Play with Sound with the Junk Jam Music Game

Since we were talking about doing taste tests to explore the sense of taste, I thought it would be fun to look at ways to explore other senses as well. When it comes to learning about sound, music and rhythms are a great place to start.

This Junk Jam idea from Mosswood Connections (which came from the Exploratorium in San Francisco) is really simple to set up and uses trash to help kids play with and learn about sound.

You can play with matching rhythm, exploring pitch, counting as you hit different bottles, exploring how filling containers with different things (rice, beans, water, air) causes them to make different sounds, writing numbers on the containers and writing a song based on the order you play the bottles and more.

These containers are great to keep around and use as recycled instruments even when you’re not playing the game, and your kids will have as much fun with them as they do with purchased musical instruments.

Do you play any musical/sound games with your kids? I’d love to hear about them.

[Photo via Mosswood Connections.]There are lot’s of music learning resources available online too. Check out these Music games and Learning tools and Music Learning Flash Cards.

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Teach the Teacher Printable Worksheets: A Fun…

Shark Week generally happens in July, but any time is a good time to learn more about sharks.

First, start with some fun whale facts like these from Kids Craft Room. Here I learned about the dwarf lantern shark, which is the smallest shark and only grows to about 6-8 inches (about 15-20 cm) long. It also emits light. How cool is that?

Natural Beach Living has some great printable shark information guides, where kids can learn about different kinds of sharks, match the facts to the pictures, or print out doubles and do a shark memory game.

Living Life an Learning has some great shark activity pages including the parts of a shark, types of sharks, a crossword puzzle and more. Also check out their parts of a shark and word scramble download, and a life cycle worksheet.

Learn about how sharks float with this great activity from JDaniel4’s Mom.

Need more facts about sharks? This fact pact from The WOLFe PACK on Teacher Pay Teachers includes fact sheets, a printable flip book, informational text, vocabulary, comprehension questions and more.

Living Montessori Now has a great collection of shark themed activities with a Montessori inspired twist. You’ll find a shark roll and cover, shark phonics and lots more shark activities Deb has collected from all over the Internet.

Remember the “Sharknado” movie? A Few Shortcuts turned the combination of sharks and tornadoes into a fun science activity. You’ll need a bottle connector for this project but otherwise should have everything you need on hand. Use their template to make your sharks out of aluminum foil. So fun!

You can also do some shark themed coloring with these coloring pages from Encouraging Moms at Home. Or make a cool 3D shark with this template from korkotak. And there are tons of different shark crafts collected in this post from Kids Activities Blog.

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