gg **Gumball guessing game - make a big gumball machine (teacher giant size and/or student size) put letters/words/numbers on the gumballs....make a small object or icon that will easily fit under one gumball (we make a tiny gus the ghost). To play, all the children hide their eyes, while one child/teacher hides gus under one of the gumballs. To lift up a gumball to look for gus, the child needs to say the word on the gumball (or identify the number/letter/say a word that begins with that letter/whatever you choose).....whoever finds gus gets to hide him the next time!!!! *************************************************************** **Goofy Glasses (cut out of a file folder and let the kids decorate with feathers, sequins, etc.) *************************************************************** **Grandparents Cards...mail a letter or card to grandparents, Godparents, or good friends (for those who don't have either of the others)....I have my parents send a SASE and we walk to the mailbox around the corner *************************************************************** **Glow in the dark books......I buy glow in the dark fabric paint and we make a little book *************************************************************** Flashlights glow in the dark Lamps glow in the dark Stars glow in the dark and _______ glow in the dark (they get to choose) They color the picture, then I let them paint some glow in the dark paint on the area that glows (hint - don't put the book together until you have "glowed" all the pages) *************************************************************** **Great grahams for snack (graham crackers with pb or applesauce or bananas) *************************************************************** **ghosts - use cheesecloth and glue on a hanger form to make a neat ghost -make a glob of glue and put wiggly eyes in it to make a glue ghost -put a black yarn outline of a ghost on orange paper, cover with a sheet of white tissue....paint on watered down glue - paint around the ghost when dry *************************************************************** guitars - cover a milk carton with paper. cut a rectangular hole on one side. Put about 4 or 5 rubber bands around the carton (from top to bottom). Let the kids decorate and play - if you use different sized rubber bands you get different sounds!! *************************************************************** Art Activities Ghosts On black construction paper have the children paint white ghosts. When the ghosts are dry, ask the children to give their ghost a name that begins with the letter G and tell a goofy story about their ghost. *************************************************************** Globs of Glue Let the children spill small globs of glue onto sheets of waxed paper or acetate. Let the children sprinkle green glitter on their globs and let dry. Have the children peel the globs off the waxed paper and attach a string and hang from light fixtures or in windows. *************************************************************** Movement and Games Galloping Show the children how to gallop by running while keeping one foot extended in front of them. Have them gallop to music and in races. *************************************************************** Get-Ups Show the children how to sit back-to-back in twos, on a mat, with their arms linked together. Ask them to try to get up while holding onto each other. If they are successful, have them call out "G!" *************************************************************** Alphabet Appetizer Serve green grapes. *************************************************************** Hh Art Activities Hands Ask the children to carefully trace one of their hands and cut out the tracing. Have them write their names on the cutouts and keep them to attach to and identify artwork throughout the year. *************************************************************** Miniature Hats Prepare hats for the class to decorate by melting styrofoam cups in a 350 degree oven. Place the cups on a cookie sheet and set them in the oven for 30-60 seconds. (this goes very quick once it starts.) Have the children decorate them by drawing on them with markers and by tying yard or ribbon around them. Hang them from a tree branch for a display during H week. *************************************************************** Movement and Games Hopping a Trail Press down contact-paper foot shapes along a play area. Let the children hop along the trail making the sound of H as they go. *************************************************************** Horseshoes Have the children play a game of horseshoes with plastic horseshoes. *************************************************************** Alphabet Appetizer Happy Hamburgers Provide each child with a small bun or buscut, serve them a cooked hamburger patty and have them place the hamburger on the buns and give it a happy face by decorating with cheese chunks, ketchup and mustard.