Circle Time Song Choice Board

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Circle Time Song Choice Boards is my go-to for new students. As I prepare for back to school I begin to organize my supplies and things that I will need to begin therapy. The first thing I always pull out is my Circle Time Song Choice Board. Songs and song choice boards promote language by working on vocalizations, imitation, receptive and expressive language, and vocabulary. Songs also can aid in calming, transitions, and new learning

WHO should you use your circle time song choice board with?

I use the circle time song choice board with my very young students and my students with moderate and severe communication difficulties.

WHAT is a circle time time song choice board?

This circle time song choice card has evolved over the years from a simple card with few choices until now it has 160 songs. The base card has spots to put the song choices and some sentence strips to help students expand their utterances. By having 160 choices you can choose which songs that you would like your students to have the opportunity to select. It gives you a chance to include seasonal songs or choices that match what you are covering in the curriculum

WHEN is a good time to use a circle time song choice board?

This is a perfect activity for circle time. I often use this as a beginning or ending routine at circle time allowing each child to make a song selection. I have found that children begin to learn what their friends select and will often comment or smile at the child when the song is selected. This is the beginning of social skills, understanding your friends.

I also use it with my students that I see individually especially when I am working with a beginner communicator. The vowel songs in songs and the natural opportunity for consonant-vowel repetition.

The prolongation of the vowel sounds in music assists the students in beginning to form verbal communication. I love using Old MacDonald for both the animal sounds ( ex. baa, moo) as well as the repeating chorus ( E, I E, I, O). It is often the first song that children choose.

Many of the beginning songs have some simple movements. One of my favorite memories is of a little boy who had such a hard time verbally communicating but loved the song ‘The Wheels on the Bus’. When it would come time for him to choose which verse we would sing he would always choose ” people go up and down” and he would giggle as everyone stood up and down.

HOW do you use a circle time song choice board?

I put the song choices that I want the child to select from on the base card of the circle time song choice board. Sometimes I put extra songs on the back of the song choice card so that they are accessible but not visible for all the children. I started to do this when I had some students that would get really upset if they did not see their song so it allowed me to expose the students to new material but have on hand their old standbys.

There are definitely preferred songs that the children tend to choose. I then use these songs on the circle time song choice board to aid with transitions between the classroom and my therapy room, for assistance in calming, to begin to work on imitation, for vocabulary development and choice making.

Many of the songs that are chosen by the students have a simple sentence format that assists the beginner communicator in learning syntax and grammar.

WHY should you use a circle time song choice board?

Music is such a universal ‘happy’ activity. Some of the children I work with have significant communication difficulties. One of my observations has been that if allowed free access to choose a video that more often than not they will choose a song video. They may watch the same video over and over and then you may begin to hear a repetition of the melody.

Some of my English Language Learners may choose videos of their native language and this can serve as a bridge for me to mimic the melody. One of my students loved listening to a Chinese language song about a tadpole. We would begin each session first with listening rules and then this song and then end with the song. I picked up the melody and found the English lyrics. I then taught the song (using the video and English translation) to this student’s inclusion class. This created a community of learners for this young boy. Can you imagine his excitement to enter a class that is all singing ‘his’ song?

There are definitely preferred songs that the children tend to choose. I then use these songs to aid with transitions between the classroom and my therapy room, for assistance in calming, to begin to work on imitation, for vocabulary development and choice making.

Many of the songs that are chosen by the students have a simple sentence format that assists the beginner communicator in learning syntax and grammar.