Your Name is a Song Music Activities

After the first day of school, the main character in this book was very upset. No one in her class could say her name, not even her teacher. The girl’s mother encourages her to sing her name for her classmates, and that is how they will learn to say her name. The girl also explains that people at school made fun of her name. Some girls in her class pretended to choke on it, a boy’s eyes got very wide, and someone said her name was made up. 

While they walk home, the girl’s mother talks to her about the importance of names and where they come from. The girl learns that names come from dreamers, that names are strong and that it is important for everyone to learn new names.

The next day at school, the teacher calls out everyone’s name and gets stuck on the main characters. The girl decides to sing her name and the teacher is surprised. The girl then explains that names are songs, and sings her teacher and classmates names. Soon, everyone wants to hear the girl sing their name. The girl’s teacher asks her to sing her name again and her classmates sing it back. 

If you are wondering: I don't have this book YET. I have ordered it through a local book store and I'm still waiting for it to come in! That's why I have pictures with the cover only.

WHAT IS THIS BOOK ABOUT?

This book tells the story of a young girl who has a hard day at school, telling her mother that she doesn't want to go back because no one could pronounce her name correctly. Her mother shows her that every name is a song and she goes back to school the next day singing everyone's name-song and her own.

LESSON PLAN 📝

The lesson plan that I created to go along with this book is ✨ F R E E ✨ and you can download it by clicking HERE!

For this lesson plan, I said that the grade range would be Grades 1-3 but you know your students better than anyone and I figure this really could be used for any grade. I didn't include any standards because I know there are so many different teachers out there who may be accessing this and can determine which of their standards apply to this lesson.

You can see on here that I have included some objectives and prior knowledge to help guide you and help you judge which grades you can use this resource with.

The materials are all physical-distance friendly and I do highly recommend that you buy the book to support the author!

The second page really is the content and guideline for the lesson. I have structured this for a 40 minute lesson but you can totally stretch this out for 60 minutes or break up this lesson to do over multiple classes!

Essentially for this lesson, students are to figure out the rhythm of their name and create a melody map of their name to sing. In the "Practice" section, you will see some options on how you can continue the lesson if you have more time OR you can use some of the other options for future lessons. I always do a reflection at the end of my lessons to wrap up the activity and get everyone calm before they move on to their next class.

The "Beyond The Lesson" section again just gives you more options for future lessons or maybe some music homework that the students can do at home and share with their families!

Here is the printable that comes with this lesson plan. You can see that I only chose to do my first name (you could change the lesson and have students do their last name or both first and last name together instead to get a more complex rhythm) Then at the bottom is my melody map. I made this on powerpoint so I couldn't manipulate the lines in the way I would like but you get the point!

The last page you get with this lesson plan is the lyrics to the song. Part of the lesson is a call and response song where students sing the main part as a group (regular text) and then a single students of your choice (bold text) sings their name in the song.

If you remember from the "Prep" section of the lesson plan, there is a youtube video link that will direct you to a secret link on my youtube channel. In this video, I teach you the melody I had in mind when I creating this song and you can hear it with ukulele accompaniment. I provided you with this page and the chords in case you want to teach your students how to play the song themselves!

I hope you have enjoyed reading this little break down of this lesson plan. Again, this is a ✨ F R E E ✨ lesson plan that you can download from my tpt store. Just click What are some music appreciation activities that can be used in class?

How do I find a song that I forgot the name of?

What is the story of your name activity?

What is the theme of your name is a song?