Thanks to Jennifer over at The Yellow Brick Road for hosting the linky party I am participating in today! In this blog post I’ll share one simple thing I use in my classroom all the time!

My simple item is electrical tape! (In a variety of colors).  I am REALLY into color coding things for my classroom.  I have a color for each grade level based on the colors of our music series book (Making Music).  When we switched years ago from Share the Music to Making Music I was devastated because the colors weren’t the same! ha! 🙂

Anyway, here are a few things I use my electrical tape for in my room.

I use it first as electrical tape is supposed to be used for – I keep chords plugged together! I have a simple mic for kids to sing with Music Class Idol and they used to pull it apart.  A little electric tape solved that problem!

I also had problems with kids lining up and touching instruments.  I also had a heavy door that would hit the first kid in line.  So I marked off the line up area and started it with a different colored “L” for line leader.  BONUS: The line doubles as a guide to make a big circle!

I also use the lines to mark off where the Orff instruments should go in my room.

use the different colors to label the mics on the sound system.  This way I can just tell a kid to grab the blue mic and we are good to go.  The colors help in figuring out when something goes wrong too.  I labeled the plugs for my computer wires too.  (Pictures of sound system to come soon!)

Grab some tape and start taping up some stuff!

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