25 Songs That Will Support Your Instruction

Have you ever blurted out song lyrics related to something in your classroom? You are not alone! I thought I would share 25 songs that will support your instruction! Whenever my students would say something or do something and a lyric came to mind, I started singing! My students quickly caught on and by the end of the year, we were all looking for things related to a lyric. We even made up parodies related to things we were doing in class. Since this was such a big hit in my class, I thought I would include what we used as well as ideas from fellow teachers. I am so impressed with what teachers come up with to engage their students. TEACHERS GOT TALENT! After you start using lyrics in your class, I promise your students will remember you forever!

This song list is subject-related. I broke them into categories for READING/WRITING and MATH. You might see the same song in different categories and that’s ok! The possibilities are endless!

I usually use A-Z lyrics to look up the words to these songs. For the most part, we just use the chorus or a catchy part of the song!

Reading/Writing

Reading Rainbow– Tina Frabrique (Take a look, its in your book)

How Do You Know– Whiney Houston (Text Evidence)

I need a Hero– Bonnie Tyler (Heros in fantasy stories or writing about heros)

Little Wonder– David Bowie (working on Reading Wonder)

Moving Right Along– The Muppets (On to the next chapter, writing mini-lesson, steps of the writing process)

Stop, Collaborate and Listen- Vanilla Ice (Book Discussion)

Firework- Katy Perry (Figurative Language)

Ain’t No Mountain High Enough- Marvin Gaye (Hyperbole)

Livin on a Prayer– Bon Jovi (After the rough draft and before revisions in writing- “Ohhhhh, we’re halfway there!”

Old Town Road– Billy Ray Cyrus (Arlyn Clarke used this for an AR Kick Off. “Yeahhhhh I’m gonna read my book on my way to school I’m gonna read, till I can’t no more” (2x) I got the books inside my bag, bookmarker’s attaches …..teacher might be mad cuz I care about no math….. can’t nobody stop my reading, you can’t stop my reading.”

Ice Ice Baby– Vanilla Ice (Gina Martin used this for Text Structures. “Text Structures, baby”

Bad Romance– Lady Gaga (Holly Smith used this for RACE Text Evidence when they would only complete the R and the A. Ra-Ra Ah-Ah-Ah.

Heathens- 21 Pilots (Michelle Pineda sings “All my friends are Readers. Take it slow. Wait for them to ask. What books you know. Please don’t make. Any fake reader moves. Real reading is what we always do!” Or “Readers. Are you writing? In your journal? Say you’ll never ever give up!”

Schoolhouse Rocks (Grammar)

The bluest eyes in Texas– Restless Heart (spelling word bluest)

Math

Cha Cha Slide– DJ Casper (Slide to the left, slide to the right, Take it back now y’all)

Drop it Like It’s Hot– Snoop Dog- (Division)

How Do You Know– Whitney Houston (Problem solving- Explain)

One– Three Dog Night (One is the Loneliest Number- Number sense)

This is How We Do It!– Monel Jordan (Showing how to multiply or divide)

Cupid Shuffle- Cupid (When multiplying or dividing decimals- “to the left to the left to the left to the left… “ and dance and then “to the right”.

Old Town Road– Billy Cyrus (Gina Martin created a parody for converting time. “Yeah, I’m gonna teach this class about converting time, the units change, then they change some more. First let’s take a minute, sixty seconds in it…”

Ice, Ice, Baby– Vanilla Ice (This is a parody for Rounding written by Christina Brauner. Listen on Instagram HERE.

“Round-ing baby
Round-ing baby
All right stop
Collaborate and listen
Mrs. B is back with a brand new objective
Rounding, it must be done precisely
Underline the value with a pencil lightly
Will the digit change?
I don’t know.
Let’s look at the digit to the right and we’ll go
Higher, if the digit is 5 through 9
You need to bump it up, the one that was underlined
Leave it!
If the number is 0 through 4
I’m leaving your digit, not even gonna raise the score
Remember,
Rounding is a necessity-
Anything less than your best is not okay with me!
Raise it, or leave it,
You better make way
Zeroes are coming
And they don’t play
If there was a digit to the right
Yo, let’s change them
All to a zero while your teacher revolves it.”