Working with young singers can be such a fun and rewarding experience, but it can be challenging to teach a new song or anthem to children who aren't yet reading (words, let alone music!). What do you do? How do you teach something new, quickly and effectively?

For children who are not quite reading, teaching by rote is the way to go.

What is Rote Learning?

Rote learning is based on imitation and repetition (source). This is how young children learn best! Hearing, seeing, and experiencing things over and over again.

If you've spent some time around young children, you know one of their favorite words is "again" - "do it again," "read it again," "sing it again," etc. This is how we learn.

When teaching music (an aural art form), it's important to help children develop their listening skills and auditory memory from the beginning. Teaching by rote is a great way to do this.

Looking for a musical for your children's choir to do this spring or summer?

There are dozens of children's musicals out there, with topics ranging from Creation to the story of Jesus feeding the 5,000, Noah, Moses, Esther, Jonah and everything in between. Most are based on a familiar Bible story, though set in a more modern context.

Some include production notes with ideas for set design, staging, and costumes. Others can be put together in less time with a smaller group of children.

I tend to look at the quality of the music first - something that's singable and in a good range - then, I look for meaningful text - a story line based on scripture with sound theological teaching.

I did a little searching to see what I could turn up this year - here are a few spring/general musicals worth considering:

If you go to the grocery store or the park or Target, you’re likely to hear it - the sound of a small child singing a song they know by heart (often looping through a favorite section over and over). “The impulse to move, speak, sing, and play rhythmically is a natural and vital part of being human” (source). But, if it’s not encouraged and nurtured from an early age, children can “forget how to sing.” 

How do you help them rediscover their singing voices? 
How do you develop it and teach them to sing in a choir? 
Where do you start?

In today’s post, I’m walking you through the ins and outs of developing children’s singing voices in a choir setting - from vocal exploration to developing choral musicianship. Let’s get started!

Exploring the Voice

This is a vital step in the process. Give children numerous opportunities in rehearsals to explore what their voices can do. This helps them build coordination and gain control of their voice, develop an understanding of the voice and what it means to sing, and build confidence.

When was the last time you saw a child really excited about something? They jump up and down and wave their arms and run around. Movement is a natural response for children (source). After all, we learn by doing, acting, observing, experimenting, and feeling. This is especially important to remember when teaching children to sing. Singing is a full-body activity (source) and movement invites children to connect and engage with music in a whole new way.

Use movement activities in your choir rehearsal to help develop critical listening skills, that all-important sense of steady beat, responsiveness, discernment, sensitivity to phrase-shaping and other elements of music expression, inner hearing, understanding of harmony and tension-release, and musicality. Movement also helps children develop coordination skills and connects eye and ear and body and mind.

"When we sing a hymn, we are singing history." - Paul Lusher (source) 

Hymn-singing is a tradition that spans the centuries, uniting us with believers in the past, present, and future. But I believe hymns are more than historical relics. Here are three primary things I think we can learn from hymns still today:

Church Heritage

There's so much history and tradition embedded in hymns. We carry on a piece of that legacy when we come together for worship and sing the same hymns that others have sung for hundreds of years. And at the same time, we're preserving important parts of music history: "Much of the musical heritage of the church is encountered in hymnology: such forms as plainsong, chorale, psalm tune, and gospel hymn." - Hanna Katja Elina Powell (source)

Breathing is a vital component of singing.

But the way we breathe when singing is different than the way we breathe in everyday life, requiring us to use our respiratory muscles in new and different ways.

The goal when singing is to have breath control and good breath support.

Breath control means being able to inhale quickly and exhale slowly throughout the phrase while maintaining good posture. (source)

Breath support means using other muscles (e.g. abdomen, back) to support the work of the lungs and foster better tone production and the ability to sing longer phrases. (source)

We've all seen it: Children dressed in sheets with rope belts and felt beards, carrying shepherds' crooks and reciting the oh-so-familiar lines of the nativity story. 

The Angel Gabriel, with a halo made of twinkly lights and holding a cardboard star wrapped in tin foil shares the good news. 

Mary and Joseph enter as everyone sings "O Little Town of Bethlehem," and let's not forget the darling 3-year-olds dressed like lambs with felt-ear headbands and cotton-ball-covered shirts.

There's no denying it - children's Christmas programs are pretty adorable.

There are dozens of children's Christmas musicals out there, with topics ranging from the Wild West to outer space to the 1950s, most with some sort of modern spin on the original Christmas story. 

Some include production notes with ideas for set design, staging, and costumes. Others can be put together in less time with just a small group of children. Many include familiar carols of the season along with original music.

It's that time of the year again - the time when choir directors everywhere begin choosing music for next year!

From conferences to reading sessions to the seasonal reading packets in your mailbox, the stack of anthems, catalogs, and listening CDs on your desk at any given time can get overwhelming.

Where to begin? Is there a method to this madness?

As a quintessential Type A individual, I believe there is a method for every madness, anthem selection included! Today, I'm sharing an inside look at my process - my selection criteria, the things I take into consideration, and questions I ask myself along the way.

Whether you're choosing music for an adult choir, youth choir, or children's choir, I hope you find this insight useful and beneficial to your ministry.

Let's get started

In search of new repertoire or teaching ideas for your choir? Need a few games ideas for the next rainy Wednesday night? Looking for resources for starting a children's choir program?

Whether you're new to choir-directing or you've been doing it all your life, we all need new ideas and fresh resources every now and again.

Today, I'm sharing a rich and varied collection of some of my favorite children's choir tools and resources - everything from devotions to gathering activities, warm-ups and games to repertoire and curriculum ideas, rehearsal-planning tools, resources for building a choir program, and more.

Enjoy! 

Devotions

Devotions are an important part of church choir rehearsals, as they help center our hearts and minds on the true reason for our singing. Devotions also offer a wonderful way to connect to the stories young singers hear and learn about in children's time and Sunday School.

Earlier this week, I shared some of my favorite tried-and-true rhythm games and activities for children's choir. Most were focused on keeping the steady beat, moving, listening, improvising, and developing aural skills.

Read the full post here.

Today, I'm adding to the list with fun and engaging rhythm games that focus on rhythmic reading, pattern recognition, composition, and developing musical independence.

As directors and teachers, it's important for us to assess whether or not children are able to respond to, remember, and reproduce a short rhythmic pattern to understand where they are and areas where they need more reinforcement (source).

These activities will help you do just that: