Teaching Figurative Language Through Poetry

One of my favorite writing units comes at the beginning of the year for me.  How lucky am I?  Actually, I make it that way so I'm kind of creating my own luck ;)

I love poetry, music, and figurative language.  When you put all those together, what do you get?  MUSIC!

I created an activity that involves looking at song lyrics to find figurative language.  It focuses on hyperbole, similes, metaphors, and personifications.  You can check it out by clicking here.

Do you explicitly teach figurative language using poetry or music?  I'd love to know how.

Music for Learning and Bonding Link-Up

I know I already posted about this, but Amanda at Teaching Madness is having a music Link-Up.

I have always been a big fan of using music to set the mood in the classroom. This past year, I really started exploring using it as more than just "background music."  Here's some of the songs I love and the ways I use them.

To signal that it's time to transition or clean up.  Usually, these are upbeat songs with heavy rhythms.  They dance their way to their seat or the next station until the music stops.  These are just some of my/their favorites.

• Peanut Butter and Jelly Time by Kidz Bop
• Blue (Da Ba Dee) by Pokerface Hits
• I Like to Move It by Madagascar Team Players
• Born This Way (Lady Gaga Karaoke Tribute Instrumental Version)
• Celebration by Kool & the Gang
• Rockin' Robin by Bobby Day
• Mambo No. 5 by (Karaoke Instrumental Track) in the style of Lou Bega
• Whip It (Karaoke Instrumental Track) in the style of Devo

To reinforce math concepts. 

• Lemonade Stand (Liquid Measurement) by Teacher and the Rockbots
• You Can Multiply by Twelve by Teacher and teh Rockbots
• Long Division by Karl Roemer
• Nonagon by They Might Be Giants

 To reinforce science concepts.

• Things in Space (8 Planets) by Teacher and the Rockbots

To reinforce language arts concepts.

• Prepositional Phrases by Mr. Duey
• Synonym Antonym Homonym by Rockin' the Standards
• Writer's Song by Rockin' the Standards

Brain Breaks--Music List

I attended a workshop in which the presenter taught us to us music clips for transition times.  It's amazing how quickly the kids stop what they're doing, clean up and get out of their seats for a minute or two of dancing!  You might think this isn't worth the loss of instructional time, but let me assure you that IT IS!!!  We do this about every 20 minutes, and I get so much more genuine attention from them afterwards that I do this religiously. 

I downloaded all these songs from Zune (another company that competes with iTunes).  http://social.zune.net/music/.  I adapted the music to include some educational songs.  Sneaky, aren't I? 

Here is a a list of the favorites: 

• "The Place Value Rap" by Rockn' the Standards
• "The Turbo Hustle" by DJ Maestro Presents...
• "Cupid Shuffle" by Cupid
• "Kung Fu Fighting" by Carl Douglas
• "The Freeze" by Greg and Steve
• "Peanut Butter and Jelly Time" by Silly Kidz
• "Aint No Party Like a Number 9 Party" by Math Man
• "Let's Do Them Eights" by Math Man
• "Seven Tables (Ludacris and Pharell style)" by Multiplicaiton Hip Hop with Mr.G. & The Kiddie Crunk Crew
• "Nonagon" by They Might Be Giants
• "Head, Shoulders, Knees and Toes" by Johnny Only
• Macarena by Los Ninos de Sara

You can also get a bunch of the newer pop songs as the "karaoke version" with no words (only the melody).  I've done this for Lady Gaga, Katy Perry, Maroon 5, etc.  Just search for the band's name and look for "karaoke" on the album cover.  A word of caution: Listen to the song ALL THE WAY THROUGH.  Some songs have vocals randomly throughout the song, and they aren't what you want to be sharing in a classroom.