The first musical I reviewed was "Jack and the Beanstalk". The table of contents lists the teachers guide pages and the song lists. Each song in the list also gives reference as to whether it is a choral piece or a solo.
The songs supplied in the review kit have wonderful pages that contain nothing but lyrics and cute pictures so as to make excellent transparencies for the whole choir to see when you are teaching the music.
In the list of characters, the pages of the songs are listed next to the character's name. This is a handy way to have quick reference in a nice neat fashion. I generally have to scribble all over the pages of other musicals I have used to make note of the things for which this publisher has thought about ahead of time. This is a real time saver in my opinion.
Throughout the musical, the direction for each character is suggested. In the back pages of the teacher's guide, there is some great information on how to get started. There is a suggested timeline in regard to how much time should be alloted for the preparation of the music, the sets, the costumes and props. There are also suggestions on how to integrate the musical into the curriculum.
One of the things that I liked about the accompaniment tape is the simple instrumentation that is used. It's a full enough sound for the kids to sing along with but if you were to want to add your own instruments with it, the tape wouldn't over shadow your students' playing abilities.
A few notes about the casting. The author says that "Jack and the Beanstalk" was originally written to be performed by a class of about thirty kids, but the show is very flexible. If they have two sheperds could be used, of course, you could double or triple that amount. This musical is easily modified and in fact, encouraged
