Mrs. Potato Head Singing Time

I have been wanting to make some sort of Singing Time activity where children build a face or clothe someone (e.g., the armor of God) for some time now so creating a Mrs. Potato Head for Mother's Day seemed perfect. The best part is that this isn't a Mother's Day only activity. In fact, later, I can create some seasonal clothing ... and when I am not using it for primary, it makes a nice activity for children that doesn't take up much space :)

This was a very easy activity to create, but it did take some time to cut everything out and color everything in.

I would be happy to share the artwork for this if you want to post your email address (so that I can send the attachments to you). Otherwise, to create the pieces yourself, I simply drew a rough potato shape onto a piece of white paper, using a dark permanent marker. I then drew a variety of accurately-sized hairstyles, hats, dresses, hands, eyes, noses, and mouths, by placing a new white piece of paper over the potato outline. It was that easy! The time-consuming part was taking the time to color, cut, and laminate the pieces. I then attached Velcro stickers to everything so that the children could attach the parts to the potato head. You can find Velcro stickers at craft stories, fabric stores, and even in the sewing section of Wal-Mart.

There are so many ways to integrate Mrs. Potato Head, or something similar, into a primary music activity but here are just a few ways:

Potato Head Activity #1
I only had time for this version in junior and senior primary today.

Call children up to select a part to add to the potato head. (I pulled their name out of a jar.) Each part has a song number written on the back. Then, find the song in the book, and read a line from the song. I asked children to raise their hand as they recognized the song to which the line was written. We sang the song once children correctly guessed it. Where possible, I tried to add something "fun" to sing with the song.

Potato Head Activity #2
Place all the potato head pieces into a bag so that children cannot see the parts. They reach into the bag and select a part. The object of the game is to put together a complete Mrs. Potato Head before class ends. If a child selects a part that has already been placed on the Potato Head, they can then switch out the piece for the new piece.

Add a fun rule for switching out a piece. For example:
a) They can switch out the piece, but then they have to answer a trivia question about a song (then prepare questions like, "what is the line of the song that goes after  ..." or "In 'Stand for the Right,' what does it mean to be 'be true'?")
b) If children pull a duplicate piece, we can sing a song of their choice before switching out the new part.
c) If children pull a duplicate piece, we switch the piece out on the Potato but don't sing another song.
d) etc.

Potato Head Activity #3
Hide potato head pieces under chairs. Describe the Potato Head piece, and if the child is holding up, they get to come up and add it to the potato head. This could be done with a spinner that points to "skirt," "hat" "eyes," etc., and then another selection process that indicates which description of each to pick. This way, children have the opportunity to change the skirt, or change the eyes, etc,

- or -

Attach answers to various questions to the Potato Head pieces. This way, children can be involved with trying to figure out which of them has the right answer on their Potato Head piece. They can change out eyes, clothing, etc., while they are listening for answers to questions, which lead to the singing of songs, too.

I would love to hear your other ideas about how to use Mrs. Potato Head in Singing Time.