If you’ve ever had to prepare a song last minute for a Primary program, sacrament meeting, or a Primary Christmas song for the ward party — you know exactly how rushed and frantic that feels! No worries, the kids do NOT need to memorize the words for the parents and visitors to love watching them sing!
Thus, we created this fun Sing-Along Poster to help us out!
We were in just such a position when our ward asked us to prepare a whole nativity skit with just 2 Sundays to go! They wanted 2-3 songs from the Primary. Our plan was to scratch that, and we opted to sing The Nativity Song with all 5 verses, so it’s nice and long, and paint the entire picture of the manager scene. Head over here to grab The Nativity Song Skit!
To accomplish this huge task, though, we were going to need big fun posters to get the kids excited to sing the song! So, off I set creating a catchy poster for all 5 verses of The Nativity Song. I’m also sharing a The Nativity Song Flip Chart, for those that need something printer-ready.
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How to Make a Sing-Along Poster for Primary
Supplies:
- Poster Board — I bought a large pack like this one from Amazon so I ALWAYS have these on hand. They came out of my Primary budget. 🙂 Another good place to pick some up is at the dollar store, though those ones are thinner and somewhat flimsy. Still great for the price and in a pinch!
- KING size Sharpies — Yes, this is a thing, and they are as awesome as they sound!! I use these for EVERYTHING around my house. Like labeling food storage with expiration dates and storage totes. I bought a 12-pack of King Size Sharpies on Amazon and I love having a set of them.
- Crayola Markers — You can grab a 2-pack of the ones I use on Amazon. Or watch for them to go on sale for back to school. The washable ones are generally around $3.50 then.
- Printer/Paper/Ink — to print additional pictures or symbols, as needed. I use HP’s Instant Ink so I’m never out of ink! You can even try your first month free!
Steps to Make a Sing-Along Poster:
Spacing: You can use a pencil to roughly section off your poster per line of the song, to help you fit everything on the poster. Be careful to not start too large, you’ll run out of space faster than you might think!
I don’t really space things anymore, and just sort of dive in and mentally section off the poster as I go. For example, I need to get “Beloved of the Year” in this space, what would be a good/cute way to do that?
- Lyrics First: Write everything with your king sized sharpie first. Just plain text, caps, block fonts, and symbols that you want to include. You can also include little accents like lines, arrows, and dashes to help move and direct through the poster.
- Using Symbols: Symbols are great of helping the younger children follow along. They don’t have to be complex, even words like “hast’ning” can be demonstrated with how you write out the word. I used italics to make the words leaning like they’re hurrying on their way. Another example is “following” where I used some footprints and made the word move along the path.
- Adding Pictures: Sometimes, there’s a word you really want to incorporate – like Jesus, Shepherds, or other important figures that may not be easy to draw. You can always grab clip art from the church website or online to print and add to your poster. Make sure you print it while planning out your spacing.
- Color Highlight: After you have all your words for a single verse on the poster, it’s time to accent the words and make them stand out! Your sharpie will dry fabulously and won’t bleed into your other markers. That means, you can color right over your big fat black lines without worrying about mucking up the colored markers.
Some fun ways to highlight the words you could use:
- Create a shadow with the color
- Highlight the entire letters all the way around with color
- Fill in block letters with a solid color or pattern
- Create a pattern behind the letters like dashes, x’s, dots, or lines
- Add accents to the letters like triangles or dots at the end of each straight line of the letter
- Fill in empty sections of the letters with a color or pattern (like inside the circle of the letter a, o, e, and others.
The Nativity Song
Sing-Along Posters
Verse 1: The Season
This is the season beloved of the year.
Sing a rhyme; Christmastime soon will be here.
Tell the true story of Jesus’ birth,
When, as a baby, he came to earth.
Verse 2: Star and Angel
This is the new star, shining so bright,
Lighting the world on that first Christmas night.
This is the angel proclaiming the birth,
Singing “Hosanna!” and “Peach on the earth!”
Verse 3: Stable and Manger
This is the stable, shelter so bare;
Cattle and oxen first welcomed him there.
This is the manger, sweet hay for a bed,
Waiting for Jesus to cradle his head.
Verse 4: Shepherds and Wise Men
These are the shepherds, humble and mild,
Hast’ning to worship the heavenly child.
These are the wise men who followed the star,
Frankincense, gold, and myrrh brought from afar.
Verse 5: Mary, Joseph, and Baby Jesus
See the sweet mother, Mary so fair,
Joseph, who guided the donkey with care.
See the dear baby of Bethlehem,
Little Lord Jesus, the Savior of men.
Have you ever made Sing-Along posters for your Primary to use? What tips can you share?
