It's a fun song and game to help the students start out the school year: to get to know each others' names and work together.
Ideas:
Vs. 1 - Sing students' names, i.e. "Now there's Johnny in the ring..."
or "There's a young boy in the ring..."
Student stands in the center of a circle of students and makes up his/her own motion. Students hold hands and walk around circle.
Vs. 2 - Students stop walking, stand still and copy the motion the student in the middle is doing. The lyrics could be changed to: "Now let's do the motion..."
Vs. 3 - Students do the motion in the verse. Students could hold hands and skip around the circle. Student in the center chooses another person to take his/her place.
You could have the teacher surprise the students each time by singing a different motion. (They have to be quiet and listen before moving.) Some ideas:
- walk
- march
- tiptoe
Also, for verse 3, students could turn on "bubbles" and walk around the room while teacher chooses new student to be "it" in the middle. Students could practice walking away from the circle for half of the song and moving back to the circle for the second half of the song so they are ready to hold hands and walk around the new "it" to repeat verse one.
