Clean Up Songs

In my classroom, I require my kiddos to clean up their centers and regroup at carpet before picking a new center. At the beginning of the school year, our centers are bare bones to enable easier clean up as my kiddos get used to our routines and procedures. As the school year goes on, I add more and more to the existing centers, plus add more centers. This year we're starting off with just 7: Play Dough, Puppets, Dramatic Play, Lego Table, Blocks, Listening Center and Puzzles. Eventually, we'll have about 30 up and running at the same time!

When it comes to cleaning up, I always play a video on my SmartBoard. Since clean up songs are usually short, I often play the song twice, with the expectation being that once the song is over for the second time, everyone will be finished cleaning and be back at carpet. If a group isn't cleaning up their center, then I close that center for the rest of the day and those students are the last to pick their next center.

I have a whole list of videos that I play for clean-up, since I believe novelty is important. I switch songs frequently, so that the kids don't become numb to the same music every day. Here are my favorite songs to use:

The Learning Station has this fun video set in a classroom. It's very calming too, so the kids don't get too excited.

This one is over 5 minutes long, so I only play it once and I expect the kids to be done cleaning and at carpet by the time it finishes the 1st time. 

Here's the same song, but with a cute animated video set in a classroom. It only runs about 2 minutes, so I play it twice during clean up time.

Harry Kindergarten has this very catchy tune that I love, but it's less than a minute long, so I generally play it 3 times.

Storybots has this amusing video that my kids love too. Again, I play it twice or even 3 times since its short. Having it play during the whole clean up time keeps my kids on task and is an audible reminder of how much time they have left without me saying anything.

My kiddos really enjoy the Clean Up Robot from Mark D. Pencil and Harry Kindergarten too. They will sing along and act like robots, which sometimes makes clean up take a bit longer, but they're having so much fun it doesn't bother me :)

I think this one is my favorite, just because I like the rhythm lol! 

The kids love watching this one, because the pictures are drawn on the screen. I love how it repeats "Thank you very much!"

This one is a compilation of songs by LittleBabyBum. I use this one for the last clean up of the day when we move straight into Language Arts. The kids who are cleaned up get to come and watch the rest of the songs which are all versions of popular fingerplays and rhymes. I usually skip some of the songs so that we're not watching the same couple every time.

This one refers to cleaning up a bedroom, but my kiddos never mind that. It's a catchy song, and I often catch kids singing "Pick it up, pick it up, pick it up now!"

I hope you've found a new song or two to help out with your clean-up transitions!