January - "As a Child of God"

What a sweet song this is.  I already started teaching it to my kids.  They are picking it up really fast!  I am teaching it to them in American Sign Language.  Kids learn a song so much better when they are doing an action as well as singing. 

I taught them the chorus first.  (That is the part of the song after the verse that gets sung over and over.)  I introduced it in this order:

1. The pianist played the top right hand only and no voices.
2. I sang it to them with the piano top right hand.
3. Finally I invited them to sing it with me once through.

Here is where a fun little game comes in.  Kids learn things by doing them over and over again.  But that can get really boring.  Kids also LOVE competition and challenges.  I asked a teacher to time us for ONE minute.  Me and the kids sang a'capella (without the piano) the chorus of the song as many times through as we could before time was up.  About six or seven times.  Now they are pretty comfortable with the tune and words.  I wouldn't go too much longer or the children tire of the game and it won't be as useful the next time you want to use it.

Before I said anything else I went right into singing the chorus while signing with my hands.  Watching someone sign is usually pretty mesmerizing at first for a kid so I had their attention right off.  And many of the kids tried to mimic what I was doing.  When I asked the kids to sing and sign with me I did it s.l.o.w.l.y.  Your kids will get frustrated with you go too fast!  Hey, adults are that way too, right?

I also taught them the first verse of the song with no sign language.  Don't overload your kids.  They need to be able to retain what they learned so you can build on it the next week.  And it is just that easy!  Have fun.