We had a very upbeat and energetic program. Everyone started moving and shaking right away after the “Hello” song, so we got up and sang a bunch of dance songs including "Wake Up" and the “Hokey Pokey”. The children were very excited to “Do the Monkey”. This week, I brought out the Chinese Gong as the instrument of the week and the children took turns banging the centre before finishing off with a rocking jam session and parachute shake.
Joel came out to ease the transition to having me lead the group. Clearly, Joel is adored by all of the participants who were thrilled to see him return for the first class. It appeared that I had my work cut out for me if I was going to be taking over his role. Joel introduced me to the group as I learned some of the children's names. But as soon as the familiar opening chords of the “Hello” song started, the energy was high and everyone was singing and participating with incredible enthusiasm. We sang through a couple of songs before some of the children led us into an extra long set of jumping and moving around. I introduced the big bag of instruments and led a “Shaking medley” of “Shake it Baby, Shake It”, “Hey There Shakey Shakey”, and “Twist and Shout”. We followed that with the Parachute and Little Green Frog before singing our Goodbye Song. Both Joel and I were giving high fives at the end. I think everyone had a great time and I am really looking forward to next week. There were 18 children attending along with a good number of grown ups, and at least a couple staff from the shelter. I met a lot of people and I'm still figuring out who everyone is and what roles they play. But, they were all extremely excited and ready to go. All of the children had participated in groups with Joel before, and were singing along.
All of the staff and participants were extremely warm and welcoming. They clearly love the program and it is a pleasure to be a part of it this session. One child was visibly distraught that Joel would not be returning to lead the class. I have learned that she had been attending the group since she was about 4 months old. She sat with her back to me for most of the class but seemed to open up a little towards the end. Other than that, everyone was extremely receptive.
Whoa, today was a busy day at Birkdale. My apologies if my blog is shorter than usual, I am pretty tired after an eventful morning! There were a couple of new faces today and not many moms were able to join us. Luckily I had 3 amazing shelter staff available to participate and as we sang the Hello Song, two new siblings walked in with their mom. I was about 15 minutes into the class when the oldest sibling threw a complete tantrum when his mom decided to leave. I kept the class going but it was hard to compete with this meltdown, let me tell you! The shelter staff took turns trying to do damage control and bringing the mom back into the room, but to honest at this point, I wasn't paying attention. I had a class to run! I slowed things right now and did my best to keep everyone's attention by using props (turtle puppet, and rolling the ball). We also sang 2 songs about the beautiful sunshine today (Mr. Sun, Trees Need The Sun), and sensing that the group was getting restless, we stood up and marched around the room (Elephants Marching). Sticking with the animal theme we then sang a silly song that allowed us to stick out our tongues (Little Green Frog). The IOTW was the Tingshaw Bells from Tibet and I couldn't have chosen a more perfect instrument for today. It allowed us a chance to be quiet and focused as I demonstrated how to create the ringing sound by tapping the bells gently together. They LOVED the fact that I was able to come up close to then ring the bells directly over their head. After making sure everyone had a turn, we put them away and brought out the Jam Bag.
The meltdown was at about a level 10 by now and Elizabeth was called to assist, so we sang over the commotion (Three Little Birds, De-Oh, Head And Shoulders). I took a risk in bringing out the parachute, but played a compilation of slow tunes instructing all the children to lie down and look up at the colours overhead. It seemed to help calm the somewhat erratic energy of the group and as the little lad was taken out of the room with Elizabeth, I put away the parachute. Due to the challenges during today's class, I decided to ask the group "What songs did we sing today?" I wanted to remind them of all the fun that we had singing about all the beautiful things outside (like the sun, trees and animals). The group seemed to respond well and yelled out things like "frog! turtle!" etc. It also helped focus the group once again for the Goodbye Song, which we sang all together.
As I packed up my things, one of the shelter workers said "wow, that was crazy today" and all I could think was "yea, but man, am I glad there was no strike because I would have missed seeing you guys!"
It was March Break last week and I must admit after having a restful week off, I was dying to get back to Birkdale to see all my little (and big) friends. Admittedly it was the first time I felt a bit apprehensive about seeing everyone because I have grown quite close to one girl in particular, and it struck me for the first time today that maybe over the break she had moved. I wish you all had the privilege to meet this little girl (come visit!). She is 5 years old but seems years older (I guessed her to be 8 when I met her for the first time). She has an amazing spirit and energy that affects the entire group when we sing together. Other children who are shy seem to gravitate toward her and she encourages children and grownups alike to participate as much as possible. In some ways, I hope one day she will no longer be at the residence, but when that day comes I will be very sad to see her go. I was happy to see her there again today, and was also very excited to see a couple of new faces as well. After making some introductions, we sang the Hello Song all together, inviting our new friends to stand up, turn around and sit back down. I noticed that almost all of the grownups (with the exception of one mom who seemed more comfortable in a chair) was sitting on the floor with us today! Hooray! It was wonderful to see them feeling more comfortable with the idea of sitting together, singing and interacting with their children and the others. Also, this becomes a habit and allows new moms to feel comfortable doing the same.
Due to the fact that we had five new children in class, I took the class at a slower pace than usual starting the Roly Roly (taking our hands up and day, big and small, fast and slow) and continuing to roll our hands 'round and 'round for the Wheels On The Bus. At this point, one little girl (who may or may not have been able to speak english) starting yelling at me. The mom jumped in trying to explain that her daughter knew the melody but was mad that I was singing the wrong words! LOL She didn't understand that I was singing in a different language but nonetheless it was interesting to see how a child can recognize a melody so easily, and quickly change their behaviour because they feel comfortable enough to participate (she wasn't so keen in the beginning but this broke the ice in a way, as she tried to sing along in her own language afterwards - south african dialect?). We then took our hands and practiced keeping a beat during the song I Wake Up My Hands. Looking at the hands, we counted all ten fingers and I taught them the chant I Have Ten Little Fingers. It was fun to see who knew the difference between their right hand and their left hand. Staying with the body part theme, we hid our hands behind our backs and found different parts of the hand (thumb, pointer and whole hand) during the song Where Is Thumbkin? Children seem to love this one because there is an element of surprise (finding the correct part of the hand and showing everyone) and yet uses changing tempos to create a kind of anticipation during the melody (on the line run away, run away as the hand hides once again behind the back). I decided to shift the focus from the hands to the feet, and asked the group to stand all the way up. We began by stomping the feet loudly to the beat of my guitar and sang Stomp Your Sillies Out, using other body parts on the additional verses. Finishing the song on 'yawning our sleepies out', we laid all the way down on the floor, some of us snoring loudly and stretching our arms up high above our heads. My favourite song seemed to fit in perfectly here (Sleeping Bunnies) and after hopping up and down for three (!!) verses, we sat back down and I brought out the IOTW.
This week I chose to bring the Chinese Gong. I wrapped it up in my scarf and revealed it to the group somewhat dramatically (this always makes the instrument seem more special and exciting). After speaking briefly about the history of the Gong, I showed the group how to hold the mallet properly and swing it across the front of the body, aiming for the "sweet spot" directly in the centre of the circular- shaped instrument. After playing a game about who could hear the sound the longest, we passed around the instrument allowing each child to practice hitting the centre. Some seemed shy, making a soft sound with the mallet, while others were more adventurous and played the gong loudly swinging the mallet back and forth (sometimes hitting their neighbour by accident). After some apologizes and lots of giggles due to one little child's CRAZY gong playing (new little guy whose English isn't very good, thus repeats EVERYTHING you say, LOL he has my heart already), we put away the IOTW and some of the older children helped me bring out the Jam Bag.
I made sure to remind the group about the various rules due to a couple of new participants (no maracas on the drums, no hitting each other with the instruments etc.), making sure that everyone had something to play, and we sang three songs all together, starting with Mr. Sun, De-Oh, and Lion Sleeps Tonight.
The parachute is ALWAYS fun. Period. This time I used the CD to play Clean-O in hopes they would recognize the melody for when I teach it next week, and also played some slower tracks because the little ones were almost TOO excited and starting to run around underneath bumping into each other.
We sang Goodbye and after a couple hugs I left feeling a little lighter and, as always, appreciative of all the support from the shelter workers at Birkdale. They are AMAZING! Anne Marie, Revi and Natalia, I am looking at YOU!
Today I met with Elizabeth prior to class to locate the Jam Bag, which is now stored in her office. As we caught up, I heard a staff member make an announcement over the residence P.A system to all mothers and children that Rainbow Songs music class would start in approximately 15 minutes. Well within 3 mins, the door burst open and familiar faces began pouring into the room. The little girl who told me she would miss me last week literally RAN into my arms and gave me a big hug which lasted for several minutes. To be honest, it was the warmest welcome I have ever experienced in an RSF environment on only the second week of class! Elizabeth looked quite moved and excused herself, and I completely understood why. She has worked very hard to create a wonderful program for the children living in the residence and it mustn't have been easy to hear the closure of Children's Services at Birkdale. However, today she saw FIRST HAND how her hard work is affecting the lives of the residents here and I think she was simply overwhelmed in seeing how open and resilient these children really are to new people and the experiences that come along. I took a moment to set up my CD player, and saw that even the shyest participants from last week were talking a mile a minute, asking me TONS of questions. The shelter staff who participate week to week have quickly become my favourite people in the room because they seem to take on the task of disciplining the children when need. Not only are they are funny and talented when it comes to making animal sounds, they seem to have a profound amount of respect for each other and their residents. This affects the way in which the children engage with their own mothers, and I find the children to be very well behaved.
We sang the Hello Song and almost everyone stood up, turned around and sat back down. I asked the group "what day of the week is it?". After much deliberation, we sang through the days of the week activity, which incorporates various aspects of both rhythm and melody. "I Wake Up Hands" continues work on these areas of music-making and so we woke up each body part one at a time. Singing about opposites is a great way to engage young children and so I asked them "what is the opposite of BIG?", "what is opposite of UP?" and "what is the opposite of FAST?". Using their answers, we sang Roly Poly and Hands Together, Hands Apart. Afterwards, we sang a funny animal song called Johnny Didn't Have Any Breakfast. Each child had the opportunity to become an animal, suggesting to the group either a sound or action we could do all together. One boy who was new to class today hid his face in his hands and so I took a risk when I asked the group "what animal like to HIDE?". One little girl yelled out TURTLES! The boy looked up in surprise and laughed, singing along on the verse. I quickly realized that no one had chosen to be a spider, so we sang The Itsy Bitsy Spider. We stood all the way up and flew around the room singing Shoo Fly. The group seemed to love exploring the space and I decided last minute to Shake Our Sillies Out taking cues from the children (yawn our sleepies, clap our sillies, stomp our sillies, stretch our strechies etc).
IOTW this week was the Darabouka. I showed them how the drum sounds when played on the floor versus when played on the lap. I enlisted the grownups help in keeping a specific beat on the floor while I played a more complex pattern on the drum. When played together at the same time, the rhythm sounds reminiscent of belly dancing, and some grownups even got up and danced around the room! It was awesome. I brought out the big bag of instruments, and with some help from the shy boy I previously mentioned, we handed out instruments to all participants. We reviewed Jamaica Farewell from last week and sang a new jam song called De-Oh. The shy boy grabbed a tambourine for himself and was very talented, playing on beat. I could see him being a teacher one day because he kept encouraging other children to play and sing as loudly as possible. It was incredible to see! After we put away the Jam Bag, I took out the parachute and took a moment to explain the rules for the first time (i.e., no pushing under the parachute). The first track was slow and so I laid down under the parachute looking up, and soon enough, all the children were underneath with me. There was lots of laughter and giggles when I instructed them to stand up and dance around during the fast track and we finished the third slow track by lying down on our bellies. Singing goodbye went really well and I got four hugs AT THE SAME TIME at the end! Overall, an amazing second week.
Today was my first day at the Birkdale Residence. I was very excited to meet Elizabeth and discuss the changes that have been taking place at Birkdale over the last couple months. Children's Services is no longer running at Birkdale (a service originally offered to residents) and so now the space has been transformed into a Family Resource Center. The new structure runs similar to a daycare in the respect that there are programs running in the morning and afternoon with supervision, however differs in the fact that it is no longer promoted as a drop-off program. In fact, grownups are encouraged to use the space WITH their children. RSF fits perfectly into the "Rhythm and Sound" component of the new programming and the first day certainly reflected Birkdale's efforts to engage both mother and child in a music making activity. As participants began to enter the room, I handed out name tags and introduced myself to each mom and child individually. I couldn't help but notice the vast range in ages (3 months - 8 years old), and started to form my lesson plan in my head by asking them questions like "What is your favourite song?" and "Do you enjoy singing?" One child pointed at my guitar and squealed saying "Look mom, its a guitar!". As we sat down I decided to break the ice even more and ask the older children "How many strings do I have on my guitar?". It counted the strings together I used this time to practice addressing them each individually (some of the names were tricky to pronounce) and we launched right into the Hello Song. I decided to use the 2-4 Year Old version so they could have an opportunity to stand up, turn around and sit back down with their grownup. We were very comfortable on a colourful rug with pillows so I decided to ask the group "Who had a hard time waking up today?". Many of the grownups raised their hand and we all laughed at each other *The first laugh of the class is ALWAYS the best and establishes a connection almost immediately that reinforces the idea that the time we spend together is FUN!* Using our comfortable surroundings, we laid down and went back to sleep only to rewake up all over again.
Earlier in the week, I attended a workshop at the University of Toronto for the Early Childhood Music Association and one idea that was reiterated over and over again was that allowing children to engage using their own ideas is important to creating a positive environment. So even though it was the first day, I asked many questions throughout the 40 minute class. For example, after waking up all of our body parts I asked "What is white and cold and on the ground outside today?". Even though this is a very simple question for a grownup, allowing a child to answer and engage allows them to feel part of the musical narrative. We sang a winter version of the Itsy Bitsy Spider (along with the other three verses) and when one grownup said "Oh I wish I was somewhere HOT", I said "Let's GO!" and we sang through a song called Some Like It Hot. I knew immediately that this group was probably the most advanced shelter group I've yet to work with and it was VERY exciting to hear participants singing loudly AND in harmony! I was totally blown away and I think everyone felt quite proud of themselves when we were able to divide the group in two and sing alternating melodies. I kept rolling with this idea that they would "feed" me the next song and so as we got our bodies moving to the uptempo beat of Some Like It Hot, I thought "why not dance?".
Standing we sang the Hokey Pokey and it was fun to see that most children had little inhibitions about dancing in front of one another. We continued this narrative of being somewhere warm and hot by hopping on a train (I've Been Working On The Railroad) and arriving in Puerto Rico where I introduced the IOTW (Maracas). I instructed them on how to shake using a flick of the wrist, reciting Shake It Baby Shake It and gradually passed around the two maracas I was able to find scattered amongst the toys. I was also able to find a drum and some body bells and so we jammed to Jamaica Farewell to conclude the class. It was amazing! We definitely attracted some attention from the other workers at Birkdale who popped in to sing with us towards the end and swear I could feel it in my bones that this was going to be a special place to spend some time over the next couple of weeks. I have said before and I will say it again: this is the best part of the job...knowing that I have made people happy! As I left one girl who sat beside me the entire morning said "I am going to miss you!". I was delighted to be able to say "I will miss you too! But I will be back next week!". Until then...
Well today was especially wonderful because Joel came to observe and participate in the class! He added so much to the class especially since today I almost lost my voice!! So thank you Joel for saving the day, harmonizing with me and helping me carry the tunes in such an energetic, amazing way! We had great participation from the staff, moms and babies/toddlers today and we had one new toddler who tried out the class and loved it today. I showed the Sruti Box from India as the Instrument of the Week and it was a huge hit! Everyone was into choosing one key to open or close and as a class we created a special chord together.
Today was wonderful as we had two new babies and moms join our class today! Also nice to have consistency with regular attending moms and their babies in the class. The babies had lots of energy and were smiling away during the action songs such as "Flying Babies", "Zoom Zoom Zoom" and "The Grand Old Duke of York". I taught everyone the proper technique of shaking maracas and they were all naturals at it. "Shake it baby Shake it" was a real hit as they got quite into the rhythm and actions of the song.
Everyone was in the spirit of the holidays and Barbara had baked delicious cookies to share. The instrument of the week that I showed was the caxixi and the moms and volunteers were naturals. They picked it up straight away which I was very impressed with. We did a special Jingle Bells activity with body bells on the kids to get into the spirit of the holiday season. One of the babies was very fond of the body bell and shook vigorously throughout the entire song with a giant smile on her face!
I had a wonderful group of moms, toddlers and babies today. They were very enthusiastic and participated with gusto! It was so nice to receive a warm welcome back after I had been sick and had been away the previous 2 weeks. There was a new mom and baby that had come the previous week when Josh filled in for me. It was nice to see some new faces and old returning faces. They were very interested in the Tibetan Singing Bowls that I brought for the Instrument of the Week and once again they proved to be VERY keen on the parachute. The babies and the one toddler went wild at parachute time - giggling, laughing and screaming with delight. Another big hit was "Hands Together, Hands Apart" as one toddler was able to do all of the actions and the moms got a big kick out of watching him perform!
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