“Ms. Hudson, Why Are You Sweating So Much?”

This is a post that I began writing almost a month ago, but I forgot about my blog for a little bit. However, I want to talk about this approach I took in my instruction because it was one of my first real successes in the classroom. Ever since I introduced this less-traditional method of instruction, my kids keep asking me when I am going to teach them a new song.
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Thus far, I am loving the sixth grade. The teachers and other staff members are supportive, and my cooperating teacher encourages me to experiment with the activities I have my students do in class.

When my cooperating teacher told me a couple of weeks ago that I would be teaching the students about prepositions this week, I panicked for a minute. How was I possibly going to get eleven- and twelve-year-olds to memorize this massive list of prepositions when my eighth graders last semester kept confusing them for verbs?

Then I thought back to something my mother and cooperating teacher and numerous other professionals have told me frequently:

“Don’t try to reinvent the wheel.”

So I didn’t.

I “borrowed” part of what my cooperating teacher did for her eighth graders last semester. Through guided instruction, she taught her students to sing the list of prepositions to the tune of “Yankee Doodle” while performing choreographed movements that relate to the prepositions.

One on hand, she did fail to teach the students how to tell the difference between prepositions and verbs—believe me, the kids mixed this up a lot. However, almost every child remembered the whole list of prepositions BECAUSE they were involved in an activity that was repetitive and engaged multiple styles of learning/intelligence.

This brings me to my grammar instruction for my second period class this week. These kids are not in an honors program, and they have major issues with focusing on and completing traditional classroom activities. Although it was a struggle to get them to maintain appropriate behaviors on the first day of learning the song, once that was under control, they were able to learn the entire song/list of prepositions!

This song, coupled with small group instruction, led to an abnormally-high rate of success among even those students who do not study.  

One of the most helpful and insightful pieces of advice Mrs. Ramsay has given me is "Know your students." Already having seen this activity practiced in the classroom, I was very fortunate to have it "in my back pocket". However, if I thought for a moment that my students would not appreciate music and movement, I would never have planned this for them.

That being said, nearly all of my students in my honors classes perform some kind of instrument. Even in my general classes, the vast majority of students appear to have a visceral connection to music. These kids make music with everything they do, from tapping a pencil or foot to singing/humming/whistling in class.

I just gave them an outlet, and that outlet became a learning tool.

If you're interested in watching the Instagram videos of one of my classes performing the preposition song, you can click on the links below!
Preposition Song, Pt. 1
Preposition Song, Pt. 2
Preposition Song, Pt. 3