Explain the Song Book to Me

When I posted about our {daily schedule} I mentioned what we do during each part of our day. One of those includes the "Song Book" during large group time. I had a lot of people show interest in what the song book is, so I said I would do a separate blog post on this.

If you are teaching pre-school-- at any age or skill level, you NEED a song book. Even if you're a kinder class, having a song book would make for a great break between activities.

My first year teaching special education pre-school we were using High Scope Curriculum. Our district ordered all kinds of supplies from them. High Scope is really awesome if you've never heard of it and they offer a tremendous amount of resources. We no longer use their assessment system (it was crazy tedious), we use Teaching Strategies GOLD instead, but we still use everything else high scope. I could continue to elaborate on High Scope and what it is, but that would be a huge tangent to this post. I'm just here to share about the Song Book today. :) But let me know if you want more information on it and I'll talk about it more in separate post!

We use the song book during our large group time. Each day there is a child's name velcro'd to the front of the book. That is the child who gets to pick that song that day. This works so well! Every now and then you might have the child who gets upset because it's not their turn (I think that's unavoidable at this age) but after a while they adjust really well to understanding that their turn is coming and you see that behavior decrease.

The Song Book can be ordered from High Scope for $24.99. It includes a page to use for the cover and 25 full page images for common songs to help the children decide on the song they wish to sing. I also have added additional songs to our book, where I create my own images. I put each page inside a page protector in our book.

 

Because High Scope sells this book, and because it would be against my moral compass, I cannot create a similiar product to sell you. BUT if you weren't interested in purchasing, you could easily start something like this on your own. I do really like the simplicity of the images High Scope uses for their songs. They are simple, yet convey each song well.

Now because I am working with students with autism and severe disabilities I have made some adaptations to our song book. Now this is something that I CAN share with you if you are interested in making the same adaptations to your book.

I added a sentence strip to the font of our book, and small PECs to each page with the matching song. This way, I can create a language opportunity for our students who are non-verbal or low verbal and using PECs. We then add the PECs page to this visual support for singing. Students who can use their words to tell me in a sentence what song they have picked will still hand me the PEC that matches the song so we can add it to this visual, they just will not use the sentence strip.

When you purchase my Song Book Supplement Pack you will get a sentence strip, PECs pictures for common songs, and the singing visual.

Click on the picture to find this in my TpT store

Now, if you're thinking, I love this idea, but I really don't know if my students can do this or understand how to pick a song. You're thinking wrong! They can! I have to share this wonderful story with you that happened just this past school year with one of my students.


He is non-verbal, we were starting him on PECs. He was currently using "one communication page" with pictures on either side. Mostly songs actually. He was also working on sitting for carpet time. He had progressed from sitting on a peanut ball with adult support, to sitting in a chair. He had observed other students chose a song from the song book, but he had never had a turn. We working on getting him attend to the group, I hadn't tried teaching the song book to him too.

Then one day during free centers, he takes a chair, slides it to his spot on the carpet, grabs the song book, and sits down in his chair. Picks a song and takes the PEC to an adult. IT WAS AMAZING! It's moments like that, that remind me how much I absolutely love what I do and love working with students with autism.

You can use this resource in any classroom! Make whatever adaptions you need to allow your students to access it!

P.S. Don't forget to enter the giveaway to win a copy of the blorganizer by Schroeder Shenanigans in 2nd! You can click {here} to enter the rafflecopter!

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