BOCA BETH: One Song at a Time

Isn’t it nice?  The children are totally back into school - with our first progress reports having come home already and conference night is tonight at my sons’ high school.  The routine of the school year has really settled in.  The moans and groans of afternoon homework are followed by the excited welcoming of each Friday afternoon for a much needed time of R&R!

As a work-from-home Mom I truly thrive on this part of the year.  I get so much accomplished for the Boca Beth business along with personal things for the family and home!  Don’t tell the three of mine, but I love, love, love the 186 days of public school!

Preparing our young ones for the skills necessary to be a successful reader and school age child is no easy task.  I hope with my Boca Beth fun I make it a bit easier, a lot more fun and a ton more accessible than some of the learning tools thrown our way over the developmental years of our children’s lives!

Here is a fun lesson for learning the vowel sounds in English and in Spanish - great for ESL children, great for English-speaking children hoping to communicate within their community and terrific lesson fun for any preschool and kindergarten/first grade teacher!

Enjoy the song Vowel Sounds / Los sonidos de las vocales off our second bilingual music CD titled “More Boca Beth/Más Boca Beth.”  This CD was written around feedback provided by parents, teachers, and caregivers world wide.  Why not mix in a little Happy Birthday/Feliz cumpleaños song fun with others about opposites, telling time and shapes (all coming from my teacher background!).

Here are the lyrics:

“VOWEL SOUNDS”
(sung to “Alouette”)

A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U (Spanish pronunciation)

I know my vowel sounds – children echo it back
In Spanish – children echo it back
I know them – echo it back

A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U
A, E, I, O, U (English pronunciation)

Yo sé mis vocales – children echo it back
En Inglés – children echo it back
Yo los sé – children echo it back

Here is the suggested circle time activity fun:

Often times I do not even wait for it to be one of the children’s birthday – they love singing this song! Children love doing the “cha-cha-chas” so why wait?!?!?! Everyone gets a Boca Beth maraca and we do the “Cha-Cha-Cha” during the English chorus and the Spanish chorus of the Birthday Song! Sometimes I even get out a frog puppet for one child to hold and act out the part where our visiting frog says “Happy Birthday” towards the end of the song. Often times, if no one is having a birthday that particular day, I have the children stand in groups according to their birthday month, and we sing the song to the various groups depending upon how many there might be.

Happy Birthday & Happy Educating!  ¡Feliz cumpleaños & Feliz sea educando!

Boca Beth