Showing posts with label If I listen with my heart. Show all posts
Showing posts with label If I listen with my heart. Show all posts

Saturday, January 1, 2011

Teaching: If I Listen With My Heart

I am really at a loss about this song. It didn't show up on the church website until a couple of days ago, so I couldn't hear how it went (I don't have a piano). I can't seem to memorize this song for the life of me. I keep singing and singing and nothing is sticking with me, I can't even sing the tune right (with or without the music). I keep looking and thinking and praying for a way to teach it and I get nothing. I feel nothing for this song, but annoyance. Its a nice song, but if I can't sing it without needing words how can I expect my little ones to learn it. Each year I'm the chorister I'm becoming more frustrated with these new songs that feel impossible to have the children learn. My youngest never fully learned "I Know that the Savior Loves Me", the more I tried to help the children learn it the more I felt like it didn't matter because I was never going to have them sing this song ever again once the program was done. I even had many SR primary who couldn't get the song. So as I am trying to learn this song myself I'm a so frustrated I want to just say "forget it, we'll do something else" but that isn't my call to make. I seriously want to cry (and I don't cry). I got nothing!
As for people and ideas from others:
Jolly Jenn has a good flipchat that is about all I have right now. What I will probably end up doing is cutting up her flip chart, putting the pictures for each verse on a poster board and adding a few extra pictures (ie walk, earth, ear-listen/hear, mouth-say/words/speaks, scriptures).
Sofia's on Sofia's Primary Idea's blog has a few ideas about ways to introduce or get the children's attention. I am going to have a head band with hearts to over the ears (I live in Arizona and have never once in my life owned earmuffs), I might let a few different children ware them. Then I plan on having lots of small cut up construction paper hearts and having the children hold them over their hears when we sing the word 'heart'.
None of this do I feel strongly about. In fact there is a part of me that wants to just do something fun, welcome to the Sunbeams and to the New Year tomorrow and talk to our Primary President about my problem with this song and see if we can come up with a compromise. One idea that keeps coming to head is only teaching ONE of the verses to my primary and the chorus, and we'd have small groups of children do the other two verses. But again I have to see how my Primary President feels.