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Fun:
Q: Teacher: What is the shortest month?
A: Student: May, it only has three letters.
Teaching songs
Teaching songs
Benefits of Songs:
They are memorable:
The
song the students learn at their early
age has its own interesting
language. When
students grow up , they never forget such
language. It lives in their memory for ever.
They can be great fun.
The biggest factor that makes them fun for the kids
is how much the teacher
likes them, so you have a
perfect motivation for using your own
favorites.
They mark different stages
of the lesson
2. A-B activities
Students match beginnings and ends of lines,
such as ."Another Day in Paradise"
(simple) or
"Private Investigations" & "If Only..." (more
complicated).
3. Mixed-up activities
Generally, have the lines of the song on separate
strips of paper.
4. Dictation-wall
Dictation-wall
5. Translation
6. Jigsaw-listening
7. Composing
Listen to the song.
8. Writing
Put random words from the song on the board.
Students try and write the "tale of the song."
Students paraphrase the song
9. Pronunciation
10. Vocabulary
11. Listening
12. Posters
Arrange lyrics and pictures, or just lyrics, or translate.
Bibliography
Music and Song can be used to talk about people's
lives.
Principles for making a song ‘work’.
Students have fun and are therefore motivated.
Students learn quicker than with other methods
Students remember longer than with other methods
Students use rhythm and intonation when speaking,
moving.
Using the song reinforces other things such as
discipline, group work,
rewarding good behavior,
fostering learner independence
Electronic song teaching:
Songs can be presented
to learners in class
without any excessive efforts or expensive musical
instruments. This can be carried out through an
electronic program like
"Movie-Maker" or "power
point".
This program can present the song words
with
tune, motion and sound effects and timed automatic
transition electronically in a lovely way.
Make sure that:
1.Meaning of the song can be made clear in a quick
and easy way.
2.Whether the students understand the the song or
not, is easy to gauge.
3.The meanings and the song are easy to
remember
4.The song is suitable for the students in terms of
age, speed and content.
5.The
language in the song is similar to language
they will be able to use in
other parts of the class
and/ or outside the class.
Factors to take into account:
1.
Are the gestures you want to use the same in
English speaking countries
as in the country of
countries the kids come from? If not, will you want to
use the one they know to reinforce the meaning and
avoid
misunderstanding or teach them the British or
American gestures as a kind of cultural training?
2. Is the first
gesture you think of (e.g. rolling arms
around each other for “roll
over” in “There was one in
the bed” song) something that might be better used
with another meaning in a later song or in classroom
instructions
(e.g. the rolling arms gesture could be
the best gesture for “repeat”)?
3. Can the students still use the same gestures if
you speed the song up for a bit of variety?
4. Do the gestures build up to a climax, e.g. leaving
the most amusing or energetic gesture for the last
verse of the song?
5. Are the gestures fun?
6.
Will some of the kids, e.g. the older ones, be
embarrassed by doing any
of the gestures, e.g.
looking camp if they have to mime being a woman.
Making a song the focus of
your class
1. Listen to the song
That’s it – start things off by just listening. It’s
important to
remember that this is supposed to be
a fun activity; don’t make it too serious or boring.
2. Ask some questions about the title
Here are an example of the types of questions you
can ask:
For Queen’s classic ‘We are the champions’:
What is a champion?’
Such questions tend to work really well as
conversation
starters, so group three or four
learners together and then get feedback
from each
group on their thoughts. If you think it would help,
make
this your first step, i.e., before the initial
listening.
Alternatively,
prior to having listened to the song
you can teach a
couple of words and give a simple
task for the first listening. My favorite strategy is to
give three or four words from the song and ask
them to listen out for the words that rhyme with
them. You could also
brainstorm possible rhymes
before listening.
3. Listen to the song again, this time with lyrics
This time, you should give learners the chance to
read the lyrics to
the song. At this point you might
do one or more of the following activities:
- Learners can just read the lyrics while they listen. They can possibly highlight unknown words for later discussion.
- You can make a lyric worksheet as a gap fill; learners fill in the gaps as they listen.
4. Focus on a particular verb tense or
aspect of grammar
- How many examples can you find of the past simple in the lyrics?
- Why did the writer of this song choose this verb tense?
This acts as a springboard for discussing the function of a specific tense, as well as examining its form. Furthermore, it often tends to raise awareness of grammatical flexibility and ‘poetic license in the construction of song lyrics.
5. Focus on vocabulary, idioms and expressions
Start with questions like these (again, for Queen’s
classic song ‘We are the champions’):
- What does ‘I’ve paid my dues’ mean?
- What does ‘my share of’ mean?
- What does ‘I’ve taken my bows’ mean?
Go through the meanings, illustrating with other
examples if
necessary. Songs often serve as really
good contexts for phrases and
idioms, but it’s good
to make sure that the meaning is clear.
6. Round things off with some creativity
