Halloween Ideas

[00d1u000000rpp3@mckeage@uwyo.edu]

Please share your favorite Halloween related music activities that you use in your classroom. I am always looking for ideas for older kids (5th and 6th grade) so those would be particularly appreciated!

[00d1u000000rpp3@mckeage@uwyo.edu]

My students in every grade level (I don’t attempt with kinder until after Christmas), even sixth graders LOVE playing Night at the Museum. I introduce it around Halloween time and use it as an incentive activity, or for when I have a sub! You will need the song “Alone (Seuls)” from The Chorus (Les Choristes) by Bruno Coulais. You can find it on iTunes. Here are the rules:

Choose one student to be the “janitor.” That student is given one scarf. All of the other students are “statues” and are frozen in their own open space. Sometimes we pick a theme (like Halloween characters), and sometimes they choose their own statue. During the A section of music, the statues are “dusted” with the scarf by the “janitor.” Then during the B section, the “janitor” “falls asleep”, or closes their eyes, and the statues move throughout the room. The teacher chooses a statue while moving. That student is the only student that is allowed to move statue positions Then, when the C section in the music comes, the statues must find their original position except for the chosen student and the “janitor” guesses which student moved. The chosen student is the new leader and the game begins again.

[00d1u000000rpp3@annelise.rhoda@portage.k12.in.us]

I love doing boomwhacker tunes with my upper elementary groups, especially when I am focusing on note reading. Music K-8 is an awesome boomwhacker resource (and just in general). There is a tune called “Whacky Halloween” in Volume 14, no. 1. It is a lot of fun where kids can make weird sounds and just get a little crazy and have fun!

[00d1u000000rpp3@annelise.rhoda@portage.k12.in.us]

I love the idea of night at the museum! I will probably be doing this as a game for time left at the end of class!

[00d1u000000rpp3@annelise.rhoda@portage.k12.in.us]

Another Halloween idea that I liked was one with a book called “The Little old Lady who was not afraid of anything” by Linda Williams. In the book a little old lady is walking home from the forest and encounters shoes that go CLOMP CLOMP, pants that WIGGLE WIGGLE, a shirts that goes SHAKE SHAKE, gloves that go CLAP CLAP, a hat that goes NOD NOD, and a pumpkin head that goes BOO BOO. I read the story with my first and second graders, then as a class we came up with instruments that would fit each sound (Woodblock, boomwhacker, triangle, etc.) Then we read it again adding the instruments to the reading. The kids loved it!

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