Tuesday Book Club Linky Party- John Lithgow Books!

Welcome to the Tuesday Book Club!  I will be posting the 2nd Tuesday of every month  with a favorite Story book to read or sing.   (... I know it's Wednesday...- my internet at home was really spotty last night due to a storm). There are so many great books out there that students (and teachers) love! If you are a blogger feel free to link up and share your favorite book to read/ sing to your students by following the directions at the end of the post. The linky party will always be open until the end of the month.

This month I decided to focus on some of my Favorite John Lithgow books-  Marsupial Sue, Illustrated by Jack E. Davis and The Remarkable Farkle McBride, Illustrated by C.F. Payne.

I just got Marsupial Sue and it is so adorable.  See a Video of John Lithgow singing the story below:

This is the story of a young kangaroo who longs to be a koala, a platypus, or anything other than a kangaroo -- until she discovers why it's best to be who she is (description from Barnes and Noble). It is an adorable song (with the music in the back of the book!) that gets stuck in your head easily but it is so cute that I don't mind.

I love this book because it teachers kids that they are awesome just being who they are!  They don't have to dress differently, or be a class clown, or be super great at math, or be a great singer to be who they are- teachers and friends will accept them no matter what.  Everyone is good at, and meant for, different things in this world- if we were all the same, how boring would that be! Get the book HERE

My other favorite John Lithgow book is The Remarkable Farkle McBride.

Click HERE to see John Lithgow reading this one (I couldn'f find this one on youtube which is why the video isn't directly embedded into the post).  He is so expressive that sometimes, I show the videos instead of reading myself to save my voice- the students love it!

This is a hilarious book with really funny pictures about a boy, Farkle McBride, who keeps trying different instruments- Violin, Flute, Trombone, and "the entire percussionist section".  He quickly masters each instrument, but then gets bored or frustrated with it and throws it away (or into a lake).  At the end it is revealed that he actually loves "Musicians All Playing Together" and he becomes a conductor and is thus finally satisfied with his musical experience.  This book is great for introducing the families of the orchestra and is really fun for the teacher to read and the students to listen to.  I always imitate the instrument sounds, yell when Farkle yells, etc and it is the most requested book in my classroom.   You can get the book HERE

Click the link below to link up and join in the fun! Don't forget to save the picture at the top of this blog post and insert it into your blog post with a link back to this page!  When you click the link it will take you to a new page where you copy the link to your blogpost and you will be all set!

Rhythm Football- a Game to engage your toughest critics!

Have you ever asked students, in person or on a worksheet, what they most want to do in music- and had that one kid who says or writes "Football" just to be funny??

This year, I thought, why not turn a camp/ physical education favorite- Steal the Bacon- into a way we can practice music and "play football" at the same time??   My toughest critics (boys who LOVE phys. ed and don't really like singing all that much) LOVED this game!  

Here are the game directions:

•Before Game- Print and cut out score board, game pieces, and rhythm cards.  Make score board and game pieces into magnets! Laminate Rhythm Cards for durability.

•Students are split into 2 even teams and each team sits along opposite walls (walls A and C) and are numbered.  (There should end up being 2 of every number, one on each team)

                                                                                       

 A 

D          B

C

•End-zones are determined for each team (Walls B and D)

•Teacher places 5- 10 rhythm cards in center of room between both teams.

•Teacher reads a rhythm and then calls a number

•The students with the number called race to find the rhythm card that was read and get it back to their end-zone without being tagged.  The teams ARE allowed to help find the rhythm pattern by pointing, cheering, etc.

I have scored this game in two ways:

•If a student gets the rhythm card into their end-zone without being tagged they move their game piece 20 yards

•If a student tags their opponent who has the rhythm card they advance their game piece 10 yards

•First team to advance 100 yds Wins! (You could also start both teams on the 50 yard line and first to advance 50yds wins if you are short on time)

•If you do not have an interactive white board, Print out Scoreboard one and make into a magnet.  Also Cut out 2 Footballs to make into magnets as well to move across the board.  Get a free interactive SMARTnotebook football field here!

OR

*If a student gets the rhythm card into their end-zone without being tagged they get a touch down and earn 6 pts.  If the team can read the card correctly, they get their extra point (total of 7).  If the player who scored for their team can read the card accurately by themselves they can get a 2 point conversion (total of 9 points).  

*If a student tags their opponent who has the rhythm card they get a Field Goal and earn 3 pts.

*The team with the most points after a pre-determined number of rounds wins!


To keep track of the score, either draw a scoreboard on your white/ chalkboard and have a student good at math keep score or use the scoreboard provided! 

If you have SMARTnotebook you can also look up “Scoreboard” in the gallery for an easy interactive board to use.  

Scoring Example:

•A rhythm is read and #3 is called.

•If team "A" #3 grabs the correct rhythm and gets back to his/her end-zone before getting tagged by Team "B" #3 then team A move 20 yards OR earns SEVEN POINTS. If Team B #3 tags him/her then team B moves 10 yards OR earns THREE POINTS.

•Sometimes a player will run up fast and grab it, and sometimes both players will walk around it waiting for the other person to grab it.

•The Teacher can call out more than one number at a time .This is good if one set of numbers is taking to long. The caller continues calling out numbers until a team gets the rhythm back to their end-zone or is tagged.

You canget Levels 1-10 on Teachers Pay Teachers- each set is only $2.00!

Level 1 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, and quarter rest)

Level 2 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest and half note)

Level 3 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest and beamed 16th notes)

Level 4 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest, beamed 16th notes, and eighth-2 sixteenths)

Level 5 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest, beamed 16th notes,
       eighth-2 sixteenths [aka ti-tika], and 2 sixteenths-eighth [aka tika-ti])

Level 6 (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest, beamed 16th notes,
       eighth-2 sixteenths [aka ti-tika], 2 sixteenths-eighth [aka tika-ti],
       and ti-ta-ti [aka syncopa])

Level 7- (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest, beamed 16th notes,
       eighth-2 sixteenths [aka ti-tika], 2 sixteenths-eighth [aka tika-ti],
       ti-ta-ti [aka syncopa], and dotted quarter- eighth [aka tam-ti])

Level 8- (quarter note, beamed eighth notes, quarter rest, beamed 16th notes,
       eighth-2 sixteenths [aka ti-tika], 2 sixteenths-eighth [aka tika-ti],
       ti-ta-ti [aka syncopa], dotted quarter- eighth [aka tam-ti] and eighth-dotted quarter [aka ti-tam])
Level 9- Adds dotted eighth-sixteenth (tim-ka)

Level 10- Adds sixteenth- dotted eighth (ka-tim)


I have also added a 6/8 version to practice common 6/8 patterns!

Feel free to mix and match cards- I teach half note first, but I know a lot of teachers who teach 16th notes first so I did not include half notes in the 16th set and visa versa.

Want to save by getting ONE BIG file of all the rhythm cards?  Click here!

Want to play the game with musical symbols/ Vocab?  Check it out here!