Singing Time

Today I started teaching the song that was written for this year's Sacrament Meeting Program, "I Know That My Savior Loves Me". I must preface my explanation of what we did with the fact that we have a small primary with approximately 30 children.

The 2010 Outline for Sharing Time suggested that I teach the song and let the children come up with the actions that will help them remember the words. I had decided as I prepared for singing time that I would have each class take a line of the song and come up with the actions for that line. I had written the words to the entire song on the chalkboard and used that to assign out the lines.

As we learned each line, I would invite the class to come show us the actions that they had come up. Then as I stood there with the first class, I was inspired. I asked each child in the class to put their hands together palm to palm. If they wanted to sing, they pointed their fingers to their chin. If they wanted the other children to sing, they pointed their fingers to the other children. To my amazement and joy, every child in our Primary, with the exception of the 3 year olds (who didn't understand what was happening) and one or two others, took turns singing a solo and letting the other children sing too.

This was wonderful! We had a class with 2 children another with 4, but the rest had 5-9. This meant that with the introduction of the line of singing it 2 or 3 times and each child doing their solo/group singing, each line was sung from 4 - 12 times. It took the entire singing time to accomplish, but the children loved it! And they learned.

As a side note, it was good for me also. I was familiar with the tune and the words, but I in no way had it memorized. It is much more set in my mind now. Once again I say "Hooray for inspiration!"