Introduction:
Sing with the children each day learning a song each week, it is important tho have variety. Have a good music player and sing along, use acoustic instruments to support you. It is possible to sing their names, to sing as a group, with clapping. Begin with rhythm early and add singing so the children are comfortable with this. It must be part of daily school life, the development of musical skills improves outcomes in academic work. The songs you choose must have interest for each age group and select pitches which are neither too high or too low, many children are capable of singing high so do not start too low. You can encourage them to gradually widen their range by singing through the scale and the accents.
Discovery of the Child (Kalakshetra, p.364)
‘Success is bound up with the need for the production of plenty of music around the child, so that there is set up an environment calculated to develop musical sense and intelligence.’
Discovery of the Child (Kalakshetra, p.361)
‘Rhythm, harmony, writing and reading are joined-together in the end and form three interests, three stories of graded work and joyful experiences which burst out into the full splendour of one single victory.’
Advanced Montessori Method II (Kalakshetra, 348)
‘A child audience is a very special one, it demands something more than is demanded by an audience of average intelligence, it is one in which musical intelligence is developed our object is not merely higher and higher grades of understanding but also higher and higher grades of feeling, it is a task not beneath the dignity of the greatest composers or the most accomplished technicians’.
Techniques for singing songs:
To warm up children can be in a circle and raise and lower a silk cloth together while practicing making a tone which gets higher or lower.
Children can repeat parts of a song after you or children who read can be given music.
Children can accompany themselves with the bells, tone bars or instruments.
Children can play songs where groups are divided and sing different parts art the same time.
Children can sing folk songs, songs in other languages, from different countries, songs from different epochs, like Gregorian chants. At festival times have songs to go with the season, have modern songs, classic ones and fun songs with silly lyrics.
Practicalities, the steps required for children to learn a song:
- Start with the name of the song.
- Always begin with the same pitch, you can mark it with a tone.
- Sing the song.
- Later give an explanation of any difficult vocabulary.
- Play the melody again with an instrument, this helps the children to check that they are singing at the right pitch.
- Say the lyrics like a poem keeping the rhythm.
- The adult sings a phrase and the children repeat so the song can be broken down and understood more, you can check at this point if the children continue, showing they know the song.
- Sing the whole song together, go back to any stage if the children have problems, if the children forget the lyrics you can mouth the words.
- The children can say the song silently while listening to the teacher sing.
- Keep singing while the child has interest.