Ode to ASL

My Primary-related project I want to do this year is to take videos of myself signing Primary songs in case they might be helpful to some googling chorister out there, which is how I stumbled upon how easy it is to teach using ASL. I have taught SO many songs using ASL signs, and I just swear by it. It is so simple, so easy, so beautiful to watch, so fun to do, and so effective for learning the lyrics. A few songs they have learned using ASL...

-As a Child of God (the first one I did! inspired by a YouTube video I have linked in a past post, and which I'll link again when I'm posting from my PC since I haven't figured out linking on my Blogger app)

-Had I Been a Child

-Choose the Right

-I Stand All Amazed

-I Feel My Savior's Love

-I Know Heavenly Father Loves Me

-When I Am Baptized (kinda...a few ASL signs, not as many as usual, this is one I did five years ago when I was first in Primary. "rainbows," "rain," "clean")

-Sing Your Way Home (love this one!!)

-God Is Watching Over All (also ADORE this one!)

-these are the only ones I can think of off the top of my head. I'm pretty sure there are more!

Had I Been a Child

I'm excited to teach the kids a brand-new song (brand-new to me and them anyway), "Had I Been a Child," starting next week. I'm going to use ASL signs to teach it. Probably this week will just be the first verse. I'm hoping to have it ready for Easter. I'm not sure if they'll sing in sacrament meeting, since they never have since I've been the music leader, but I'd like them to. We'll see! If nothing else, we will enjoy it in Primary.

1. Had I been a child when Jesus came
Unto the Nephites that blessed day
And showed them the wounds in his hands and his feetAnd knelt with them to pray

2. Then he might have held me safe in his arms;
He might have looked in my eyes and said
A word, with his blessing of kindness and love,
His hands placed upon my head.

3. Someday, when the Savior comes again,
Oh, how I hope that my heart will be
As pure as the hearts of the children that day
Who gathered around his knee.

Signs: (mostly found at signingsavvy.com--love that site!)

I

child

Jesus

come

bless

day

show

wounds

hands

feet

kneel

pray

hold

safe

arms

look

eyes

word

blessing

kindness

love

hands

head

Savior

come

heart

pur

heart

children

day

around

knee

Where Do You Belong?

I ran across an old Senior Primary singing time which I thought was really successful. "The Church of Jesus Christ" was a program song a few years ago and I got this idea from a blog somewhere--unfortunately I'm really not sure although it's likely it was The Crazy Chorister, who was my muse for at least the first year I was chorister.

Anyway, I printed out the Church logo extra large--I think I enlarged it on the photocopier at church and it was probably on an 11x17 sheet. Then I covered it up with several easily recognizable "worldly" ;) logos which I found on Google Images. Here's the list I have in my files--I won't upload the actual images since that would take too long and I already should be getting ready for church right about now:

Apple

Mercedes

McDonald’s

Disney

Target

Wii

Xbox

Barbie

Bakugan

iCarly

The Suite Life

Hannah Montana

Guitar Hero

High School Musical

Washington Redskins

Halo

Lego

Where the Wild Things Are

Fantastic Mr. Fox

Yu-Gi-Oh!

Anyway, I taped all the logos so that they covered the Church logo. As we sang "The Church of Jesus Christ," I walked around with my poster and offered it to various kids inviting them to take one. Each took one until the Church logo was revealed. We had a nice talk about where we "belong," what we value and how long things of the world last versus things of eternity. I am 99.9% sure that I didn't use this activity for junior Primary, I think we did something else, but it was a nice opportunity to talk about the meaning of the song for the senior kids, who already knew the song anyway.

Choose the Right

I forgot to post about how I taught "Choose the Right." It occurred to me that I could use ASL for this song too. Several of the key words in "Choose the Right" are the same as the ones in "As a Child of God," which we learned ASL key words for. Here are the signs I chose: (repeated signs are marked by parentheses)

Choose
Right
(Choice - same sign as Choose)
Before
(Right)
Holy Spirit
Light
Forever
O'er (over)
(Right)
Heart
Confides
(Choose)
(Right)
(Choose)
(Right)
Wisdom
Way
(Before)
Light
(Choose)
(Right)
God
Bless
(Evermore - same sign as Forever)

For comparison, some of the signs in this song that we already learned in "As a Child of God" are:

Choose
Right
Holy Ghost
Light
Heart
God
Bless

Both senior and junior Primary learned the first verse and the chorus during singing time. Easy and fun.

There is a great site for learning ASL signs, signingsavvy.com. In order to use the actual site to find signs you need to become a member, but if you just Google the word you are looking for plus "ASL" (for example, "choose ASL" or "right ASL") then one of the top options is a link to signingsavvy.com, which then provides a tiny, short video of a person signing that word.

I also found another great resource for finding signs, ASL Dictionary for the Deaf for the Book of Mormon. This gives synonyms for words that are unique to the Book of Mormon or LDS culture. Then you can look up the sign for the synonym instead of a tricky word like "abhorreth" (for example).

Amazing. I love it! I love being a Primary chorister with the Internet! Imagine if I had to be a Primary chorister and figure this stuff all out on my own...

The "Vigor and Vim" Song

Yikes!! It has been a few weeks since I posted.

Last week I taught the kids "Hum Your Favorite Hymn" (or as my 5-year-old calls it, "the vigor and vim song"). I found this idea on Sugar Doodle: Hum Your Favorite Hymn Visual Aid, which I loved and quickly adapted to my simplicity requirement.

If I had had the time or inclination I really love the way she did it, but to simplify it I drew a large picture of a face on the chalkboard (in senior Primary I had some kids come up and draw it for me) and then just stuck the pictures up with a magnet on the face's forehead as we sang. Super easy and really fun. For the first line ("if on occasion you have found your language is in question"), I wrote each word out and had the kids repeat after me one by one, since it's sort of a confusing line. We talked about what it means (e.g., "if sometimes you say something or think something that isn't so great") and went over each word individually. The rest of the song was pretty easy to teach with the image ideas from the Sugar Doodle link.

The kids especially liked the purple hippo, pink elephant thing, and in fact I printed out pictures of a purple hippo and a pink elephant and put those up on the face too, which they thought was funny. They also quite enjoyed the phrase "vigor and vim." By the end of singing time they all had the entire verse mastered.

I have mentioned to my kids many, many times that the songs they learn in Primary will help them throughout their lives. President Packer has said on a few occasions, including one of our stake conferences a few years ago, that a favorite hymn can be like a "delete key" in our brains. I have used this tool throughout my own life. For me, it is not necessarily my "favorite" hymn, but the first lines of "A Child's Prayer" always come to me when I need comfort or help. "Heavenly Father, are you really there?" It has been such a blessing in my life and I love to remind my Primary kids that they can use that tool as well. It's as simple as choosing a song and turning to it whenever things get haywire up there in our brains.

As a Child of God - simplified ASL

New year, new resolution to post every week! Really! This time I really will! This is what I am planning to do today. I have used a few ASL signs here and there on past songs ("When I Am Baptized" and "My Mother Dear") but despite the many hours spent watching Signing Time videos when my kids were toddlers, I am really not very familiar with the language, although I love it. This is a very simplified ASL version of "As a Child of God" posted by another chorister. I think the senior Primary will be really good with it and I am hoping the juniors like it too.

 

Happy New Year!

Saturday Pictionary

Well, I'm trying. I think maybe I need to set an alarm on my phone to remind myself to post each week about what I did in singing time.

Have I said that already?

This week I planned to do a Halloween sort of thing, I had these paper jack-o-lanterns left over from last year and thought maybe I would do Spin the Teacher with them. (Spin the Teacher is a big favorite with my kids, an idea I got from The Crazy Chorister long ago.) But then I was checking my blog reader on Sunday morning and saw a new post from Camille's Primary Ideas about teaching the song "Saturday". I thought it sounded perfect so I blatantly copied it. The kids loved it! Some of them were familiar with the song already but practically none of them knew the actual words.

To sum up, I had slips of paper with lines from the song:

clean the house

shop at the store 

brush our clothes

shine our shoes

trim our nails

shampoo our hair

and we basically played Pictionary. For Junior Primary I had the teachers come up and draw. For Senior Primary I had the kids draw. It was really fun.

In Junior Primary we sang the song a little at a time, over and over to really get it into their heads. For example, once we learned the lines about cleaning and shopping, we sang up to that point. Then when we learned the lines about brushing clothes and shining shoes, we sang again from the beginning up to that point. Etc. That took up all of singing time. For Senior Primary I didn't think we needed to sing it quite so many times, so we drew all the pictures before singing the song all the way through. Then we had a little time left over, so I chose kids to make up their own "chores" (they whispered them in my ear first to make sure they were appropriate) and draw them. Then we sang our own made-up verse.

Also, before we started in Senior Primary I asked all the kids who had their own Children's Songbooks to hold them up in the air. Then I pretended to collect them, and kids who didn't have Children's Songbooks also pretended to turn theirs in. It's great sometimes to have the kids have their own songbooks, but for something like Pictionary that kinda ruins the game.

Also, both Junior and Senior Primary got a kick out of pretending to shampoo their hair. That kind of surprised me but it was fun.

I love using the chalkboard because it's so simple and the kids love it. Definitely a successful day.

Keep the Beat - simplified

For the second week of August, we reviewed the first and second verses of "Did Jesus Really Live Again?" with a technique I found on Divine Secrets of a Primary Chorister: Keep the Beat. (Good for reviewing songs and also good for introducing songs.)

It's common knowledge and scientific fact that the more parts of our brains we use while learning, the better our brains retain the learned knowledge--hence the popularity of mnemonic devices in memorization. Rhymes, music, and rhythms make it especially easy to memorize words. We already have rhymes and music on our side when learning Primary songs; adding rhythms just locks the words even tighter into our brains.

Keep the Beat is especially good for teaching more boisterous songs like "To Be a Pioneer"--in fact, when I taught that one for Pioneer Day, we did use Keep the Beat, but that's a topic for another post. Anyway, I thought it could also be useful even in more reverent songs like "Did Jesus Really Live Again?"--but instead of making it complicated (which I will detail in the "To Be a Pioneer" post, yet to be written...), I made it as simple as possible. Junior Primary was especially simple, and Senior Primary was a little more advanced.

Junior Primary:

I divided the kids into two groups and assigned a 4-count beat to each group. The group on the left had lap-clap-lap-clap ("lap" being slapping their hands on their laps); the group on the right had lap-lap-clap-clap. It sounds really basic but it was more than enough for the majority of these kids--the bulk of our Junior Primary are 3, 4, and 5 years old.

Then I did a variation on the Teachers vs. Kids theme of the previous week, by having the 2 halves of the room each sing a line in turn. Left side of the room sang 1st line, right side of the room sang 2nd line, left side sang 3rd line, etc. And of course we added the beats. The left side sang their lines with lap-clap-lap-clap (done twice for each line). The right side sang their lines with lap-lap-clap-clap. It was great and everyone got into it.

Another note: most of the lines of this song begin on the upbeat, and we didn't clap until the downbeat. So that gave us a chance to talk about upbeats and downbeats.

Once we had done that a few times, I had everyone sing every line and do the corresponding beat for that line--two 4-count beats for each line. To wit:

(lap-clap-lap-clap) Did Jesus really live again?

(lap-lap-clap-clap) Yes, when the third day came.

(lap-clap-lap-clap) He wakened and He left the tomb;

(lap-lap-clap-clap) He called Mary's name.

We did it a few more times until they really had the first 2 verses.

With the remaining time, once they had settled down from all the clapping and slapping, I explained that the third verse was an especially reverent verse because it talked about the nail prints in Jesus's hands. We reviewed the ASL sign for "Jesus" and talked about how it represents the nail prints. Then I had them touch their side as we did the line "and a spear wound in His side." Then we asked the question again: Did Jesus really live again after He had died? And the answer is not just "Yes" but "OH yes--and so shall I." We sang it a couple of times through (no beats) until they had it.

Senior Primary:

I divided the kids into two groups and picked a leader for each group. Each group then had 2 minutes to come up with a 4-count beat--and I asked that it not be too complicated. So our pianist played "...Live Again" for 2 minutes while the groups auditioned to their respective group leaders. When the 2 minutes was up, I invited the 2 group leaders to come up and demonstrate their 4-count beat to the whole room.

Then I did a variation on the Teachers vs. Kids theme of the previous week, by having the 2 halves of the room each sing a line in turn. Left side of the room sang 1st line, right side of the room sang 2nd line, left side sang 3rd line, etc. And of course we added the beats. The left side sang their lines with their particular 4-count beat (done twice for each line). The right side sang their lines with their 4-count beat.

Again, I talked about upbeats and downbeats, going a little more into detail with the older kids than I had with the younger kids and making it more of an interactive discussion.

Once we had done that a few times, I had the group leaders come up again so they could help demonstrate their beats. I had everyone sing the entire song, alternating the beats again, but this time everyone had to sing each line and do the corresponding beat, even if it was the opposing group's beat. Since I have no idea whether I explained that correctly, here's a breakdown--remember, each line has a 4-count beat done twice.

Beat 1. Did Jesus really live again?

Beat 2. Yes, when the third day came.

Beat 1. He wakened and He left the tomb;

Beat 2. He called Mary's name.

It was tricky...especially because the kids had come up with fancy beats! I knew that they would do complicated beats despite my instructions--that's why I only had them sing in 2 groups and do 2 beats, because 4 groups and 4 beats would have been a little too much. Examples of beats these kids have come up with:

Lap-clap-snap-stomp

Stomp-bam (right fist hits left side of chest)-snap-snap

Tap head-tap shoulders-snap-clap

Clap-snap-stomp-stomp

For verse 3, I did the same as I had with the junior kids, letting them calm down and then talking about the 3rd verse before learning it and singing it (without beats).

As complicated as it was to explain on a blog post just now, it was really not very complicated at all to explain in person or to do. And, no bulky visual aids to cart around church--even better!

Did Jesus Really Live Again?

The song we chose for August is "Did Jesus Really Live Again?" (p. 64). It's short and simple and to the point, and very easy to teach.

To introduce the song, I talked about various miracles that Jesus did (the topic for August is miracles), and showed pictures from the Gospel Art Kit--Jesus healing the lepers, raising Lazarus and Jairus's daughter from the dead, etc. We talked about miracles He had done and I asked them what the greatest miracle was that He did on the earth. The answer: His suffering, death, and resurrection so that we can all live with Him again someday.

I picked several pictures from the Gospel Art Kit to represent lines from the song: Jesus appearing to Mary, the empty tomb, Jesus showing His hands and feet to the apostles, and the painting "The Second Coming." (If I had had enough ink in my printer I would have found clip-art online so that there was a specific picture for each line.) I invited kids to hold up the pictures as we sang the song. Often when I introduce a song, I talk about the words first. It was easy to concentrate on the lyrics for this song because of its simplicity. Some lines are even in a question-answer format: Did Jesus really live again? Yes! When? When the third day came. What did He do next? He wakened and He left the tomb; He called Mary's name. The second verse is similarly arranged.

Once we had talked about the lyrics, I said we would be dividing up into teachers vs. kids. The teachers sang the first line, the kids sang the second line, teachers sang the third, kids sang the fourth. This way, everyone only had to remember 2 lines at a time, but also got to hear the other lines each time we sang it.

Clearly nothing fancy, but it did the job and the kids learned all the words to the first and second verses in that 20 minutes.