Magical Music Classroom Reveal

Back to school time is so exciting!  This year I decided to use a magical theme for my music room.  Not exactly magic as in wizards and spells, but more of a celebration of mystical, musical creatures.  This year I've decorated with unicorns, gnomes, dragons, mermaids (and mermen) and narwhals.  It has been a lot of fun!  Take a peek at my room.

 This is the front of my room.  I used some stone wall paper to create a castle using the two bulletin boards and the space above my Smartboard.

 As you enter the room I have a small table set up for pencils, singing sticks and other odds and ends that we may use as the school year goes on.

Dynamic narwhals, tempo mermaids and unicorn ensembles are the perfect addition to my Magical Music room!  They come separately or you can get them in a bundle too.

I upgraded my crayon storage boxes this year.  For the last five or six years I've used plastic travel containers for soap.  This year I decided to go up to index card boxes.  I love that there is a little bit more room.  I also added a little reminder to keep the crayons in the box instead of dumping them out.

I love to have a reference board up for the lines and spaces of the treble clef staff.  This year it features gnomes.  Take a closer look.

Have a Magical Time in Music bulletin board.

For the last three years I have had some kind of growth mindset bulletin board up in my classroom.  It is such a great reminder to students and also to me!  This year I used dragons to help students change their mindset.  The title (which is a little tricky to read with the glare) says "Is Your Mindset Dragon You Down?"

On the side of my room I just used a bit of the stone wall paper to add some interest. 

Positive song lyrics!  My kiddos love these and I'll catch them "getting" what song one of the posters if from and smiling.  Love that!  See them here.

This bulletin board will hold the titles of Songs of the Month.  I'll start with the "Star Spangled Banner" in September.  The border and bulletin board pieces are from Creative Teaching Press.

In this corner I store my Orff instruments, steady beat swords, pool noodle ponies, Boomwhackers and right now, my piano.

My ukulele storage is actually a drying rack from Walmart.  I padded it will pool noodles and added numbers on the noodles and on the ukuleles so that students know where to put their ukes.  

I love these mermaid themed borders but didn't have anything mermaid to hang up.  I took an old bulletin board, Meet the Composers, and gave it a new title.  I think it turned out great.

This is my reading corner.  I added some sequined pillows that add some sparkle.  I decided to sort a few of my books into categories this year.  I think that I may use them during centers time. 

I hope you've enjoyed a peek at my classroom.  You can find most of the decor items that I'm using in my classroom this year in this bundle:

If you like these ideas, you might want to pin this post for later!

Poison Rhythms

Poison Rhythm is one of my favorite rhythm activities ever.  Students are so completely engaged.  They will read and perform dozens of patterns over and over without complaint.  Read on to learn more about this exciting game.

How to play poison rhythm:

1.  Choose a poison rhythm and write it on the board.
2. Have students practice this pattern by clapping and saying it several times.
3. Explain that once the game starts that they can’t clap or say this rhythm.  If they do YOU get a point.  If no one in the class claps or says the poison rhythm, the class gets a point.
4. Erase the rhythm and either show flashcards (that have a few copies of that rhythm in it) or clap the rhythm and let them decide from just listening while you echo.

I decided that using the flashcards was cumbersome, so I created a digital version.  That was SO much easier.  The play is pretty much the same except the PDF walks you through the beginning steps and there’s a theme for each set of games.  

Take a look at this video to see how I introduce/review this game with a class:

There are MANY variations to this game.  You can do a quick search on Facebook or Google to see the variations.

Instead of just clapping the rhythms, I like to mix it up.  Sometimes we will use buckets and drum sticks, tubanos, other non-pitched percussion instruments, Boomwhackers and sometimes we turn our chairs around backwards, sit facing the screen and use drumsticks on the back of our chairs. AWESOME!

If you are interested in using my digital versions (that you could also print if you wanted) take a look here:  Poison Rhythms.