Carnival Of the Animals: Part 1

Ah, spring! The weather gets gorgeous, life gets very busy, and students get antsy. I like to do a lot of movement lessons to counteract the craziness. Carnival of the Animals is perfect for this, and is a great way to review musical opposites and steady beat. Here’s what I do for the first few movements with my kiddos.

Lion listening map

Lion/Introduction

Focus: Steady beat                                          Prop: Hands, then scarves

Questions: How does a lion move? How would a lion keep a steady beat? When is there a “roar” in the music? How do you know?

For the introduction, students do “jazz hands” to show the piano line (and you try not to giggle at 25 5-year-olds doing jazz hands), then move their hands up and down in smooth motions for the strings. We don’t focus on this part as much, but the kids love to do it when we perform the Lion once we have the movements down.

For Lion, we start by finding the roar in the music. We add in an “I’m so proud of my roar” pose after each roar, and then find the steady beat. I like to have the kids move to a half note pulse so they have a little time to make their movements interesting. We talk about how lions move, and practice moving our shoulders and arms to make our lion walk more interesting. Students also explore levels, while moving and during the roar. Once students have practiced the dance in their own space, we move in a circle. Before each roar, a leader (teacher or later a student) calls out if the roar will face out, in, or up. This looks so cool! Once students are comfortable, we add in scarves.

Hens and Roosters

Focus: Short and long sounds             Prop: Hands, then scarves

Questions: Are most of the sounds long or short? When do you hear long sounds? When do you hear short sounds?

This movement is pretty simple: students “peck” towards the floor with hand-beaks during the short sounds, and freeze during the long note of the clarinet solo. (They could also freeze during the longer violin notes, but since there’s short notes as well I let them choose. AKA they keep going fast.) Once students are familiar and comfortable with the music, we upgrade our beaks to scarves. If students show they can be safe and not run, they move around the room. Students who run or are unsafe have to peck food from the chicken coop, a carpet square off to the side. With my visual, a student leader moves the star to show when students are moving and when they are frozen.

Donkey

Focus: Higher and lower                                 Prop: Mini animals, scarves

Questions: Does the melody stay on one note for very long? If the melody gets higher, does it start high or low? If the melody gets lower, does it start high or low?

This movement is great for higher and lower. After an initial listen, students draw an imaginary ladder on the floor. Depending on the class or grade, I sometimes give them paper glockenspiels instead. Students then take a mini animal (mine are from oriental trading) and have them move up and down the ladder depending on if the sound gets higher or lower. A student leader moves the donkey within the visual. We then move on to scarves, moving in the air instead of on the floor.

Tortoises

Focus: Fast and Slow, AB                                 Prop: Tinsel Wands

Questions: Is this music fast or slow? How are Tortoises and the Can-can similar and how are they different? The composer created Tortoises to be a musical joke. Why is it funny?

Man, I love this piece! We listen to the Can-Can first, since it was written first. Then we listen to the A section and compare the two. The piece is AB form, so that can also be a focus. The movement for the A section is two small circles and one larger, slower circle. That movement repeats the entire section. For the B section, students slowly trace geometric shapes. (This is an easy cross-curricular opportunity with art and math!) If students are really on the ball, I’ll let them trace create their own organic shapes. We use tinsel wands, but scarves can work as well.

Scarf Folding

I always have students fold their scarves before they put them away. We use the song below, though you could easily use another listening example as you fold.

Lit Lesson: Blue Hat, Green Hat

It is very important for primary kiddos to have opportunities to experiment with instruments. We spend so much time teaching kids how to play instruments correctly… but what really intrigues them, of course, is how to do it dead wrong. I’ve found that you can constantly correct, or you can find ways for students to experiment with how it feels to play incorrectly so they know what not to do without constant reminders. They’ve already done it wrong, so there’s not a need to do it later. Blue Hat, Green Hat is a great way to do just that. (Get it from Amazon here.)

The premise of this book is very simple. Four friends are trying on clothes that are blue, green, yellow, and red. Three always do it correctly, but one always finds a way to mess it up. The colors change each page, so the “oops” is a different color each time.

After we read the book, the students are sorted into four groups: Red, Yellow, Green, and Blue. We do a movement that corresponds to the clothing item (like moving your head for the hat). The three colors that are “correct” do the correct movement. The “oops” color gets to do a silly movement instead. Once they have the concept down, we move to instruments. The correct colors play their instruments the correct way, and the “oops” group gets to play their instrument incorrectly. I make sure to stress that you can be silly, but you can’t hurt the instrument or any humans. The example I use with the kids is blowing into a guiro instead of scraping it.

I love how versatile this book is. You can have all the kids have the same instrument or have each group play different instruments. Students could play each time or be sorted into color coded groups. I have also done this book as an exercise in how to hold mallets. I eventually split students into color groups, because it makes an easy transition to Elmer the Patchwork Elephant. I like to use a lesson I saw Thom Borden present with that book that involves color-coded groups composing using colored squares. This lays the groundwork for it, and is a great activity by itself.

I hope your students have fun making experimenting with “oops”!