Submitted by Meredith Harley Inserra, New Bern, North Carolina

Idea posted February 13, 2009

I have a fun and easy activity I do with 2nd grade using "Fossils" from Carnival of the Animals. For the first listening, I ask them to listen for the instrument that plays the dinosaur bones. They get that right away! I created a PowerPoint to demonstrate the ABACA (Rondo) form of the piece.

I notated the main rhythm from section A on the PowerPoint and taught the kids this chant to go with it:

ti - ti ti - ti tah (rest)
List-en to-the bones.
ti - ti ti - ti tah (rest)
List-en to-the bones.
ti - ti ti - ti tah ti - ti tah tah tah (rest)
List-en to-the bones. Of-the di-no-saur.

When they can say it and patsch it on their laps, I give them sticks to beat the floor (I have carpet) using alternating hands. It's fast, so it's a challenge too! Because the pattern repeats, I have the boys and girls alternate playing the pattern. There's less stick noise that way, too. For the B section, we use our sticks to conduct the orchestra. For the C section, we take ONE stick and pretend it's a clarinet as the clarinet plays.