Look what arrived at my doorstep last night! I can't wait to get this beautiful book into the hands of our music students. Featuring the words of Amanda Gorman, poet and activist, and illustrations by Loren Long, a New York Times Bestselling illustrator. I preordered this book back in January, after Ms. Gorman shared her poem at the presidential inauguration, and have been anxiously waiting for it to arrive. Here it is! Check back soon to see how we use this book in our class!
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Happy Week Four! This week the students and I took a virtual trip in honor of National Hispanic Heritage Month, learning about Cuba and singing "Havana" by Camila Cabello with all kinds of instruments. Being able to make music together while still experiencing the COVID pandemic is no small feat, and it has been truly wonderful to see the students' faces light up as we make music together. Since I mentioned COVID, I thought it might be good to briefly share some of the mitigation strategies we use in the music classroom on a daily, hourly, even minute-by-minute basis: -Mask checks multiple times throughout each 30-minute period. If a student is wearing a mask incorrectly, they are immediately asked to reposition it. -Hand sanitizer is available to the students as they enter and as the students exit. -Two air purifiers running at full speed all day and night. The filters were just cleaned this week, too, woohoo! -Both classroom doors are open between classes to encourage air flow. -Multiple air vents in the classroom are moving air all day. -Students do not just sit and receive information - we are up and moving for the majority of the class time. I am doing everything I can to minimize risk of COVID19 in the music classroom. I have been following the studies out of Colorado State University since the pandemic started since they are focusing specifically on musicians and the aerosols that our content area can create. The latest release (August 2021) shared that singing is safe when the above mitigation strategies are used, specifically masks. I will continue to keep myself informed and our students as safe as possible. This past weekend I had the really wonderful opportunity to spend my Saturday morning with a few friends at the Greater Cincinnati Orff Schulwerk Chapter in Cincinnati, Ohio. Their guest presenter was Franklin Willis, who is an excellent educator from Nashville, TN. His work focuses on bringing hip hop and popular music styles into the music classroom and it was an excellent presentation! Click on his picture to the left to go to his website and learn more about him. In 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grades this week we took a virtual field trip to Havana, Cuba. We read a book (accessible on Epic! through the students' accounts) called Hello Neighbor! Cuba and played instruments typically found in Cuban music, called son: bongos, claves, maracas, and guiros. We also talked about Camila Cabello, the Cuban-born musician famous for her song Havana. Then, we worked to recreate the song using modified lyrics, the percussion instruments listed above, glockenspiels, and xylophones! See the clip below of a third grade class' experience. This week, Young Fives and Kindergarten continued our learning about bees, including reviewing "Here Is the Beehive." We then used this song to help us learn about rest position and ready position, which we then used for our first experience on the xylophones. The kids did amazingly well and really enjoyed playing the xylophones! An example of our Young Fives practicing the song: An example of our Kindergarteners singing the song: I'd like to end this week's post with a sweet, brief moment I happened to capture during one of our bee activities: a quick glimpse of normalcy! *Young Fives and Kindergarten are learning about bees this week in music class! We reviewed what we know about bees - lots of musicians knew about bees' pollination, honey, and stinging abilities. Then we sang a few bee songs (like this one), helped bees buzz (vocal exploration), and started our pre-reading skills by identifying bees and bumble bees (ta and titi). *First Grade focused on clocks this week by reviewing the steady beat that we practiced last week, and instead of copying each other, the students kept a steady beat on different parts of their bodies to The Syncopated Clock by Leroy Anderson (the same person who wrote "Sleigh Ride" that we hear during the holiday season). Then we used "Hickory Dickory Dock" to learn about form, making an ABA pattern with "tick tock" and "Hickory Dickory Dock." And we even added movement and instruments! *Second Grade is building on "Hickory Dickory Dock" in a similar way to first grade because it is an awesome experience that they didn't get to do last year when we were virtually learning music. The second graders not only sang the song, but they spoke the rhythmic part, added form (most classes chose to do A,B,A/B,B,A, which is a modified rondo form), and then did all parts at the same time while rotating through the different parts...it was just wonderful. Check out these *Third Grade is continuing our Pure Musical Michigan project, and we really focused on exploring the different instruments in our classroom to replicate the sounds we heard last year. The students broke off into groups and started creating their outline for the commercial - they are really coming together! Below, you can see a class in action, working in their groups to decide on sounds and placement of those sounds. *Fourth grade this week did some interpretive listening (the first six minutes of this video) and colored a paper based on what they thought the music sounded like. Here are some examples, from students who wanted to share. Mrs. Hagan's class: Mrs. Jarjoura's class: (formerly Dr. Wagner's) class: *Fifth Grade continued our work with "Lift Every Voice And Sing" - this week we focused on learning the melody and identifying different parts of a piece of music: treble clef, bar line, numbering measures, sharps/flats/naturals, fermatas, and so much more. It was a great way to draw connections between the music they will be doing in their instrumental classes with what we've been learning in General Music during their time here at King!
Some highlights from this week: *Hearing, "I GOT IT!" when a 4th grader was playing an accompaniment part for our song, "Sally Go 'Round the Sun." This is my favorite type of moment as a teacher! *Sharing information with Rotary Club of Ann Arbor members about a proposal to bring ukuleles to the music classroom at King Elementary. You can read more about the proposal here or donate to our PTO here if you're interested. *Playing "Oh My, No More Pie" with our Y5 and Kindergarten students. The magic microphone made an appearance and students got the opportunity to sing by themselves. We have so many brave souls in our classroom! *Taking the 3rd graders outside to listen to the sounds of everyday life - birds, wind, kids playing, lawnmowers, etc. Someone even heard a jackhammer! They listened very well and we compiled quite a list. See the picture of one of our 3rd grade classes below: *Our fifth graders are learning about "Lift Every Voice and Sing," an important song for many different reasons. This week we focused on the history of the song as well as comparing and contrasting several wonderful versions: Kirk Franklin, Ray Charles, Committed, and Chloe x Halle. We will also use it next week as we work on a score study (looking at the different parts of physical pieces of music, like treble clefs, quarter notes, fermatas, etc.) and then learn to sing this iconic piece. *Kindergarten students also had an opportunity to add Boomwhackers to one of our favorite books, Pete the Cat: Rockin' In My School Shoes. When we sang the words "rockin' in my school shoes," the students were to play their instruments, and then stop. It's harder than it sounds! Welcome back to King School, musicians!
A quick update: This week we focused in all grade levels on the book All Are Welcome by Alexandra Penfold and illustrated by Suzanne Kaufman. Our youngest learners learned how to sing the melody of the words "All Are Welcome Here," then transitioned to using the melody's rhythm to playing the hand drums. We also focused on getting/putting back instruments in a safe way, creating a seating chart, and decorating the wall outside our music classroom. To decorate our hallway, each student chose a paint chip (thanks, Home Depot!) and wrote their name. Our older elementary students also wrote something that they love about music. Check out how beautiful our mural is outside of the music room! |
Mrs. BergerTeacher, parent, dog mom, traveler Archives
March 2024
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