Today's post is about self-awareness. I'm also excited to share a song that I've been incorporating in music therapy sessions that addresses self-awareness.
First of all, what is self-awareness?
If we refer to the dictionary (Merriam-Webster Online Dictionary), self-awareness is defined as:
an awareness of one's own personality or individuality.
In several classrooms I serve, we've been focusing on self-awareness. This topic in and of itself can be challenging to think about teaching when working with students with disabilities. We've been approaching the topic with a wide variety of approaches, activities and songs. Some of these approaches include talking (and singing), about feelings as well as favorites. We also introduced strengths and weaknesses in one classroom, as we were discussing personality/individuality and how we are all different. The song I'm sharing today fits perfectly for this topic and I love it's message of "I"ll keep getting stronger".
I came across the song online one night as I was planning for sessions for the week.
The song is "What I Am" by Will.i.am. The song and its lyrics are below:
There are so many different ways of using this song in sessions. In most of the sessions I've used this song with rhythm instruments (specifically maracas). We shake to the beat, raise our maracas high ("I'm a keep my head up high"), and then bring them back down ("And nothing's gonna bring me down.."). We shake faster each time we hear the drums too! As we clean up the maracas, I ask each student to share a word that describes their personality/them. For students that need help with this, we insert different words mentioned in the video (i.e. "Are you musical?" or "Are you helpful?",etc.)
How could you use this song?
As always, thanks for stopping by More with Music! Check back soon for another blog post!
Thanks for sharing. I'll have my kindergarten kids dance to this song on Monday here in Taiwan.
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