World Music Resources for free and on sale today!

I'm so excited! 29 different music sellers on TeachersPayTeachers have been giving away free and half-off files each day in October, and today it's my turn to share with you! Have you been downloading all the files this month? I have gotten some awesome new resources for my own classroom. If you haven't, don't worry- you still have a few more days. There will be new free and half-off resources for music teachers every day until October 13th. Just search for "13nights" on TeachersPayTeachers to see the files available that day. Along with mine, there are some great files from Music Teacher Resources available today too!

My free file today is a collection of resources for teaching the Japanese folk song, "Donguri Korokoro". This song is a really fun one because of the song of the words (just try saying "korokoro" over and over again). I learned it in early elementary school, along with every other child in Japan, and still love it! The song has the "syncopa" pattern in it, which makes it a great way to practice syncopation, or subtly introduce it in the younger grades without overtly presenting it.

My other new file is 50% off and it is another Japanese folk song called, "Akatonbo (or alternatively phonetically spelled Akatombo...)". This song is near and dear to my heart, as I know it is for many other people in Japan. I learned this one in elementary school as well and it is a beautiful, peaceful song about a dragonfly at sunset, and fond memories of childhood. We used to sing it in a round around the campfire at dusk- just hearing it now makes me feel cozy. This song lends itself nicely to several teaching concepts, for which I have included teaching resources: the song is pentatonic, in triple meter, and can be sung in a round. I've also included some percussion accompaniment parts to create an ensemble performance in your classroom.

Both of these resource sets include recordings of a native speaker speaking the words from the text for you and your students to practice and singing the song with the original text, slides to use as powerpoints or interactive whiteboard files to teach the song and a variety of concepts, and fully editable worksheets to accompany the song. I hope you find these to be a helpful addition to your classroom library and that your students enjoy them as much as mine do!

Did you ever get a chance to go see my guest post over on The Yellow Brick Road? My post was all about my thoughts on teaching world music. Go check it out here and share your thoughts!