Pioneer Day Singing

Pioneer Day is coming up.

I know some choristers go all out for this day from making butter to dressing-up. And I know some of you don't do anything at all because of various good reasons. 

This year I needed something very simple. (I'm tending 6 grandchildren for 5 days and a little overwhelmed!)

I'm doing a simple song pick with pictures.

Click HERE to download my pictures.

I love the song 'Pioneer Children' and have a word flip chart that I use.

Click HERE to download flip chart.

Last year I made cards for 'Fun To Do' with a Pioneer theme. 

You can check that out and download them HERE.

Also, last year I taught the song 'When I Hear of Pioneer Children'. You can check out that post HERE.

I hope everyone has a Happy Pioneer Day

 and keep singing as you walk and walk and walk and walk...

I Want to Live the Gospel

Our pick for the month of July is 'I Want to Live the Gospel'. I LOVE this song. It goes so well with the monthly theme of  'I Choose the Right by Living Gospel Principle.'

(We haven't decided yet if we will sing 'The Wise Man and the Foolish Man' in the program. Everyone knows it and I thought it had a great message so we did it last week. You can see my lesson plan and ideas I collected HERE.)

 Anyhow, here is my lesson plan for teaching this great song.

Click HERE to download my plan and rainbow cards.

An interesting fact I learned about this song. Sister Naomi Randall wrote the words. If she sounds familiar it's because she also wrote 'I Am a Child of God'. A quote from her about this song:

"It is my hope that the children will make a personal commitment to live the principles of the gospel more today than they did yesterday and that they may experience the joy and happiness that comes from living the gospel."

LOVE that. It's something I'll have to tell my kiddos!

Happy Singing!

The Wise Man and the Foolish Man

I know some choristers are NOT singing this song for the program and some are. But regardless, it is a great, fun, popular song with a wonderful message. You all know I'm all about NOT re-inventing the wheel so here is what I've found from other bloggers for teaching this song. I've thrown in my lesson plan too.

Nalani over on 'In the Leafy Treetops the Birds Sing Good Morning has fantastic helps to teach this song. I used most of them in my lesson plan.

Click HERE to link to her blog. 

She took the pictures of the Wise and Foolish Man from THE FRIEND magazine and made them into 3 sizes for us to copy as well as colored or black/white. 

Click HERE to link to the pictures. 

Here is my lesson plan (most of the ideas are from Nalani). 

THANKS Nalani for such wonderful ideas and saving me tons of time!!

Click HERE to download the lesson plan. 

I got the label idea from 'Teaching LDS Children's blog HERE.

I made my own labels and action cards to tape to my blocks. You can download those too.

Click HERE for labels and cards.

Some other great ideas you might want to try:

Camille has a fun idea using paper houses HERE.

Sugardoodle has some great ideas with a 3rd verse as well as using actual rocks and sand HERE.

Terri Hutchings has written a great arrangement for the song with a more reverent option HERE. You can download the sheet music as well as view a video.

I hope this helps having all the resource together in one place.

Happy Singing!

4th of July

Happy Fourth of JULY!

It seems I always have a sub for this holiday. So here are few of my go-to plans.

This is a fun and easy matching game. Just assign a song (I am reviewing program songs) to each matching picture. For my SR, I like to have them tell me facts about the picture. Example: How many red stripes on the flag, white stripes, how many stars, who made the first flag? etc. They really like showing me how smart they are!

Click HERE to download the matching.

Here is a post I did last year. It was a big HIT! It is very easy, low prep and great for a sub.

Click HERE for this activity.

The easiest one of all is 'PASS the FLAG'.

Buy a small flag on a stick. Pick a song to practice. Start passing the flag as you are singing. Have the pianist stop suddenly. Whomever is holding the flag tells something they love about our country or a freedom they enjoy.

I LOVE the song 'My Flag'. It's a great one to teach or just sing on the Sunday before Independence Day.

Here is the flip chart I use to help everyone remember the words.

Click HERE for the flip chart.

Camille has some cute ideas over on her blog for the 4th of July. She does poppers or glow sticks.

Click HERE to go to her blog.

Sugardoodle.com also has some cute ideas. You can check those out HERE

Whatever you choose to do GOOD LUCK and Happy 4th of July!

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Nephi's Courage

I've been trying to figure out how to teach this great song. My SR knows it well so I will just be reviewing it but most of my JR don't know it at all.

There are sooooo many cute ideas out there for teaching this song. I don't like to 're-invent the wheel' but I do like to put my own spin on it. Here are a few I have added to:

The OCD Primary Chorister made a cute flip chart with pictures that she drew. You can link to it HERE.  I decided to use this with my SR to review but I re-did it and just put one 'key word' with each picture.

There are NO pictures for the chorus.

Click HERE to download a copy.

Camille over on her blog had a darling idea of teaching the first two verses of the song with puppets.

You can check out her post HERE. 

There weren't puppets for the chorus and Camille does the 3rd verse a different way so I made some puppets for them.

Susan Fitch has some really cute puppets on her Etsy Shop. You can check them out HERE.

I used her puppets but on the church's website there are some there too.

Here's how mine turn out.

When the kids know the verse pretty well I'm going to pull out the 'STAGE'. 

I use a shower or curtain rod with a long curtain attached. I have 2 teachers hold the rod. The kids stand behind the curtain and hold the puppets up over the rod as we sing.

Click HERE to download the puppets I added. 

Happy Singing!

I Feel My Savior's Love

My song pick for the program for April is "I Feel My Savior's Love". I've been searching the web for a way to teach it to my JR kids. Over on the FB LDS Primary Choristers page, Katie Gibbons had a cute idea. So I made it on my computer and added one more phrase. 

THANKS Katie!

I'm only teaching the 1st verse and chorus, so this is only for that.

Click HERE to download a copy of the pictures.

Happy Singing!

More Than Enough

I am so in love with this song! Mother's Day has never been a favorite of mine simply because I never thought I was doing enough. But Shawna Edwards has captured my exact feelings in her new Mother's Day song called 'More Than Enough'. You can buy it HERE from her website. You can get just the sheet music or a bundle with an MP3 recording. 

There is also a darling YouTube video sung by the One Voice Children's Choir.

Showing the video would be a great way to introduce it.

I've decided to teach this to my Primary kids to sing in Sacrament meeting on Mother's Day.

On Shawna Edwards blog she gives a suggestion on how to teach the chorus to Primary children. HERE

One suggestion she makes is having the YM and YW sing some of the verses with the Primary joining in on the chorus.

I contacted my YW President and our girls are singing all three verses with the Primary on the chorus. I'm excited to introduce it this Sunday. I thought I'd do the lesson plan by Sis. Edwards by singing the chorus and having the kids listen for several things mothers often do for their children. I made some picture cards with key words they can put in order and sing from. It will work well for both JR and SR.

Click HERE to download a copy of the picture/word cards.

This is ONLY for the chorus. There are a few word changes in the chorus on verses 2 & 3 so I made cards for them also in blue and there is a special phrase at the ending.

Happy Singing!