Mrs. Potatohead activity for finding singing voice

 I'm sharing a few activities I haven't posted yet!  This one is a favorite of 1st graders and is excellent for including individual response to help them find singing voice. You can even include a guesser trying to figure out who sang one of the items to make a game out of it!

I've used it on informances in the past, including having student leaders singing the call part at the end. As the kids are still passing pieces of Mrs. Potatohead to someone else who is closing their eyes and moving with flow, after the Mrs. Potatohead song as shown below is done, I pair the song with the Mixolydian song "Tiptoe" from Experimental Songs and Chants without Words.

A clearer version of the notation can be found here.

Beehive!

A new melody for an existing chant (not sure who wrote the chant). First graders love this song and set of activities!

• Day 1: Start the students on an ostinato sung on the resting tone on macrobeats: "1, 2, 3, bzz, 1, 2, 3, bzz," having them tap the macrobeat on their legs for the first three beats and on their shoulders on the buzz. Sing the song over the ostinato.  If you are using the words the first day of the song, display the words to students with bees, sees, hive, and five underlined, guiding them to notice that the "bzz" happens at those spots.  Then, have 5 students pretend to be the bees, walking around the outside of the circle on macrobeats, gently tapping one student's should only on the buzz parts of the ostinato. Have the bees perform a major or triple pattern, and appoint five new bees, singing the last line of the song as you choose them.

• Day 2: Have students flow during the song as if they are bees flying in curvy pathways. Use this free TpT bumblebee animated vocal exploration SMART board file to have students explore their head voices between repetitions, having one student come up to the front to click the smart board and echo a triple meter pattern. For other repetitions, have students move the ostinato from day 1 again, changing which body part they sting themselves on for the buzz every time.

• Day 3: Use the song for a locomotor movement activity. Guide the students to explore curvy and straight pathways ("beelines" 😃) around the room. Have them fly high or low. Have them find closed or small shapes like they are the bees hiding, or open and large shapes like they came out of the hive.  At the end of the activity, ask the students to "fly back to their nests" returning to their spots.

Other ways to vary or spiral the activity to other grades, depending on students' skill levels:

• Have one student hide a toy bee around the room like it is hidden in the beehive as the rest of the students close their eyes. When the song is over, have students open their eyes and point quietly when they see the bee. Someone who pointed quietly will get to hide the bee next, and anyone who gets a turn performs a triple or major pattern.

• Use the toy bee to go around to students during the song, pausing after every line to "sting" a student with a dramatic resting tone buzz! Invite the student you sing to perform the resting tone as well. 

• Have students find the DO SOL MI patterns and sing DO SOL MI on solfege or on BUM BUM BUM in the song every time it occurs. They could also look at the notation for that pattern if they are ready for symbolic association, or they could replace it with different major tonic patterns that they create singing or writing and singing.

• Have students sing chord roots (DO DO FA DO, DO DO SOL DO) and possibly transfer that to instruments.

• Connect to the major tonic patterns in the song by playing the major tonic game. My version of the game: Students listen to patterns and jump after they hear a major tonic pattern, singing "major tonic," and they squat after they hear a major dominant pattern, singing "major dominant." If they are incorrect they sit down where they are and are out until the next round. Perhaps add subdominant in there since it is part of the song's progression!

Notation is here if you want to edit or display it in higher quality to your students.

Simon Sings!

Think Simon Says, but to help the kids think about the difference between singing voice and speaking voice.

You don't use the words Simon Says at all.  You simply give an instruction either using your singing voice or your speaking voice. The students are only to follow the instructions you SING, not the ones you speak in the game. If a student follows a direction you SPEAK, they're out and they sit down!

I like to improvise in Dorian or Phrygian mode to give the directions in the game. You also can sing tonic and dominant patterns in major or minor tonality, later adding in subdominant patterns. The purpose is for the kids to practice and for you to assess how they're doing with hearing the difference between singing and speaking voice!



Extension:

If my students are REALLY good at hearing singing vs. speaking (which my K and 1st graders are!), I make it even trickier for them!  If I sing the directions on the RESTING TONE, they should follow them, but if I sing the directions on ANY OTHER NOTE, they shouldn't follow them!  This helps me assess whether students are truly audiating which pitch is the resting tone!

Measuring Student Growth: 1st grade Singing Voice

In my district teachers are required to show student growth using data through a Student Growth Goal. My growth goal was focused on 1st graders finding singing voice and singing more in tune. Here's how I tracked the student data.


Student Growth Goal:

"All students will improve in their ability to sing in tune with accurate pitch. 70-80% or more will improve by at least one level or maintain the highest level according to the Singing Voice Development Measure, and will improve in the percentage of pitches they sing in tune in their singing test."

This resource gave me my rating scale and most of my songs and patterns. My principal LOVED that what I was doing was based in research!

The Measurement and Evaluation of Children's Singing Voice Development by Joanne Rutkowski

Pretest
On their pretest in October, students echoed patterns in minor tonality, and sang a minor song they had learned.

Song used on pretest (students sang for me individually as others worked in centers):

Patterns students echoed on pretest:

How students were rated in the assessments:

 Singing Voice Development Measure

Joanne Rutkowski's research determined that students progress toward using their singing voice through the following stages. I recorded the students singing with my iPad, and graded each student based on what range they were singing in.

1. Pre-singer – does not sing but chants the song text.

2. Inconsistent Speaking Range Singer – sometimes chants, sometimes sustains tones and exhibits some sensitivity to pitch but remains in the speaking voice range (usually A2 to C3).

3. Speaking Range Singer – sustains tones and exhibits some sensitivity to pitch but remains in the speaking voice range (usually A2 to C3).

4. Inconsistent Limited Range Singer – wavers between speaking and singing voice and uses a limited range when in singing voice (usually up to F3).

5. Limited Range Singer – exhibits consistent use of limited singing range (usually D3 to F3).

6. Inconsistent Initial Range Singer – sometimes only exhibits use of limited singing range, but other times exhibits use of initial singing range (usually D3 to A3).

7. Initial Range Singer – exhibits consistent use of initial singing range (usually D3 to A3).

8. Inconsistent Singer – sometimes only exhibits use of initial singing range, but other times exhibits use of extended singing range (sings beyond the register lift: B3-flat and above).

9. Singer – exhibits use of consistent extended singing range (sings beyond the register lift: B3-flat and above).

Mid-year assessment:

I checked on student range with this song in February. I used this song because it goes above the "Initial Range Singer" range above. Many students had grown to "Singer" level (Level 9 on the scale) by February, many of them even hitting high E's!!!

End-of-year assessment:

Students individually sang patterns, Hello There!, and See the Bird (from pretest) for their final assessment. 

Hello There:

Patterns in post-test: 

So how did it turn out?

The students grew more than I could have imagined!!  100% of students increased or maintained their singing voice level. Here are video examples of just HOW much these students grew!!

Who has the ___? Singing voice game

One of my favorite singing voice games that I've seen work WONDERS in bringing out kids' singing voices is based on the song Frere Jacques/Are You Sleeping.

Here is the original version of the game:

Teacher tosses small stuffed animals to students, or hides items behind their backs.

Teacher sings (to the tune of Are You Sleeping): "Who has the brown bear?"
Child who has it sings in echo: "I have the brown bear!"
Teacher sings: "Who has the dog?"
Child who has it sings: "I have the dog!"
Teacher sings: "Who has the black bear?"  (the hardest line to sing, so out of the 3 kids with turns this round, the child with the highest aptitude should get this one!)
Child who has it sings: "I have the black bear!"
Teacher sings: "Pass them on, pass them on" as students pass their toys to other students.



Here's a new twist on it with a focus on resting tone, for the younger kids who are still primarily focusing their singing voice work on finding the resting tone:

Same game as above, but the students sing "ME!" on the resting tone, instead of echoing the entire line. See below!

This can be done with ANY set of 3 items. Examples:
marker, pen, eraser;
rainbow, gold, leprechaun;
spider, ghost, witch;
tiger, bear, lion;
etc.!

I usually try to make the second item the one with the shortest name, because of the half note in the music in measure 3.

Happy singing! :)