Transitions from one activity to another have to be deliberate to sustain the energy of the children and the momentum of your “seamless children’s play.” Generally speaking, common practices between activities like talking, side comments to parents or even praising children, going to look at your notes, or going to get another prop stops the flow of energy, creating dead space in your children’s play, which invites children to become unruly.

Techniques can be employed that smoothly connect one activity to another, separate one activity from another, move children from excitement to calm, spark a jolt of energy, magically engage children in props, yet entice them to give them back. Every transition can and should be planned, like stage entrances and exits, or blocking in a stage play.

Transitions can be as simple as standing up or sitting down for the next activity. They might include a triangle sound when you want children and parents to move from sitting to standing or standing to sitting, avoiding words. Silence can sometimes be used effectively for transitions, as with everybody continuing to sit while you put down a hand drum after presenting a meter, and pick up a recorder to present a tonality—no words, just as in a performance.  Another technique might be to move a group from sitting to standing and then just starting a song, like Everybody Follow Me, which, in itself, moves people in and through the next activity. Or, move the group from sitting to standing and then just start chanting in a meter, while moving appropriately, which will invite both chanting and movement. These simple transitions allow space between activities, but not dead space. The slight daylight between rhythm and tonal activities, usually initiated by either standing or sitting, clears the aural palate for audiation to shift gears.

Planning how you are going to distribute and collect props is essential to a smooth running class. Handing out props works best in the context of music, as does collecting them. Particularly effective is to start the meter or tonality, pick up the prop and use it in the context of your meter or tonality as you wish the prop to be used by the children, essentially demonstrating the prop as a “musical instrument” accompanying your singing or chanting. Then pass out the props one at a time as you continue chanting or singing. Cuing the “ensemble accompaniment” one at a time gently brings children into “playing their instruments” musically. Continue the activity as long as desired and then collect the instruments one at a time, keeping the meter or tonality going until the final prop is turned in. The energy of the music and gradual crescendo and decrescendo of the accompaniment makes willing participants of little children who might otherwise want to go crazy with the prop or cry when having to give it up. Contrast this non-verbal, highly musical encounter to passing out rhythm sticks to a group of little ones before starting an activity, and then trying to quiet all of the noisy sticks to start the activity, or ending the activity and then without the musical narrative, trying to get children to let go of the sticks.

Transitions that connect activities are highly useful as children develop the readiness for extended time within a meter or tonality.  You might move from an immersion activity in a tonality, to a Resting Tone Activity, and then to an Art Song in the same tonality. Or, perhaps you would go from an immersion activity in a meter to Rhythm Dialogue, to Macro/Micro Beat Activities. A bit of planning can keep the meter or tonality as the driving force while you move children smoothly from sitting to standing, one energy to another, one kind of movement to another, one prop to another, taking the musical mind on an adventure without interruption, casting a spell until the adventure comes to a close. You can always chant on the resting tone to carry a tonality.  It is more difficult and more distracting to talk in meter, but a bit of careful planning can provide for the connections to be non-verbal, supporting a highly musical encounter.

A series of consecutive activities within a meter or tonality necessitate a break in audiation before moving to the next activity. Three activities in a tonality, for example, mesmerize children, necessitating a deliberate breaking of the spell before moving on to a rhythm activity or even a Play song. A few well-chosen words might be thrown in at that point as a technique to break audiation and bring the musical imagination back to earth, before switching tracks from tonal to rhythm, rhythm to tonal, or either to a song.

Some of the Play Songs and Gem Songs, in themselves, can offer an abrupt energy spurt as a deliberate transition. A Play Song like “I’m Gonna Git you,” or a Gem Song like “I Need a Partner” throw the class into high energy—a wonderful final fling to an exciting class before the signature good-bye song.  

Only a musician, who understands the importance of momentum between the beats, creating a legato line or articulating pitches with a bit of daylight between, and using breath to support phrasing, can appreciate how many different ways a line or a music class can be carried seamlessly, and the importance of planning transitions to carry a full 45-60 minute class of little children energetically, in a most musical manner.