jambo!

Jambo!

Last Thursday with these kids was so fun again! We began our time together with a get-to-know-you activity. It was a little challenging in these ways: It had a different language no one was familiar with, and there were hand movements. The song was called, "Jambo!" which means, "Hello!" It goes like this:

Jambo, jambo, jambo karibu (Hello, hello, hello, welcome)
Jambo, jambo, join in the game.

Jambo, jambo, jambo atoto (Hello, hello, hello, children)
Jambo, jambo, tell us your name.

Then, four students on each of the four beats of rest would say their names, and then we continue with the song again, and we continue in that pattern. It was a little tricky, and it took quite a few tries to get the hang of it, but we got it!

For the next activity we did, if I had to choose one challenging aspect of this lesson, it would have been: What are a few pop songs that ALL fifth graders know?!

In this class, they are practicing how to read fluently. My idea was that, by showing them songs they were familiar with hearing, they could catch on quickly to what they were reading, which were those lyrics. The four songs distributed were: "Let It Go" (From Frozen), "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" (From The Wizard of Oz),  "Can't Stop the Feelin'" (By Justin Timberlake, however most of the kids identified it as "The song from Trolls!"), and "Don't Stop Believin'". Each student found the rest of the kids with the same song they were given, and together in groups, they read through the lyrics very fluently. (If one child did not know the song they were given, I put them in a group with a song they did know.)

After they read through their lyrics, I gave them their next assignment--In brackets, a section of the lyrics (a verse) were singled out. I asked them to letter each line, which we called a musical phrase. The next part of that was for the groups to re-order that verse. I showed them an example with "Twinkle Twinkle Little Star."

The group that was the most into this activity had to be the "Don't Stop Believin'" group--they had their air guitars going, and their mimicking voices of the lead singer of Journey. They performed their "arrangement" of the song--I wish I got a video of it! It was brilliant. The new arrangement ended up being:

Hold on to that feeling!
Don't stop believin',
Don't stop!
Street lights, pe-o-ppplllEEE!!!!

The point of this activity was for the kids to read the new arrangement on the board, and their cue being the fact that these words were familiar to them, they still had to read to make sure they knew what they had to sing. It was an exciting activity!


This is continuing to be such a great experience! Thanks for reading :)

Bianca Newkirk