"Growing" is an original song initially composed for use in my "How Things Grow" integrated unit. The song was introduced as a book with the lyrics read to the students. The book was made more engaging by integrating the students' pictures into the book. To the students, the book and song were simply engaging conclusions to our science lessons.
Repeatedly reading the book allowed the students to become more familiar with the words and soon "read" the book to the composed melody. Soon thereafter, the students were singing the song with actions. At the end of the unit, the class finally read the book independently coming full circle just as we'd started: with traditional literacy, but with the students, rather than the teacher, "reading".
The song, however, is only part of a longer integrated unit on "How Things Grow" planned for my extended practicum and following are demonstrations of how the concept of growing was integrated into Language Arts, Science and Social Studies.
Growin' - By: Lango and Dean