Friday Fun
Music & Movement
Reward Day
Screen Time
Let's get our body moving to some of our favorite songs! If you have musical instruments, today is the day to practice! Been good all week? You have earned 20 minutes of screen time!
Why is Music & Movement Important?
Main Takeaways:
Children are very limited verbally on the emotions and thoughts they can share. It is important to develop proper movement skills so that children can become better communicators where words fail, create spatial awareness, and lead future lives as active movers and shakers.
Music is the perfect tool to draw out this behavior. Children can think with their bodies and react to the rhythm that the music provides becoming more confident in expressing themselves, in some cases, with wordless actions.
There are massive amounts of benefits to music and movement including: reducing stress, building confidence, expressing emotions, developing social & motor skills, exploring cause & effect, improving health, exercise, better memory, creativity & imagination, reinforcing language concepts, learning new words & concepts, awareness of body positions, improving balance & coordination, and refining listening skills (noticing changes in tempo or pitch).
Music & Movement Activities
Try them!
1. The Pretend Big Band
First start by giving your kids the materials to make their own musical instruments or noisemakers. Give them construction paper, empty paper towel rolls, paper plates, rubber bands, etc. Just be creative. Or you can bring in your own toy instruments like kazoos, recorders, and maracas. Next, play the following song and have your kids walk around pretending to be in a band. You can even have a pretend band leader.
2. Musical Chairs
Everybody knows this game. It’s a classic. You set up chairs in a straight line, but every other chair faces the opposite direction. There should be one less chair than the number of kids playing. You start the music and everyone walks around the chairs. You randomly stop the music and the children must find the nearest chair to sit in. The child left standing is out. You remove 1 chair and repeat until there is a winner.
3. Freeze Pop
This is just like Musical Chairs except there are no chairs. You press play and the kids start dancing. As soon as you stop the music, the kids must immediately freeze in whatever pose they are in. If they freeze too late or can’t be still, they are eliminated. Repeat the starting and stopping of music until there is a winner.
4. Copy That Copy Cat
Sit the child in a circle with enough room in the middle for a child to do a dance. Start the background music and have the first kid do a dance move. The next person must do that same dance move and then add a new one. This keeps going starting from the first dance until a kid misses a dance. He or she will be eliminated and the game resets starting from one new dance. This teaches memory along with movement.
5. Rhymin’ Simon Says
For those that don’t know the rules to Simon Says, it’s where one person is designated as Simon (teacher/parent) and the others are the players (kids). Simon tells the players what to do, but the players should only obey if the commands being with the words “Simon Says.” If Simon says, “Simon says tap your right foot on the floor,” then the players must tap their right foot on the floor. If Simon says “clap your hands” without saying “Simon says clap your hands”, the players that clap their hands are out.
Rhymin’ Simon Says is a little different and takes a little talent to be Simon. You start by playing a hip-hop instrumental. Now Simon raps the instructions to the beat of the song. Simon should really get into it so that the children can learn about feeling the beat as well as following instructions.
6. How Would You Dance To This?
You make a playlist of the most random music you can find. Pick all genres even the unpopular ones. You play it, let the kids absorb it for a second and then ask, how would you dance to this? It’s a really fun game and you will get some hilarious interpretations. Be sure to share your playlists in the comments below to assist other parents and teachers.
7. Spin and Stand
This is very simple. When the music is playing, the children must spin in a circle. When the music stops, they must try to stand on one foot without falling. This will also teach balance. Just don’t leave the music playing too long or after meal time. It’s best to play this game outside or in a room with a lot of space.
8. Slow Motion Potion
You need a little bit of technical skills for this, or just a good app like Anytune Pro+. Play the song and have kids dance to it, then slow down the tempo. The children must match the tempo with their dancing. So when the music is slow, they must dance slow. When the music is fast, they must dance fast.
