Music of the Armed Forces

I am using music of the armed forces with many of my classes this month.  It ties in nicely with election day and Veterans Day.   Most of my students were familiar with a few of the songs and really enjoyed hearing different versions and learning a little about the history of each branch of the military.  Here are the versions I'm using:

Army:  The Army Goes Rolling Along
Marines:  Marine's Hymn
Navy:  Anchors Aweigh
Air Force:  The Air Force Song
Coast Guard:  Semper Paratus

We are using listening glyphs to record our observations about tempo, dynamics, tone color and personal preference.  My 5th and 6th graders really enjoyed doing the glyphs as they rarely have an opportunity to color any more!   It has been eye-opening for me to see how some students respond in this format.  I'm definitely going to explore more ways to use this for listening activities.

I am also using a presentation created by Sara Bibee that coordinates PERFECTLY with my glyphs and the armed forces bulletin board I have displayed.

This handy guided listening unit lets me introduce each branch of the military and show students examples of each of the songs.  My favorite part about this set is that the videos are linked via Safe Share TV.  That means that I don't have to worry about what might pop up at the end of the video as an advertisement.  We have used the same clipart in our projects so the listening unit and listening glyphs look like a seamless unit.