I love using songs in Spanish in my elementary music lessons. I have a high percentage of Spanish-speaking students in my school, and the students who don't speak Spanish are still usually familiar enough with the language that it's easy for them to learn the lyrics and a fun way to learn some new vocabulary while practicing musical skills and concepts. Here are 3 Spanish language songs I use with my Kindergarten classes year-round (not just during Hispanic Heritage Month!) to teach specific musical concepts.
1. Ambos a Dos
I use this song to practice identifying call and response songs. After they've learned echo songs and call and response songs and the definition of each, I have them listen to a recording of the song and hold up one finger when they hear one person singing alone, and hold up all their fingers when they hear a group singing. Then I ask them to figure out if the song is echo or call and response and have them listen and show their fingers again to pay attention to whether the 2 parts are the same or different, and they identify it as call and response. I show them how to walk and kick in a line to play the accompanying game and I move with the solo part while they move with the group part along with the recording. By the time they've done all of that they've heard the recording enough times to easily learn the first verse, so we sing it in call and response form by having the students sing the call (because the words are easier) and I sing the response. You can see links to the recordings I use, the video of the game, and more information on the song in this blog post.
2. De Colores
When I first did this lesson a few years ago with Kindergarten it was mostly just a quick bonus activity to incorporate a bit more Spanish language into my Hispanic Heritage Month lessons with Kindergarten without much curricular purpose, but I have come back to it every year since as a way to incorporate experience with triple meter and introduce the concept of echoing, and I could never have predicted how enchanted all of my students are with this little activity! It's also a great way to give my youngest students some familiarity with a very well-known song in many Spanish speaking countries- most years there is at least one Spanish speaking student who recognizes the song from learning it at home and is so excited to hear it at school. I show students this video (starting when the song begins) and tell students to sway with the music, then echo when they hear the color names. They are always so excited when they hear it switch to Spanish halfway through! I review the Spanish words for the colors after they do it the first time, then I hand out scarves to each student so we have all 6 of the mentioned colors, and I tell them to do it again but this time when we echo the name of their scarf color they should wave it in the air, and sway their scarf back and forth in the first part as well.
Some students will naturally start singing along the second time through as well because the words are on the screen in the video, but I don't spend any time teaching the song because the main purpose of the lesson activity is experiencing the triple meter feel with the swaying and introducing the term and practicing the skill of echoing with the color names.
3. Caminando Va
I love this song so much. You can head to this blog post for all of the recordings and lesson ideas I've done with different grade levels using this song, but for Kindergarten I use it to practice performing and identifying quarter and paired eighth notes. I teach them a fingerplay that includes clapping with the phrase "el caracolito" with 2 paired eighth notes followed by 2 quarter notes (see the full demonstration of the fingerplay with the clapping starting at minute 3 of this video), first by having them just follow my hands while I sing, then teaching them the singing as well. Once they've learned it, I break down the phrase we clapped one beat at a time and have them identify how many claps they did for each beat and notate it with paired eighth and quarter notes using rhythm cards like these DIY ones I made (and use all the time with multiple grades!). Because it's such a simple phrase it is a great introduction to rhythm dictation and an easy way for students to aurally identify rhythms after they've just been introduced.
Once we've done that, I always finish by playing them the full recording by Marta Gomez that includes the fingerplay song at the beginning and then launches into a full-length song. We sing along with the opening fingerplay and then I tell them to grab a scarf and dance "like a snail enjoying the sunshine". The looks on their faces are priceless!
I hope this gives you some new ideas to incorporate more Spanish language into your Kindergarten music lessons! There are plenty more that I've done but these are definitely my favorites to come back to every year. If you want to see all of the lesson ideas, choir songs, and performance ideas using Spanish (and many other languages) I've shared over the years, you can see them all listed by language here.
No comments :
Post a Comment