Lyrics
(Folk song)
The thread follows the needle, (repeat)
In and out the needle goes, as mother mends the children’s clothes.
Movement / Game
Formation: Students stand in a straight line holding hands. (For purposes of explaining, I will pretend there are 10 students. Student 1 is on the far left, and student 10 is on the far right.) Student 10 is the leader.
When song starts, students 1 and 2 form an arch with their hands, and student 10 walks toward the arch, pulling the rest of the line toward around. As student 10 and the rest of the students go under the arch, student 2 will end up facing the opposite direction with arms crossed over each other. Then, students 2 and 3 form an arch, and student 10 leads the rest of the line under that arch. Student 3 will be turned around with arms crossed just like student 2. Continue until all of the students (except for students 1 and 10) have been turned around.
Then, students go through the same process, this time turning each student back around, one at a time. Students 8 and 9 form an arch, and student 10 goes back the other direction under the arch, and student 9 will turn around facing back around with arms uncrossed. Continue until all students are back the way they started.
See also
- Activities: movement
- Harmony: I IV V chords
- Meter: 6/8
- Scale: hexachord
- Tones: drmfsl
- Source: A Singing School: We Sing,C. C. Birchard and Company, 1940
YouTube
- PDF of song with chords
- MIDI file
- Listen to the melody