Fun and Games in Music

Every year I teach music. Since music is hard to stretch out the full length of class time, I adapt some of the activities suggested by Lifeway to introduce the song of the day. Typically they do not provide templates for any of these games, so I spend a good bit of time making the games (or else I'm scrambling 5 minutes before class, depending on how organized I am that year).

• Day 3: An animal print matching game- I make group matching games each year. I make index cards with letters and a images on them. I either hide the cards or pass them out as kids answer questions. In the room, I tape up matching images on the wall, so when the card with matching image is stuck on top of it, the cards will spell out a word. This year I have the words ADMIT, BELIEVE, and CONFESS, each with a matching animal print below the letters. Simply cut up the letters (with the print also attached) and cut out the matching prints. Tape the animal prints along the wall (or anywhere else). The kids can then match the letters to the prints and spell out the words found in the day's song

Animal Print Matching Template

• Day 1: Amazing Animals- Two activities are suggested for Day 1 that emphasize the amazing animals that God has made. I adapted these two activities into games for different age groups. For the younger age groups, I am following the first activity that suggest giving the children a slip of paper with an animal name written on it, and instruct them to walk around the room acting like that animal. I have a lot children who cannot read, so I provided squares of paper with an image of animal on it instead. For the older kids, I have a matching game with images of animals found out west and a matching fact about each animal. I will hide them throughout the room and have the kids work together to match up the cards. Both activities are found in the template below.

Amazing Animals Matching & Animal Charades Template

• Day 2: Fishing Game- On day three Lifeway suggests playing a fishing game with phrases found in the day's song. They say to attach a magnet to the end of a fishing pole and attach paper clips onto the paper fish with the phrases printed on them. Below is a template for the fish.

Fishing Game Template

• Day 4: "Like Jesus" Concentration- To play "Like Jesus," Lifeway says to create a concentration type game by using images of heroic western figures, and one card with an image of Jesus. Once all the matches are made, the card with Jesus on it remains, because Jesus has no match. I made a template with 17 matches.

Like Jesus Concentration Template

Have fun!