Morning Transition

I wanted to share how I transition from morning work (or whatever you may call it) to the first thing on the schedule.  I play a song called "Good Morning," that is a fast, cheerful, and upbeat song.   My expectation is that everyone is in their seat, cleaned up, and ready to learn.  The song is 1 minute and 47 seconds long, which is just enough time for the students to do everything they need to do.  I LOVE it because it signals the students to cleanup without me having to tell them to do so, and it eliminates me having to countdown or set a timer.  It is cute because most of the students sing along with the song too.  This transition has worked wonderfully for me.  I always got a kick out of it when I would walk over to the CD player and I would see the kids start to clean up because they knew the song was going to come on, or I would hear little whispers telling each other to start cleaning up - even before it came on!

I tried to search for this song everywhere, but couldn't find a sound clip.  The CD is called "Good Morning Exercises for Kids," by Kimbo (click the link to bring you its Amazon listing).  It is track #9, "Good Morning." I found the CD in my local library in the children's section.