Echo

*SCROLL DOWN FOR "ECHO" INSTRUCTIONS*

Sunday's singing time was a blast! With both Jr. and Sr. groups I started out with my pianist playing the song in the background and asked them to just listen. I asked them to think about how it made them feel. I then explained that with such fun music to such a happy song, I can't imagine it is supposed to be sung like this: *I stood rigidly and sang the words with a very solemn face.* I told them this is a song to be sung with a smile on their faces and a little movement in their bodies. Then I performed a little dance that is what the music made me feel like. Then it was their turn to do the same, while we all sang the chorus together a couple of times. After singing the chorus,  I showed the poster of  Adam and called a child to come up and put their face through the cut out. Then I asked the child if he could bend his knees to the beat of the music while we sang it. (LOL The little Sunbeam who played Adam said "no" and stood there like a tree...but after him everyone got the idea and bounced to the music.) While the pianist continued to play the music to the song in the background, I explained as quickly as I could what was going on in the picture, as well as explained any big words, (such as "descendants" in verse 1), and then we played Echo.

Echo is basically "I sing; you copy me". So I started with singing:

Me: Adam was a prophet
Children: (echo) Adam was a prophet
Me: First one that we know
Children: First one that we knows

You get the gist of it, I am sure. We continued until I sang something that they could not quite echo, maybe because it was too fast or lots of words crammed into a phrase. At that point I would stop, explain the phrase if needed, and then have them echo it back to me once or twice or until they were all together and got it right. Then we would sing the chorus.

We continued this way one prophet verse at a time, having a new child come to the front when we sang the chorus, to play the part of the next prophet (the former child taking their seat). We actually finished the fifth verse with Moses before there was only five minutes left. To finish quickly, instead of one child at a time using one poster, I had 4 children to come to the front at once and Echo sang (without explanations or stopping) the verses to Samuel, Jonah, Daniel, and the final verse, as well as the new verse found in The Friend Magazine (No poster yet. In retrospect I should have at least had a picture of President Monson for that last verse.)

I issued a challenge to them to memorize any verse of the song this week. Any child who will recite to me a memorized verse before music time next Sunday will get to be first hold and display their cute little faces through the prophet poster they have memorized a verse for.