Daria Music Review

Today I am pleased to introduce to you, Daria and her wonderful music. Daria is an internationally known folk singer who uses her music to reach kids and promote a better world! When I was given the opportunity to review one of her products I was instantly intrigued by the Earth Day CD with Reduce, Reuse, Recycle E-Book. (I was given a copy of this product in exchange for my honest view). 

This particular CD focuses on being a good steward of the world we have been given. Many of the songs are derived from well known tunes making it simple to learn and catchy too. The girls favorite was "Ride Horse Ride" (naturally, since they area pony lovers) which focuses on the importance of animals and what they can teach us. Other songs on this CD include "Our Beautiful Rainbow World" which celebrates diversity and "We've Got the Whole World in Our Hands" which emphasizes the importance of doing all at we can to take care of the natural environment around us.

The ebook was a ton of fun too! It consists of 10 unusual instruments that represent various cultures. Information is given about each instrument and the culture it came from, along with instructions on how you can make your own with stuff you have around the house. 

The girls each picked out a couple instruments to make, so they could play along with the music. They each made a monster jawbone rattle (from the Afro Peruvian culture).  Bria  also made zamponas (from South America) while Nadia chose a turtle shell rattle (from Native Americans). 

Eli liked the monster jawbone rattles best!

Making the instruments really brought the music more alive for my hands on kids!  They were able to rock out with Daria's music as well as creating their own!

These products would be a wonderful addition to any sort of Earth Day or cultural study. I for one plan on including them when talking about history or geography!

Whether you are listening to her play some of the more well known children's songs or her own creations, your appreciation of other cultures is sure to grow just from the interesting instruments  Daria uses in her music.

Daria offers a variety of products:  including her CDs, instructions to make instruments and even actual instruments! Make sure you visit all of her stores to see all she has to offer!

Daria's CD's
Daria's Little Village Store
Daria's TPT Store

You can also hear samples of her music as well as hear some of the instruments over at dariamusic.com!

Be sure to check Daria out and allow her to bring music and culture to your kids!

Steady Beat Parade

Independence Day is almost here (for those of us in the United States at least), and we celebrated by practicing our beats and rhythms in our own little parade! Visit Gummylump to read more!

Melting Ice with Salt

This experiment ended up combining a couple activities.  One was our original experiment to observe the  affect salt had on ice; salt lowers the melting point of ice.  To do this I took 4 little cups of colored water and added a different salt to each of them, table salt, kosher salt, sea salt, and rock salt. They were concentrated solutions with salt still visible at the bottom.

I froze water in a couple different sized containers and then provided a variety of tools for the girls to use to put the salt water on the ice.

I was hoping the colors would stay separate, so we could see when each solution went.  Since it was all basically water, and all I had to color them with was food coloring it pretty much mixed together.  You could definitely see how the salt water melted the ice pretty rapidly.

The more pressure with which the solution was applied (like with the nasal aspirator directly against the ice), the faster and deeper it melted.

The rock salt seemed to melt the ice the fastest when simply set on it, but no real measurements to actually say.  The tunnels made by the salt were kind of pretty.

I had seen a post before about Musical Salt which used ice and salt to make noise.  So before all our ice melted I decided to see if we could get ours to make some noise.  I took table salt and dumped a bunch of it right on one piece of ice.  Low and behold we had noise.  It wasn't really music, but it was crackling as the ice was melting.  I think it helped that the ice was already a bit melted which allowed the salt to get into already existing cracks and work faster.

It is hard to see, but there is a pile of salt on the ice.

I tried to repeat it with the other types of salt, but I didn't get near the about of crackling like I did the table salt.  Perhaps the finer grain allowed it to get into the cracks better???

Either way they all enjoyed playing with the ice until it melted.

Do Re Mi Bottles

I saw this last summer in a magazine and was smart enough (at the time) to write down the amounts needed. I knew I would probably need Nathan for this activity too as he is usually better at activities involving air.  It turns out I didn't really need him, and none of us were too good at it! Oh well, the girls thought they were doing it, and they could still hear the notes (just faintly).

So what you need: 8 20 oz plastic bottles (Nathan insists glass would be easier, but I don't know where I would find those), water, food coloring (optional)

Start by filling each bottle with the amount of water needed to produce the desired note.  I guess you need some sort of measuring device as well.

Do - 7 oz
Re - 9 1/2 oz
Mi - 12 1/2 oz
Fa - 14 oz
So - 16 1/2 oz
La - 17 1/2 oz
Ti - 18 1/2 oz
Do - 19 oz

She kept asking me what they were for.

After filling them all I decided to add some color to the water.  The girls enjoyed shaking them up and changing the colors.

 Remove the lids and blow across the top of the bottles to create the note.  This is the part we weren't very good at.  I have included some videos anyhow, and I would love to see it if someone is good at it and can make it sound a bit more fluid! If you are good at it you could even play some simple songs!

I brought out the girls little do, re, mi puzzle to emphasize each note since we weren't too good at it.  The enjoyed trying the bottles and the puzzle.

Of course we had to sing along, "Do a deer, a female deer..." It at least gave us a good opportunity to talk about low versus high (which I think the girls already knew,, but this re enforces it).  I know they know now! We brought out the musical bells, and Bria brought two to me and told me it is the low one and the high one. She was right!