Fun Friday Theme: The Orchestra

This is our last Fun Friday program before the school years ends and I know the kids are getting antsy for the end of the year, the nice weather, and summer break, so I tried to create a fun (and very loud!) program about the orchestra.  I borrowed parts of the program from The Show Me Librarian and created a few on my own that would better fit our program and group of kids.

I began by asking the kids if they played any instruments and we briefly discussed the instruments that one would see in an orchestra.  Our school district does include a violin program that some kids are a part of and I wanted to make sure to acknowledge these kids for playing music.  Then we voted on if we would rather listen to The Composer is Dead by Lemony Snicket on CD complete with orchestra sound affects (and read by the author) or have me read it aloud.  Now the story is quite long, so while it was being read, I allowed the kids to decorate their homemade kazoos (toilet paper tubes).  We had 26 kids today, so we got about half way through the CD and the kids were just not paying attention so I stopped the CD and finished the story by reading aloud.  Most of the kids didn’t actually get Snicket’s humor and I had to explain the ending.

Once the kazoos had been decorated and our story had been read, it was very simple for the kids to finish putting their kazoos together – a small piece of waxed paper and a rubber band does the trick!  Make sure to ask about latex allergies before starting… you never know!  It was quite a loud program, but we did get to sing a little with Mary Had a Little Lamb, Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star and Row, Row, Row Your Boat.