Darla Hanley's Music Room
Creative Teaching for Students of Today (& Tomorrow) PK-8
Today’s Teaching Strategy: Making Waves
(Scarf Play: Beat/No Beat)
PK-1
© 2025 Darla S. Hanley
This teaching strategy is all about waving scarves in the air (and beat/no beat)! It goes with George Frideric Handel’s “Water Music Suite No. 2 in D: 1. Allegro” because its an artistic masterwork students should get to hear—and with the 2013 “Surf Spaghetti” by B11 to prompt scarves moving like noodles (lol)!
This track is available on multiple streaming audio platforms. (Like many of my teaching strategies, you should feel free to find other audio tracks to anchor the learning experience using music that works in your setting or new tracks to simply “mix it up.”)
Pedagogical Foundations
Sometimes we know what something is by knowing what it isn’t (lol). In music education we talk a lot about beat and rhythm. We want students to experience steady beat, duple and triple meter, and a variety of rhythmic patterns, for example, with a goal of having them internalize these concepts. We want them to feel the beat of the music and respond to it. Further, in addition to offering any kind of personal response, we want students to respond by performing rhythms that conform to a time signature, meter, and/or musical style. This work is all about singing, playing, and moving in a way that matches the rhythmic structures of the music at hand.
On the flip side, we know that sustained movement with long lines and phrases equals another form of artistic expression. And we all lean in when we hear beautiful long arced lines performed by musicians—that’s something.
In my view, students need to explore and experience rhythms in a million ways (lol). Plus, they should feel a free/non-rhythmic expression in contrast. Stated another way, students need to feel being in and with the groove AND being outside it. That contrast will help them understand and internalize matched rhythmic expressions. Make sense? So how do we do this? Consider these 3 things:
Use dramatic play to have students pretend (e.g., galloping pony v. snail) and move both rhythmically (a-gallop, a-gallop) and freely (crawl slowly at a personal pace).
Play games that include specific rhythmic patterns and a free response (e.g., play a start-and-stop game that has contrasting components like: a green flag signal = clap the steady beat; a blue flag signal = rub hands together like they are cold and you are trying to warm up/no beat)).
Make room for discovery. Have students explore ways to play instruments to create rhythmic beats with a pulse AND sustained sounds.
Today’s teaching strategy “Making Waves” combines movements to the beat and “free” movements with no beat. I hope you give it a try with your students. But first, let me remind you who I am:
Hi! I’m Darla, an experienced PK-12 music educator, college professor, and former Berklee College of Music Dean looking to connect with teachers, parents/caregivers, and others seeking to advance creative music making for today’s students—and their teachers. In Darla Hanley’s Music Room you will find teaching strategies, advice and teaching tips, playlists, and more.
Today we are going to wave to music—and to each other—using scarves! When do we wave to someone? (When saying “hello” or “goodbye”)
ProTIP: Helping students make musical and non-musical connections is important for their learning. Ask lots of guiding questions.
Distribute 1 scarf to each student. Let’s all wave to each other with our scarves! Look at everyone as you wave “hello” to them. What fun!
Now we will play a scarf game. Watch me to know how to move your scarf.
Play the recording of "Water Music Suite No. 2 in D: 1. Allegro” and perform the first stanza of “Making Waves” (until “Just Like Me!”) leading students to copy the way you move your scarf.
ProTIP: Vary scarf movements to include high sweeps with full arm extended, and both macrobeat and microbeat. Let the music inform movements (lol), demonstrate strong beats, and have fun!
Add the second stanza (“4, 5, 6… tricks”) and lead students to toss their scarf (freely) in the air and catch it several times (as the trick).
ProTIP: This individual toss and catch game is not to the beat.
ProTIP: Remember it can be super exciting for young students to see a scarf floating all the way to the floor! Let them try that, too—and watch the no beat fall by!
Lead students to perform all of the “Making Waves” stanzas. Watch me to know what to do: move your scarf to the beat of the music or toss it in the air and catch it!
ProTIP: Add the “toss and watch it fall” if that fits your teaching time and students.
Making Waves
© 2025 Darla S. Hanley
Wave, wave, wave, say
1, 2, 3
Wave, wave, wave, wave
Just like me!
Making waves, we’re making waves
Making waves, we’re making waves
Wave, wave, wave, say
4, 5, 6
Wave, wave, wave, wave
Let’s do tricks!
[Toss scarf in the air to catch it OR watch it descend to the floor]
Video
Materials/Set Up
Scarves
Space for Movement
🎵 George Frideric Handel "Water Music Suite No. 2 in D: 1. Allegro” Link to Track on Spotify
🎵 B11 “Surf Spaghetti” Link to Track on Spotify
EXTEND the Learning:
Invite students to form partners and perform a toss and catch game as prompted by “Making Waves (Part 2)”.
ProTIP: The toss and catch game is free (not to the beat of the music). Engage students to perform a few back-and-forths before returning to the original “wave” chant.
Making Waves (Part 2)
© 2025 Darla S. Hanley
Wave, wave, wave, say
7, 8, 9