Many traditional music activities can be recycled to stimulate music learning. Take any favorite activity and try using it with rhythm or tonal content. Folk song games can be played with rhythm chants. Rhythm instruments can be used with rhythm chants, Rhythm Dialogue and Macro/Micro Beat Activities. Tone bells or Orff instruments can be used for Resting Tone Activities. Scarves or ribbons can be used for flowing movement in either rhythm or tonal activities.
Favorite things that you might have in your classroom can also be used to stimulate music learning. Hoops, bean bags, or pom pons can become delightful musical instruments with rhythm activities. If you have access to a preschool classroom, borrow a set of brooms to sweep up macro and micro beats, accompanied by tonguing. Toddler hammers, blocks, dolls, puppets, or any other items can be used creatively with music learning activities. Household items like toilet paper tubes or telephones can be used with Resting Tone Activities or Tonal Dialogue. Pretend telephones or pretend microphones can be equally effective. Make believe opens another full dimension to “play with.”
Props, games or instruments you might use for rhythm activities or tonal activities can be used regularly with different meters or tonalities, and each meter or tonality can be used with any number of props or games. One week you might use hoops with duple meter and the next week hoops with triple meter. Or, you might use hammers one week with duple meter and hoops the next week with the same meter.
Music learning is enhanced by the regular rotation of meters in rhythm activities and tonalities in tonal activities. The various meters and tonalities offer great variety of content, while the many options for props or games offer great variety for engagement, greatly multiplying the many choices for creative lesson planning. Young children are delighted when a favorite toy or prop is brought out again as a musical instrument. A teacher can rotate props as much as meters or tonalities, coming up with a different combination every time that excites children and excites the musical mind.
Music learning, like learning language, requires a great deal of repetition. Recycling favorite play activities and reusing favorite props or toys offer endless opportunities for repetition of content. The consistent need for immersion in the various tonalities and meters and interactivity through Rhythm Dialogue, Resting Tone Activities, Macro/Micro Beat Activities and Tonal Dialogue offer endless opportunities for repetition of props and toys. Every music activity can be a fresh, attractive experience for children, with enough repetition and enough variety to enchant children as well as to serve music learning.
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