Earth Day

I love to live on this beautiful planet Earth. Living on a ranch in Salmon, I've especially learned to appreciate the land and plants and trees and water. I love sitting out on my deck in the evening and look at the beauty I am surrounded by; it fills me with such peace. I enjoy watching the boys play in the natural setting outside and see the happiness it brings them when they play in the dirt pile, or swing and splash in the ditch, or when they climb the trees. (Sorry about the quality of these photos--they were taken with my cell phone.)

I felt like it was really important for me to do a music lesson at school about Earth Day. I found some songs in the curriculum to play, and then found a few more on YouTube to watch. The week prior to Earth Day (April 22), I talked to all the students about why we celebrate Earth Day, and asked them things that we can do to help make the Earth stay a beautiful place. And we talked about the movie Wall-E and how the consequences for not taking care of Earth could make it look like that. Then all the grades watched the "3 R's" song (Reduce, Reuse, Recycle) and the song "Once is Not Enough" from Sesame Street. Then we listened to the "Recycle Rap" and the "Have to Have a Habitat" song.

I had the students all make a project from "Reused" materials. Two years ago when new music textbooks were ordered, they came in long sheets of brown butcher paper, and the paper had been stored in my office. I was going to get rid of it a few months earlier, but then I decided to wait and somehow incorporate the paper into the Earth Day lesson. After each class had the Earth day discussion, and we watched/listened to Earth Day songs, then I had the students draw with old crayons their own murals on sections of the long brown paper. They created pictures that had to do with our planet Earth. Then I put all the classes Earth Day murals on display on the stage wall. It was a fun project! For the Kindergarten students, I had them do a different project. We made our own shaker instruments re-using yogurt containers and cereal boxes. I washed and saved yogurt containers for months preparing for this project. Then I cut circles out of cereal boxes to make lids for the yogurt containers. Each student chose a yogurt container, added a cup of dry beans to it, chose a cereal lid, and then I taped the lid onto the yogurt shaker. It was also a fun project, and the Kindergarteners really loved their Re-used Shakers!!! This is one of the Kindergarten classes with their shakers in front of some of the murals: