I used music in my classroom since I started teaching and always knew music was important. I loved getting to think through elementary music classroom ideas for math, ELA, and science when planning my lessons. I knew music was important, but it wasn’t until a close family member suffered a debilitating stroke that I got to see the incredible power of music firsthand.
After the stroke, my relative lost all of her speech. So, imagine our surprise when we were all together at church after her stroke and heard her singing one of the hymns. It was a hymn she had been singing since she was a little girl, and not only was she clearly singing each of the words, but she was singing them in harmony! With tears streaming down our faces, my family and I were in absolute awe of how the human brain works.
The reason why she could sing but not speak is because music activates a different part of our brain than speech. Music has countless benefits for students and should not be isolated to just the music classroom. Here are some important reasons why you should be using music in your classroom:
Reasons To Bring Elementary Music Classroom Ideas in Your Curriculum
We all remember singing the ABCs or remembering the chant for counting by 7s or 2s. But there are many other benefits to having music in the classroom besides memorizing the curriculum to use music.
Memory and Retrieval
Music aids in memory retention and retrieval of information. Music lights up the brain like a Christmas tree. It stimulates multiple parts of the brain by activating the right & left sides of the brain, as well as the front & back of the brain. The more lights on the tree, the brighter your living room is. Our students’ brains are the same way, and I wanted to use strategies, like music, that allowed them to shine brightly and be successful in their learning!
Motivation
Music motivates active participation in learning. Music is a powerful tool for student engagement. While you may have a student or two that won’t be eager to sing, most kids love music. When I saw a student wasn’t jumping into the songs we sang, I would later ask them what kind of music they liked. During my first year of teaching, a student said that the only music he’d sing to was rap music.
Now, I was not a rapper and honestly don’t personally enjoy rap music, but you better believe that the next song I introduced was a Sequence of Events rap song, and I’ll never forget how his face lit up and how he joined in when I taught it to the class!
Movement and Motions
When it comes to elementary music classroom ideas, we all know that music incorporates movement and motions, and that’s why it’s important for many students. The goal of all instruction is student success, which is why music is another great way to incorporate kinesthetic learning. Using movement and motions along with music will help transfer information into students’ long-term memories.
Focus Learning
Music helps focus learning on key details and concepts. Whenever I wrote a new song for our classroom or had my students help me write a song, it allowed us to synthesize and summarize the essential information that we needed to learn.
Positive Classroom
Music builds a positive classroom environment. My students and I wrote a good morning song that we sang to each other at the start of every day! I wish I had begun this sooner because we couldn’t help but smile after singing our morning song together. It was such a positive way to begin our day!
Fun and Motivating
Music is FUN, exciting, and motivating! Just like brain breaks, students enjoy music, and we want students to always enjoy learning and their time in our classrooms! Adding music into your school day is truly an easy way to make learning fun and to keep students excited and motivated to learn! It doesn’t take much prep but has a big impact!
Start Using Music In Your Classroom For FREE Today!
I’m so excited for you to start using music in your classroom that I have put together one of our favorite math songs as a gift for you!! It’s called the Hundreds Chart Shuffle and has been used by over 40,000 teachers!! I created this song to help my students better understand the concept of 1 less, 1 more, 10 less, and 10 more. It’s not only fun but also helps students understand more and less!
I’ve also included a printable hundreds chart and a fun task card activity for you to use with your students so they to practice this important skill in a fun way after you’ve learned the song!
CLICK HERE to get the Hundreds Chart Shuffle More Or Less Song! These elementary music classroom ideas are just a few of my favorites. There are so many other ways to incorporate music.
Want some specific elementary music classroom ideas and how you can use them in your classroom? Click Here for 3 Simple Ways To Incorporate Music Into Your Elementary Classroom!
Leave a Reply