The magic of teaching using songs, great ideas and access to Flashcards and PowerPoints for teaching the best phonics song in the world!
Chances are, if you ask a child to sing an abc song, they’ll sing it to the tune of “Twinkle Twinkle Little Star.” And these days, if you ask a child to sing a phonics song, they’ll sing the KidsTV123 phonics song (a is for apple, ah ah apple). Kids love to sing, and kids love to read, bringing songs into your classroom is a wonderful thing and it’s magic for the kids’ learning.
“Music is to the soul, what words are to the mind.
Isaac Brook
“Words make you think a thought. Music makes you feel a feeling, A song makes you feel a thought."
Yip Harburg
Those great tunes you remember from your childhood, lullabies, nursery rhymes, Disney songs, they stay with you for life, they fill you with emotion! The Grand Old Duke of York, Humpty Dumpty, Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah, all-time greats! The tunes, the lyrics, the rhythms, the rhymes, they hook the children in. Children’s sponge-like memories take care of the rest.
There’s a brief overview of how music opens up parts of and positively affects your brain >>>here<<<.
Rhyme, repetition, alliteration, all help to improve phonemic awareness as children recognise individual sounds in a word and identify them in others. In the KidsTV123 song, the children directly learn the sounds of the letters on-screen, and eventually know them by heart.
Teaching the lyrics to a song by showing them the written words on paper or on-screen is a super way to teach phonics. Let them become familiar with the song, then present them with the written words to decode. Early readers will begin recognising the first letter in key words, more experienced readers will be able to decode the complete words, and all students will progress in their reading journeys, “cracking the code” of reading!
Teachers know that repetition is key to fluency, particularly in the foundation stages of language learning. Teachers also know it is a challenge to include repetition in classes, as modern-day teaching moves away from the tedious and tiring rote learning of yesteryear. Songs provide an opportunity for repetition of words and grammatical phrases in an enjoyable way.
A great rhythm will have children tapping their feet, and whilst they’re playing with toys or swinging in the park, they’ll be humming the tunes of their newly learnt songs in time to the catchy new beats! Rhythm also provides a good opportunity to begin thinking about general rhythm in speaking English, which might differ greatly from some other languages, such as Urdu or Arabic for example. Reaching fluency in any language will require a good grasp of the rhythm native speakers of that language use.
Learning the lyrics of a song is a simply fantastic way of teaching new vocabulary in a fun and lively way. Simple melodies matched with key vocabulary can be sung again and again, and may never be forgotten. Learners can be challenged to copy down lyrics, the lyrics can be displayed in the classroom, songs can become part of a weekly or daily routine, and vocabulary can be extracted and used in other lessons.
Reading Comprehension too can be practised using a song’s lyrics. Songs often form a story, use lots of imagery and are rich resources for teaching understanding of text and interpretive skills. Reading strategies, such as re-telling, visualising and questioning can be practised with learners.
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When teaching the KidsTv123 phonics song, get the children actively involved in the song. Have them make letters with their hands to help remember the shapes, have them eat the apple, play with the ball, make cat ears with their hands. Very quickly the learners will remember the letters and the respective vowel and consonant sounds associated with them.
Extend the song into classroom activities, perhaps tracing sandpaper letters or making letters using Lego whilst listening to the song. Learners can match magnetic letters with pictures of the associated words on a whiteboard, or they can use phonetic objects (bought or made) to bring the song to life.
The KidsTV123 abc phonics song (Zee version available >>>here<<<; Zed version available >>>here<<< on YouTube) is possibly the best phonics song ever written. I use it again and again with all my young learners, and my own kids at home love it too.
To help teach the song, I’ve made a multi-layered PPT and Flashcards, available >>>here<<< on my TPT store. The slides and Flashcards contain the abc Letters, Chants from the song and Pictures for your learners’ enjoyment!
The PowerPoint has 5 parts: (Pictures, Letters and Words), (Letters and Words), (Pictures and Letters), (Pictures alone) and (Words alone).
The PPT and flashcards will help accelerate the children’s learning of the song. Work through the PPT whenever you have free carpet time; practise the lyrics with the flashcards whilst lining up; play games such as reveal and match; have a card hunt; let your imagination run wild!
Anyways, I hope you enjoy them, send me an email if you have any ideas or suggestions, I’d love to hear from you!