Submitted by Merri Purdy, Lake Luzerne, New York
Idea posted July 6, 2006
I used the lyrics to "Katy's Song" from Music K-8, Vol. 16, No. 5 for a quick end-of-the-year writing activity for my fifth, sixth, and seventh grade students. I retyped the lyrics in Microsoft Word and formatted a table to go below each phrase. Students in my general music classes used the boxes below each syllable to enter the new melody (note name) and the fingering (for piano in middle C position) of each note.
Another idea is to have each student rewrite their new melody on staff paper, illustrate it, and place it on a bulletin board. This activity could work very nicely for any melodic instrument such as the recorder, guitar, resonator bells, or xylophone as well.