Sometimes as elementary music teachers we put so much energy into being a great teacher that we don't have much of a life left at the end of the day. With concerts to plan, lessons to teach, and responsibilities to manage it may seem difficult to keep our work life from bleeding into our home life, but there is hope. Here are 5 ways to find a work/life balance. 1. Decide What Is Most Important When trying to manage a work/life balance it is important to decide in advance what things are most important in your life and give those the most attention. To do this remember that 20% of the activities we do in class give 80% of the results we get and 20% of the activities we do at home bring us 80%

Old Joe Clark is a staple of elementary music repertoire. Try this re-imagination of one of elementary music's most popular songs! Click Here To Download the Free GrooveTrack Click Here To Download the Free Sheet Music Teaching sequence Introduce the song by singing one of the verses for you students. Use call and response to teach the first verse when the students have become familiar with the melody teach them the other verses or let them attempt to learn them on their own. Once your students are familiar with the melody and can sing acapella or accompanied by a single instrument add the GrooveTrack. Use lower volumes so the students can hear themselves and slightly louder volumes as they

Sometimes on our journey of teaching elementary music we may find ourselves in situations where the respect and dignity of our position is not honored. In short, we aren't treated like "real teachers". This is a difficult topic because the nature of our teaching positions and our subject matter is often very different than the nature of a classroom teacher, and many times it may be viewed as not as important. In order to be respected to the utmost extent, we have to have professional boundaries while at the same time being respectful and diplomatic to our colleagues. We have to hold ourselves to a high standard and then advocate for our positions and subject matter by presenting and demonstr

It's that time of year again! Enjoy this cute, simple, original Halloween tune set to the melody of the French song La laine des mountons (the wool from the sheep). Download the hauntingly beautiful GrooveTrack and get a Bonus Vocal version of the song to use in your classroom! Click Here To Download the Free GrooveTrack Click Here To Download the Free Sheet Music Teaching sequence Introduce the song by singing one of the verses for you students. Use call and response to teach the first verse when the students have become familiar with the melody teach them the other verses or let them attempt to learn them on their own. Once your students are familiar with the melody and can sing acapella o

We've all had "that" class. The one where half or more of the students are misbehaving and some are actively trying to undermine the progression of class. It's frustrating and makes teaching miserable if not impossible. To make things worse, this kind of class is rarely addressed in teacher trainings and there isn't a ton of information about how to handle these types of situations. So what can you do? 1. Divide And Conquer One of the biggest difficulties in dealing with half or whole class misbehavior is the momentum that is built up by the number of students and their ability to hide in the crowd. One of the best things to do is to give energy and attention to positive behavior and this ca