Monday Morning Go to School is a fantastic song for practicing rests and basic Solfége patterns such as do-mi-so and so-la-ti-do. In today’s post you’ll find two free downloads, one which includes visuals for the clapping game to reinforce rests and another which includes colored notation to assist your students in playing on color-coded instruments such as Boomwhackers™.
Clapping Game to Reinforce Rests
Monday Morning Go to School doesn’t have a traditional clapping game, so I decided to create one that would help reinforce the rests that show up in the music. Ask your students to create a silent motion to represent the rests. For example, tapping their shoulders or patting an invisible ceiling.
Download the free visuals below to help your students learn the game. Students will have a partner and mostly repeat a pattern of clapping for two beats, and patting their partner’s hands for the next two beats. It will be up to them and their partner to decide on a silent motion for the rests. If you can’t do partner games or students are distance learning, have them pat their laps or chairs instead. Thanks to SillyODesign for the awesome clipart that I used for the visuals.
Singing in Solfége
This song is fantastic for practicing Solfége. You can work on patterns such as do-do-mi-so (Monday morning & Friday evening) and so-so-la-ti-do (we go marching home). I also love that students are using the words “as we go marching home” just as they’re singing their way back to the tonic.
Download the notation below to play it on Boomwhackers™, Specdrums™, or colored bells.