Music to their ears...

Music is a staple in my classroom and the students absolutely love it. I have it playing for the first five minutes of every lesson; when students are walking in, removing outerwear, getting their equipment and placing their bags on the bag rack. They have been trained into knowing that when I press ‘stop’, I am ready to start teaching. 
   To eliminate the endless questions about the title of the song, I have a permanent spot on the whiteboard where I write what is playing. I play the same music for every class on the same day and just have it on repeat and on/off mute in the background. 
  The music is selected from classical music, modern classical music, pop instrumentals, film soundtracks and bhangra! I sometimes select the music according to the day of the week. For example, on a Monday morning I have something energetic and rousing playing like Offenbach’s ‘Can Can’ music or the Indiana Jones theme music to wake students up. If I want to lull them into calm on a Friday I turn to ‘Morning Mood’ by Edvard Grieg or ‘Shake it Out’ by Florence & the Machine (piano instrumental).

I have too many audio files to mention so here is a selection of some of the more popular ones:

Modern classical:

‘Divenire’ or ‘La Nascita Delle Cose Segrete’ by Ludovico Einaudi

Pop instrumentals:

‘Starships’ by Nicki Minaj (a piano instrumental version)

‘Next to Me’ by Emile Sande (piano interpretation)

‘Get Down’ by Nas (instrumental)

‘Harder than You Think’ by Public Enemy (instrumental)

Classical music:

‘Jupiter, the Bringer of Jollity’ by Gustav Holst

‘William Tell Overture’ by Gioachino Rossini

‘Habanera’ by Georges Bizet

Film soundtracks:

‘Superman Theme’ from the original Superman soundtrack

‘First Class’ from the X-Men: First Class soundtrack

‘He’s a Pirate’ from the Pirates of the Caribbean soundtrack

‘What are you going to do when you are not saving the world?’ from the Man of Steel soundtrack

Be prepared for student requests (which I don’t mind since it shows an interest) and students singing along (which I am usually spearheading)!

What do you/would you play to students? Are you going to give this a try with your classes? I’d love to read what you think...