This week (9/14-9/18)

This week in...

Kindergarten- we met a new animal on our farm- sheep! We got to play egg shakers while singing "Listen to the Sheep" and we moved and danced around with the shakers. We read a story called Hattie the Hen and practiced moving our voices high and low with the story.

1st grade- we got to practice our xylophone playing even more! We are working on telling stories using the xylophone going up and going down. We practiced the story "Jack and Jill" and also "Wiggle and Waggle." We are getting really good at holding the mallet correctly and making fun sounds on the instruments.

2nd grade- we are reviewing the notes la, so, and mi using lots of songs and games. This week we learned a song/game called "Bluebird, Bluebird" and also played the birdie game. For the birdie game, Ms Buckley hides a small stuffed birdie underneath one of 3 cups. Each cup represents a note (la, so, or mi.) While Ms. Buckley is hiding the birdie, everyone closes their eyes so that no one knows where he is hiding. Then, Ms. Buckley sings a pattern using the notes la, so, and mi. Whichever note the pattern ends on is the cup where birdie is hiding. This requires students to use their ears to help them decide which note was sung last (la is the highest, mi is the lowest.) It's a fun ear training game that the kids enjoy. :)

3rd grade- we are getting fancy with our xylophones! We are playing borduns (a simple steady beat accompaniment pattern), tunes (the melody of our singing) and we are improvising our own tunes! We are using the song "Willowbee" as our foundation since we already know that song from two weeks ago. We are getting really good at creating our own melodies on the xylophone.

4th grade- we have begun playing recorders! It's always fun to start students off on recorders. They have a bad reputation but are such lovely instruments when played well. We used the following tongue twister poem to start us off:
         How much dew does a dewdrop drop is dewdrops do drop dew?
         They do drop as do dewdrops drop if dewdrops do drop dew.

We then figured out how to say that poem using only the word "doo." Then, we whispered the poem on the word "doo." Eventually, we whispered "doo" into our recorders, which is how you make a nice sound on it. Super fun! We even had conversations with a partner but could only use the word "doo." It was pretty amusing. :)

5th grade- we are continuing our drumming practice by creating rhythms using Chad (quarter note), Ghana (eighth notes), Tanzania (sixteenth notes) and our newest rhythm, Cameroon (two sixteenths and one eighth note.) We learned a song called "Togo", which lists even more African countries. After the song was finished, we would echo 4-beat rhythms on drums. We then got into 4 long lines/teams (I called the teams canoes) with one leader (the captain) at the front. The leader would get a drum and would be in charge of performing a 4-beat rhythm. Everyone in their canoe would copy the rhythm. We rotated so that everyone had multiple turns to be the captain.

This week (9/8-9/11)

We had a 4 day week because of labor day, but we were still busy in music class!

This week in.....

Kindergarten- we reviewed how to say and clap the number of sounds in our first names. We added to our farm animal theme with a song about the hen, "Listen to the Hens." We learned how to play drums and added those to the song! We also did the "Chicken Dance" to fit into our hen theme of the day. :) We got to play our red/green game where we walk for the color green and stop for red. Some students even got to come to the front of the room to lead the game.

1st grade- we have been music detectives trying to tell the difference between music that has a steady beat and not steady beat. We are pretty good at it! We also learned how to hold xylophone mallets by copying Ms. Buckley's movements and sharing a set of mallets with a partner. We learned a poem about Jack and Jill to help us move our mallets in different ways so that we can play the xylophone soon.

2nd grade- we have continued our hammer theme into these week- we are building tree houses! We practiced using a saw (with quarter notes), a hammer (with eighth notes), and painting (with half notes.) We reviewed the notes la, so, and mi from pitch hill and used those notes to sing many different patterns.

3rd grade- we have begun playing xylophones! We used the song "Willowbee" that we already learned and got to play a steady C and G bordun pattern to accompany the song. Next we will learn how to play the melody of the song. So far we have been paired with a partner so that we can help each other learn the xylophone parts successfully.

4th grade- it's all about SCAT! Scat is a bunch of nonsense, gibberish words that don't really mean anything. Jazz singers use scat words to sing solos. We heard the Queen of Scat, Ella Fitzgerald, sing a couple of songs- she is amazing! We got to create our own scat patterns alone, with partners, and in groups. We are also learning a bit about Ella's history and how she became such an influential jazz musician.

5th grade- we reviewed our name rhythm compositions and added rhythmic notation to our pieces this week. For names that are one sound long (like Sam) we added quarter notes to go with them. For names that are two sounds (like Sarah) we added eighth notes. For names that are four sounds (like Alexandra) we added sixteenth notes. We don't know the rhythm to go with three sound names yet...that's coming soon. :) Now we are giving the hand drums a break in favor of the bigger tubano drums! We will start learning more about Africa and the places where our African pieces of music come from.

This week (8/31-9/4)

Happy Friday!

This week in....

Kindergarten- we learned to sing the song that will begin every music class called "Hello, Everybody." We got to bounce Lola and Izzy (two adorable stuffed ducks) to the steady beat to match with a poem. We also learned to play rhythm sticks along with a duck quacking song. We also figured out how to say and play our names on the rhythm sticks. It was a great second week!

1st grade- we played a longer game with the "Rig a Jig Jig" song that we started learning last week. In this game, each set of partners got to create their own steady beat movements to go with the song. We then performed them for the class! We have also started being detectives- our job is to listen to each piece of music Ms. Buckley plays and decide whether or not is has a steady beat. We are pretty good at it!

2nd grade- we are doing lots of hammering in music class! We learned a fun song called "Johnny Hammers"- ask your child to share it with you! We also got to explore steady beat and rhythm with the song "Hammer Ring" by hitting mallets on the floor. We reviewed our old friends la, so, and mi from pitch hill. We also got to draw rhythms on construction paper to use in a fun rhythm clapping game.

3rd grade- we are still in the land of machines! We got to move like machines as a class this week. We noticed that most of these movements showed a steady beat and were repetitive. We challenged ourselves by doing the "Zackody, Kody" name game at 80 beats per minute with a metronome. We also began learning the song "Willowbee", which allows students to travel down an "alley" with their partner while doing a made up dance move.

4th grade- we got really good at telling the difference between steady beat and rhythm this week. We also can tell the difference between straight and swung eighth notes. We used the old poem "Bubblegum, bubblegum in a dish. How many pieces do you wish?" to make a game out of it. We even made a mini-performance using this poem and some rhythmic improvisations at the end of class.

5th grade- we created compositions in groups of 4 using our first names. We are performing them using our voices and hand drums. We had to work together to be able to say our piece twice in a row without stopping, while also adding in up and down strokes on the drums.