I’ve been away from home for so long I was beginning to forget what the national anthem sounded like but this little guy jogged my memory. Too cute!

O Canada!

I wish I could say we had a song on Super Simple Songs for St. Patrick’s Day, because if any day deserved a fun song that everyone could sing, this would be it…but we don’t. I think there is “green” in one of the color songs on Super Simple Songs One…but don’t quote me on that….we’re in the 12th month of classes so the color songs came and went 11 months ago.

As a kid, it was my dream to learn to play the bagpipes. I wanted it more than anything…for about a year. I don’t know why I never did it. Maybe it was the whole kilt thing.

This shot from the Tokyo St. Patrick’s Day parade today got me thinking I should have just put on the kilt and learned to play the thing.

But that bagpipe dream was soon replaced by a short-lived dream to learn to play the sousaphone. I wasn’t sure about that one today.

Maybe if he had had a green mohawk?

But anyway, long story short….I think I’ve decided that I want to learn to play the bagpipes again.

But that could just be the Guinness talking….

With the help of our friend Sujeong, Super Simple Songs can now be purchased in Korea.

Sujeong is the founder and Director of the Arts in Education, International Center (A.I.E) and MILK English (Moving, Imagining, Laughing Kids) and we’re very excited to be working with her to help make Super Simple Songs available in Korea.

So if you’re in Korea, please take a look at her site and all of the wonderful work she’s doing!

This is an activity I pull out once in a while that gets plenty of “one more time pleaseeeeee!” from the students. And the great thing about it is that it can tire out even the genkiest of classes before you need to sit down for some quiet work.

There are a few ways you can do this:

Numbers

Write the numbers 1-10 (or 1-20) on the board with your students. You write, they write, a combination of both, etc. Select a number and erase it or cover it with a frog. Then tell the students we’re going to pretend to be frogs. Everybody crouches down and gets ready to jump. Then, go through the numbers again, pointing to each one. When you come to a frog, everyone jumps up and back down. Then continue on through the rest of the numbers. Next you can erase another number, have a student choose or have a student erase. It gets silly and a lot of fun by the end when you have 6 or 7 frogs or more.

Other ways you could do it….

ABCs in groups of 9 or so.

Phonics/sight words.

Vocabulary review with flashcards.

Days of the week.

Months of the year.

I made a pdf file with some jumping frogs. Feel free to download and use it.

Jumping Frogs Printable

Found this at the veggie shop today and have no idea what it is or what to do with it. But it looked so neat I had to buy it.

Anyone know what it is?

This month’s topic at school is transportation. It’s always a fun topic because kids love trains, planes and automobiles more than just about anything else.

Here are some musical bits I made a couple of years ago. We use them in our classes to get up and move around and pretend to be driving, flying, riding, etc.

Feel free to download and share them!

Car
Bicycle
Train
Rocket
Airplane
Helicopter

I received a reply to my chopsticks post from the Teku Teku Daimyo blog.

It’s a great video that really puts things into perspective….752 pairs of disposable chopsticks are thrown away every SECOND!

I hope you’ll take a second to watch it…

In Japan, Setsubun is celebrated on the 3rd of February. It’s a celebration of the division of seasons but it usually refers to the spring division. Spring setsubun is around the same time as the Lunar New Year and in the past it was thought of as a new year celebration. The practice of cleansing the evils of the past year and scaring off the evils of the coming year is still done today, especially with school children. Beans are thrown (mamemaki) to symbolize this.

Usually they are thrown at a person wearing an “oni” (demon) mask. At school, often a staff member will wear a mask and visit each of the rooms and the children will throw beans at them.

At Knock Knock English, we have our own version of Setsubun we do in class every year leading up to the holiday. Ed Emberley’s “Go Away Big Green Monster” works great for this. We tried beans once but it was all a bit too messy! So, in recent years we’ve settled on these cute little fluffy pompom balls.

They’re great to review some counting, colors, etc before you begin the activity.

The kids throw the pompoms at the monster in the book after the second half when he is slowly disappearing. In real Setsubun activities, “Oni wa soto! Fuku wa uchi!” is shouted. It means something like, “demons out! luck in!” We opt for “Go Away Monster” and it works great. Then we leave the room and come back in with a real Oni mask.

It’s nice to see little light bulbs go off as the students make the connection between this fun English activity and the traditional Setsubun activities they do in kindergarten/school.

If you’re not in Japan, celebrate Setsubun anyway! It’s a fun introduction to Japanese culture for young children. Or a great way to get over the fear of monsters under the bed! A quick google search on “Setsubun” will get you all the information you need.

So Happy Setsubun everyone. May your new year be full of luck…not demons!

Dyson vacum cleaner - $500

Roomba robot vacum cleaner - $700

Maid service - $400/month

Super Simple Songs - $17.50

hmmmm……….

Thanks to Onchankids for sharing!!