There are many opinions on this and here is mine. I personally will always post the words because:
1. As soon as I don't need a hymnbook to sing I Know That My Redeemer Lives then I might think about not posting words. This is a great hymn that I have sung for years and years - in choirs, at Girl's Camp, in church, etc. etc. But guess what? I still get some words mixed up so I need to glance every once in awhile at the hymnbook. (I even still get some of the words to I Am A Child Of God mixed up lol) I would definitely consider these two songs as songs that I really KNOW and that I "go to" when I need a boost. 2. Teachers come and teachers go and teachers help control. It is sooo much easier on the teachers if there are words for them to refer to. 3. Your non-singers are more apt to sing. Gives them confidence. For some children memorizing is simply a hard task and it may take two to three times as long for them to get it than you want to give, because then I might lose another group of children to boredom from too much repetition. 4. Less reteaching - sing a song whenever you want. The great thing that happens is that, in my experience, the children actually have more songs that stay with them in the long run with posting words. 5. Not sure that it has ever been printed that to sing a song in Primary it must be memorized. Encouraged to memorize for sure. 6. Memorizing and learning are not the same. 7. More variety = less song fatigue - sing a song whenever you want and don't be limited by only the songs they have memorized. I have way too many songs that I want to sing and I really don't think I could whittle it down :). 8. Learning happens faster and easier using multiple senses. (Why is that Periodic Table Of The Elements still on your wall when you are in a Senior science class? What haven't you had a test on it and memorized it? Of course you have, but to retain it, you need to see it again and again. Word walls build and build not take away and replace. I would be toast if I couldn't look at my cheat sheets when I'm converting metric to standard :) 9. This is my #1 reason: ANYONE who walks into Primary can sing full out with us, whether it be a visitor, an inactive, a nonmember, or a new child. Here are my two stories that will always always stay with me:
I know that my children have more songs memorized at the end of each year because they have been able to see the words and their repertoire is always building.
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This helps me plan and get inspiration as I pray: I have 20 precious minutes with the children each week and my responsibility is to teach The Gospel and to help these precious children increase their testimonies and be ready to defend them. There are some legit fun things that I have chosen not to use any of these precious minutes on. One of the things I have dropped is having a way to pick which song we are singing. I already know what songs are planned for the day - most times except favorites day - so I figured this is not an area I am going to spend any of these minutes on. (Also, this area seems to be more in the crafty area, which I most definitely am not strong in so it was a no brainer that this would be something I would whittle out.) It also helps a ton with smooth transitions. How do people learn the best? 1. By doing - not listening 2. By moving - active learning 3. By singing - Music 100% helps us learn things faster, not talking about music, but actually singing ie ABC song, commercial jingles. 4. By using as many senses as possible My philosophies on less talking leads to more learning during singing time are based on personal experience because this has been my style for years. Sing, Sing, Sing has been on the Church's website under the Primary music calling for years. www.churchofjesuschrist.org/callings/primary/leader-resources/music/teaching-music/planning-primary-music?lang=eng Benefits I have found of less talking: 1. Great engagement and hence more participation - I almost always have the children with me 2. Less behavior management!! - since they are pretty much with me singing, this is easy breezy 3. Natural learning to memorization - We don't spend months working on pretty much only the songs for the program, they just naturally get memorized because we end up singing them enough. 4. More retention - because we sing more, we don't lose the songs we already learned 5. The messages are usually pretty simply stated in the song lyrics so the children learn Gospel messages BY singing the messages. They then really LEARN the songs. (Of course there are times to share and of course there are some words/concepts that need to be defined, but usually not too many.) My last thought on this is line upon line. No one expects a Sunbeam to "get" every word in a song, but if we sing it when they are 4, and then again when they are 6, and then again, and again by the time they are 10 they are going to know it pretty well - both memorization know, and meaning know. It's not a sprint, it's a marathon - keep it up. First of all, I treat teaching the memorization of a song as a marathon and not a sprint. I structure my singing of songs for the year in such a way that the learning comes naturally over the course of the year. I also usually don't spend a singing time learning a song. I will put it into my plan throughout the year and gradually teach the message and they will naturally learn the rest. The tips on this page can be used this way, or they can be used if you would rather do the teach all at once, or in a month, method. (I just found I have way better retention if I sing more songs and wrap them in through the year where they fit the message.) To start with my go to method to teach the melody is to sing it with a recorded version 2-3 times before I actually want to use it in Singing time. I do this in the transition time between Sacrament Meeting and Primary as they are coming in. Flip charts and the recording and after 2-3 times they are pretty familiar with "how" it sounds and they have a start on the words. I put "learning" a song into 3 categories: 1. A song that you sing OCCASIONALLY because it enhances your singing time. A specific example of this is Saturday. It is a super good song when I'm teaching about The Sabbath Day, but not one I would normally use. In this case we would simply sing it for that singing time to reinforce the message of the day. 2. A song that I want them to become FAMILIAR WITH and through time they would eventually memorize it. By time I mean perhaps a year or two. This year it was Follow His Light. I actually thought I wanted to do it all this year, but other songs came up and I'm content to work on it over the course of a couple of years. 3. A song that we are preparing to sing somewhere ie Sacrament meeting, Ward Christmas party. Also, I feel like each year there should be some new songs that are taught specifically to MEMORIZATION IN A YEAR. A specific example of this would be Come Follow Me this year. Even if we hadn't used it in the program. So with those clarifications here goes some of the things that I do - many of these are teacher tricks that I use in my day job :) For all categories: I submit the songs that we are singing the following week into the Ward Bulletin. So this past Sunday were songs for next Sunday. That way the children can be listening to them over the week and perhaps families can use them in their Gospel studies. Songs That We Occasionally Use - Eventually they will get more words memorized
Songs That I Want Them To Become Familiar With - no time deadline So my best example for this, is one of our songs this year - I Will Build An Ark. This is a song that is a great song for many different lessons, the children like it, and the chorus is great for the youngest ones. It is also one that would be GREAT during the Old Testament. Here are some of the things we will do this year when we sing it - meaning we will be doing all of these things on separate days, maybe do 2 of them on the same day:
Songs We Want To Teach To Memorization - with a time deadline
Teaching The Meaning
Now with all of this being said, there have been good times and there have been not so good times. For instance we were going to sing like a cowboy, but realized that it was super hard with the song I had paired it with. So we just sang with gusto instead! Anywho this are pretty much my go to things. Most don't really need props so I can do them planned, or unplanned, and switch it up at a moment's notice. |
Here are my tried and true tips/tricks based upon my past experience, CFM, Preach My Gospel, and also using my teaching strategies/philosophies that I also use in my day job.
Most are simple directed listening (Focused Attention) based for easy memorization and then also focusing in on topics for internalization of the Gospel messages. Lot's of my different ideas on a few pages :) Archives
March 2021
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