- sturdy surfaces (for tapping on)
- drumsticks (or similar stick-like items)
- loud
- rhythm
- soft
- surface
- tap
MA Standards:
Literature/RL.PK.MA.3: With prompting and support, act out characters and events from a story or poem read aloud.
MA Draft STE Standards:
Physical Sciences/Matter and Its Interactions/PS4.A: Investigate different sounds made by different objects and different materials and reason about what is making the sounds. [Cause and Effect]
Head Start Outcomes:
Approaches to Learning/Cooperation: Joins in cooperative play with others and invites others to play.
PreK Learning Guidelines:
Mathematics/Patterns and Relations 9: Recognize, describe, reproduce, extend, create, and compare repeating patterns of concrete materials.
EEC Infant and Toddler Guidelines:
PW50: The older toddler engages in a variety of physical activities.
Percussion Band
© Commonwealth of Massachusetts, Department of Early Education and Care (Jennifer Waddell photographer). All rights reserved.
Skill Focus: Creative Expression, Generate Sounds, Imaginative Play, Speaking and Listening
Have children use sticks to tap out different rhythms on various surfaces just like Max in the book Max Has Two Sticks by Jerry Pinkney.
- Pre-arrange different surfaces in a semi-circle so children can easily move from one to another.
- Tap out a rhythm for children to hear, and then encourage children to tap out the same rhythm on the different surfaces and notice any differences they hear. Ask them to tap softly and then loudly.
- Then invite one child to tap out a rhythm for everyone to mimic. Repeat until everyone has had a turn.