Four days left.  At the very end of those four days is probably my least favorite time of year, the before holiday break sing-a-long.  That magical 30-45 minute stretch of time at the very end of the very last day before break with 500+ students hopefully singing holiday songs together.

Just think about how fortunate I am.  I GET to just sing holiday songs with my kids and have fun!  What most people fail to realize is that I have to either teach or review those songs before we do the sing-a-long.  So we’re talking the same songs all day, every day for at least two to three weeks since I only see them once a week.  That translates to singing Blitzen’s Boogie at least 50 times before that magical end of day.  Sure it’s fun for the kids as they’ve only had to hear it 2-3 times but I would rather not hear it in my sleep anymore.

I used to love holiday songs, Christmas songs in particular.  Beautiful melodies, twinkling lights, Christmas trees, blah, blah, blah.   Now what I get is Rudolph “like a lightbulb” over and over again.  And have you ever tried teaching a song with a lot of words to children who can’t read yet?  Let’s just say they’ll only be singing the “fa la las” for Deck the Hall and not the rest of the lyrics.

When I first took over the sing-a-long at my previous school, I used the overhead projector, transparencies and CD’s from our curriculum.  It was this frantic switch after each song of each transparency to the next and taking the CD out of the boombox and putting in the next one before I lost the kids during the transition.  Thank goodness for iTunes where I could actually put together a playlist!

Then came the projector to go with my computer and I could put together a powerpoint with the words to tie into the i-Tunes.  I could rehearse with it AND let a 5th grader handle the changes in the powerpoint slides.  A lot less crazy than the earlier way.  This worked just great until airplay came along.  Who knew you couldn’t play iTunes AND do powerpoint at the same time?!?  Back to the drawing board.

So I go to bed tonight, knowing that I’m going to be bored out of my mind for the next four days with the only consolation being that when I put on “I’m getting nuttin’ for Christmas” or “You’re a Mean One Mr. Grinch”, kids are going to cheer and say “I LOVE that song!”.  After all, it’s all for the kids, right?  Bring on the sing-a-long!