I recently posted about Beat Buddies and how amazing they were for classroom management. I think classroom management is a huge component of being a teacher and I am always looking for new methods for managing my class. However a reader let me know I failed to explain properly what musical activities I do with Beat Buddies. For that error, I apologize! I was mostly excited about how they really got my K’s to calm down!
Anyway, here are a few things I have done the past couple of lessons with Beat Buddies:
- Used them to make awareness of Beat vs. No-Beat. We talked about how our Beat Buddies get scared if they don’t hear a steady beat since they are beat buddies. We shook our beat buddies in a no-beat pattern and then tapped them carefully on the floor to keep the beat. We discussed how they liked the repeated pattern and steadiness of the beat.
- We put on various pieces of music and used the beat buddies to tap body parts. We tapped the floor, our knees, our toes, our nose, our heads, our shoulders, etc. I like the song “The Hamster Dance.” Super silly, but lots of fun and a pretty good strong beat.
- We used the beanies to dance to the Music K8 song Eenie Meenie Beenie Beenie.
- I did a modified activity from the Music K8 idea bank. In my activity we practiced passing and how we politely pass. Then we said “Tap, tap, pass, (natural rest)” where we gently petted our animal twice and patted it. Then we added “(animal) keeps the beat!” So it would be “Tap, tap, pass. (rest). Donkey keeps the beat!” On “Donkey keeps the beat” we would tap the beat buddy.
- Then we got out our hand drums. This was the kids first experience with instruments. We talked about how our Beat Buddies would be scared if they heard loud drumming noises and we needed our Beat Buddies help. I passed out drums and they carefully put their beat buddies on the drums. Then we talked about how we pet the Beat Buddies with a flat hand and not a fist. We also must treat our drums gently and we use an open hand and not a fist.
- Then we patted our drums gently so as not to disturb the Beat Buddy. We gradually moved the Beat Buddy off so we were still playing the drum but weren’t making a huge noise. It seemed to help their playing technique to have practiced keeping the Beat Buddy happy.
- We then used the Beat Buddy to play along with the MK8 song “There’s a Beat in my Feet.” We used the Beat Buddies to play the drums and then we played the drums with the song.
- Finally our Beat Buddies helped us sing the songs and bounce a “Flop, flop, flop” pattern with the books Froggy Learns to Swim and Froggy Goes to School.
Wrapping Things Up
My final advice? When in doubt, bake cookies! (Pillsbury makes an excellent pull apart cookie dough, I must say). A dozen cookies on someone’s desk can make them feel warm and gooey inside (pun intended). This strategy has been around since the beginning of time and is a tried and true method.
If you are new at school and looking for lessons for the first day, you might also enjoy this post on first day lesson plans!
Who did I miss? Any other key people in school we should add?
Musically,
Shelley
Love your ideas! I bought a bunch this summer super cheap but didn’t know what to do with them. I do now!
Oh yay! Thanks so much! Beat buddies are the best! 🙂
I just got my first set of beat buddies to use this year! I am super excited to introduce them to my K students. My 6th graders already had their first class and they wanted to use them! 🙂 I am thinking about also using the beat buddies to practice other concepts like loud/quiet, fast/slow. Students with loud animals would say/sing loud and students with quiet animals would say/sing quiet. Not a fully fleshed out idea yet, but something that’s kicking around in my head. We could categorize the animals together first and then they would be with the loud or quiet group. Thanks for your ideas!
Hi there! The uses of beat buddies are absolutely UNLIMITED and my K’s ask for them EVERY week. Sometimes I just get them out for classroom management reasons!
I’m buying beanie babies immediately! THANK YOU!!
I hope you got TONS of them and they worked out great for you! 🙂
I love the idea for using them with hand drums- awesome! I might steal this for my kindergarten this year… thanks for the great ideas 🙂 #fermatafridays
You are welcome!
Hi Shelley! I love the Beat Buddies activities, and I am hoping to use them in my Kindergarten classes this school year! Which song did you use to show “no beat vs. steady beat?” Hope you’re enjoying a wonderful summer! #fermatafridays ~Molly
Hi Molly! Thanks for commenting – sorry for the late reply – I wasn’t getting notifications. I didn’t use a song – I just played a little tune on the piano. I made sure my no steady beat just sounded really random and then my steady beat was very precise. 🙂 Good luck!