Summer has Arrived

Ahhh, summer! These three months are by far my favorite of the entire year, and I start counting down the days around, oh, February. I have so many wonderful summer memories: long, lazy days at the neighborhood pool with my friends, vacations with family, my beautiful August wedding last year…just to name a few. I’ve already begun making memories for Summer 2009, even though technically, it began just yesterday!

The song I wrote for this season is happy and chill, perfectly reflecting my feelings about summer. I hope you like it! Take a listen:

Do you know the warmest season of all?
It’s not winter, spring, or fall.
It comes in June and sticks around
Until September leaves are down on the ground.

It’s summer, it’s summer,
When the sun’s hot rays brighten all of our days.
It’s summer, it’s summer,
So jump in the pool to keep yourself cool,
While you sing this summertime tune.

June, July and August days are so long,
The sprinklers are going strong.
The grass needs water and so do we
So we’re healthy and we have energy.

CHORUS

Playing outside can be so much fun,
Unless you get burnt by the sun.
So wear your sunscreen, protect your skin,
‘Cause if you don’t, you’ll have to stay in.

CHORUS

I had to include the bit about sunscreen, especially after resisting it for so many years of my childhood. Now more than ever, it’s so important for children to be protected in the sun…but I’m sure I don’t have to tell you that! But back to the topic of music. I have an entire playlist on my iPod dedicated to the hottest days of the year. What are your favorite summertime tunes? Please do share!

Counting Time: Baseballs

There are a few things that really epitomize my favorite season (summer, of course) and one of them just happens to be baseball. I come from a long line of St. Louis Cardinals fans, and although I married a die-hard Chicago Cubs fan, we are able to live in harmony thanks to our mutual love of the game :) But I digress. It’s counting time, and since America’s favorite pastime is at its peak right about now, we’re counting baseballs today. Batter up!

Counting time, it’s counting time,
So let’s all sing this simple rhyme.
Ten little baseballs in a row,
Now let’s count them nice and slow:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.
Again!
1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10.

How many baseballs?
Ten little baseballs.
All lined up in a row!

I’ve been to a couple games so far this season, and hopefully there will be at least a few more before the summer’s end. In fact, I was invited to one of my students’ baseball games this evening. Just one of the many joys of summer…they are countless!

There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly

I really enjoy blogging about the resources I use most often, especially books, and apparently, people enjoy reading about them! My two top posts in terms of hits (usually as a result of Google searches) are I Know an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Pie and Is Your Mama a Llama?, which just happen to be two of my favorite books.

I have another book to add to the vault…one you’ve probably read or heard time and again. This particular version of There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly is colorfully illustrated by Pam Adams and is from the Books with Holes series, published by Child’s Play International. You can find a link to the book on Amazon here. I love that this book has thick (but not overly so) pages and is rather large – it gets the attention of my student and keeps it for the duration of the story.

Each phrase in the book ends with “perhaps she’ll die”. I don’t feel that this is appropriate for young children (though it is the traditional verse), so I always substitute “cry” for “die”.

This book is a wonderful tool for animal and color identification, memorization skills, attention to task, reading sight words, and more. It is effective because the illustrations are visually stimulating, and the story is just plain fun :)

The Shakin’ Song

Yesterday as I was making plans for summer music therapy, I decided that I needed a new song to rock out to with shakers. Because you can never have enough of them, you know? I wanted something upbeat (obviously…we’re playing shakers here!) and fun; luckily this tune came pouring out.

Shakers are for shakin’,
Shakin’ right along,
This song is all about shakin’,
You might call it the shakin’ song.
Ba-doo-ba dop, dop, da dop dow,
Shake-a those shakers now!

We’re gonna shake shake shake
Like a puppy’s tail.
Side to side, it never fails
To shake the whole day through, ooh, ooh ohh!
Shakin’ like me and you.

CHORUS

We’re gonna shake shake shake
Like a scaredy-cat,
Who’s scared of this, and scared of that.
He shakes until he’s blue, ooh, ooh ohh!
Shakin’ like me and you.

CHORUS

We’re gonna shake shake shake
Like two hands that greet,
And say hello, it’s nice to meet,
‘Cause that’s the right thing to do, ooh, ooh ohh!
Shakin’ like me and you.

CHORUS

I had all kinds of ideas for how I was going to spend the weekend, but here it is, Saturday morning, and I’m right back in my office, blogging away. What can I say; I just can’t resist!

America, the Beautiful

I’m always looking towards the next major (or minor) holiday with anticipation, because holidays mean special songs to go with them. And everyone knows that one of the biggest days of summer is the Fourth of July. I love this particular holiday because there are so many great songs just waiting to be played and sung. Recently, Songs for Teaching asked me to record a few for their website, and I was more than happy to do so. Follow the links to listen to a sample of each:

America the Beautiful

The Star-Spangled Banner

When Johnny Comes Marching Home

The Battle Hymn of the Republic

I have strong memories that accompany many of the patriotic songs we all know and love, and I bet you do, too. A few include being the designated high note hitter whenever my high school choir performed the “Star-Spangled Banner” (though I doubt I could hit that note these days!), playing “Yankee Doodle” obsessively on the piano as a little girl, and middle school choreography to “You’re A Grand Old Flag”. Ahh, memories!

What are your favorite patriotic tunes?