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Incorporating Singing Activities Into Recorder Instruction
By Erin Rosa
“To teach a child an instrument without first giving him preparatory training and without developing singing, reading, and dictating to the highest level along with the playing is to build upon sand.” - Zoltán Kodály
Most music educators and researchers will agree that instrumental instruction is enhanced by the integration of singing. According to Zoltán Kodály, Hungarian composer, music educator, and ethnomusicologist, the proper foundation for instrumental playing includes developing the ability to hear the music in one’s head by reading it before listening to it and thus, playing it. Believing that a musician should rely on his or her “inner” ear, rather than on his or her “outer” ear to know what the music sounds like, he maintained that the most effective way to develop this skill of inner hearing is to first develop the singing voice. The voice is the most natural instrument that all children possess, and singing enables one to internalize the music more so than exclusively playing instruments.
Even though many general music classrooms incorporate both singing and playing, and most teachers will agree that singing helps students to learn the recorder, the two musical skills are not often integrated in beginning recorder instruction. Some music teachers choose to teach beginning recorder using more traditional teaching strategies found in method books, which typically offer fewer opportunities for singing, and place emphasis on reading notation first, rather than integrating singing with instrumental playing.
Or perhaps, music teachers may simply need specific strategies and activities to begin incorporating singing into their beginning recorder instruction. Here are some fun ideas that will help students develop their "inner ears."
Play call and response games
Example: “Step Back Baby”
- Students learn song (the call and the response) by singing.
- Learn to play the response, “Step back, baby, step back” on the recorder. Half of the class sings the call, while the other half plays the response on the recorder. This can also be done with partners.
- Extension: incorporate improvisation. Traditionally, the call was improvised, so have the student play an improvised call for four beats while the other sings or plays the response.
Play singing games
Example: “Closet Key”
- Learn the song in second grade when you study re, and bring it back in third grade when you play the recorders. Sing the song with sol-fa syllables and learn to play it on the recorder.
- Game: students sit in a circle, with one child (A) in the middle. While the class sings the song “I have lost the closet key, in some lady’s garden (repeat),” child B is walking around the outside of the circle, pretending to hide the key behind every student’s back until the song is over. Child A has three guesses to guess who has the key.
- While the game is being played, take turns having the class sing the song and then, play it on the recorder. Have all the boys sing while the girls play recorder, then switch. Have all of the students wearing jeans play while others sing, etc.
Play/sing rounds
Example: “Who has seen the wind?”
- This is a great song for learning low E on the recorder, and the text is a beautiful poem by Christina Rossetti. “Who has seen the wind? Neither I nor you. But when leaves bow down their heads, the wind is passing through.”
- Learn the song when studying low la in your classroom, and bring it back when you are learning low E on the recorder.
- The students will enjoy this haunting melody by having part one sung with words and part two played on the recorder. Make it a great performance piece by adding a simple arrangement with Orff instruments and creative movement.
Other great activities
- Play an easy descant or ostinato on the recorder while other students sing song.
- Have students sing every song they learn on the recorder. They can sing with sol-fa syllables, absolute letter names, text, or even on a neutral syllable.
- Learn new songs by sight-singing short melodic patterns on the staff or in stick notation.
- Divide a new song written on staff into shorter phrases, and print each phrase on a separate card. Sing the song and have the students organize the cards so they are in the right order. Then, have them sing it, and finally, play it.
Final Thoughts
Kids love to sing, and they love to play the recorder! So, why not integrate the two skills? It will make your students better, more well-rounded musicians, and they will enjoy the process. You will, too! Happy music making.
About the Author
 Erin Rosa currently teaches K-6 general and choral music in Fairfax County Public Schools in Fairfax, Virginia. She holds a Master of Arts in Music Education with a Kodály concentration from the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, Minnesota, and a Bachelors of Music Education from Illinois Wesleyan University, in Bloomington, Illinois. Mrs. Rosa completed her Kodály and Orff-Schulwerk mastery certificates from The University of St. Thomas, and she studied at the Zoltán Kodály Pedagogical Institute of Music in Kecskemét, Hungary.
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