The President's Own!

Our school was incredibly honored to host "The President's Own" US Marine Band Woodwind Quintet! They were giving a concert nearby at UGA and were able to stop by our school to do a performance for our students. It was an incredible experience for all of us!

Photography Credit: Charley Clinkenbeard

Sleigh Rides and Sing-Alongs

It is a tradition at our school to have a school-wide Christmas Sing-Along on the last day before our holiday break. I had been looking for another fun activity to add to our festivities and this turned out to be the perfect choice! 

I got this lesson awhile back at a Randy and Jeff Conference but after seeing this video, I was inspired to teach it to the whole school! It is really geared more towards older students and some of the movement combinations are a little difficult but my younger students really enjoyed learning it as well. It also went along very well with our study on form this December. 

Here is my own version of the visual:

Here are the students in action at the Sing-Along:

Hope you had a Merry Christmas!

Shoo Fly, Fermatas, and Form!

NOTE: Since making this post, I have discovered the racist history of the song "Shoo Fly." Because of this, I have decided to take this song out of my curriculum. Here is more information if you are interested. I am leaving this post up so that others that check out my post will have this information as well. 

2nd Graders have been learning about musical terms! In first grade, they learned about many different opposites in music (fast and slow, loud and soft, high and low, long and short) and now they are learning the real Italian vocabulary. So far, they have learned about dynamic markings such as forte, piano, crescendo, and decrescendo and now they are learning about fermatas!

The students learned the song, "Shoo Fly," and quickly discovered that there was a fermata in the song! Then they learned some choreography and performed a circle dance mixer together.

They started out working with partners...

And then we tried it in circle formation...

Introduction/Interlude/Coda - students pretend to play guitar, banjo, and harmonica

Section A - Students clap hand with partner on "Shoo" (R, L, R), point to self with thumbs

Section B - Students clap both hands with partner on "Feel"

Fermata - Students draw the fermata in the air

(Music Teachers: I am using the arrangement from the "Share the Music" curriculum.)

To create the circle dance, I had the students form two concentric circles. The inside partners remained in place while the outside partners rotated to the right on each fermata (Oh!).

Drumming Fun!

Our school was so lucky to have Dr. Arvin Scott visit us recently!  He is a drumming professor from the University of Georgia and in addition to teaching, presents at percussion clinics, master classes, and workshops around the world.  He also founded a community-based youth program in Athens, GA called Drumming for Success.  According to his website, "it provides percussion classes and hand drums for all the kids while encouraging academic achievement, character building, and creativity through personal goal accomplishment and group cooperation."

 

Dr. Scott performed for us on several of his instruments and explained a little bit about the language of drumming.  Then, he got volunteers from the audience to come up and try out the instruments!  It was so neat to watch the students perform a steady beat and various rhythm patterns that we have been working on all year!  What a great assessment.  ;)  After seeing how successful the students were and how excited they got, I am inspired to get more drums for the music room. 

 

Here are a few pictures of our drumming fun...

 

Instrument Inventions

After learning about the Instruments of the Orchestra, the 2nd grade classes used some imagination to design a brand new instrument!  The students used the movie, Animusic, as their inspiration.  Animusic is a movie comprised of various "music videos" using computer-generated instruments.  The students are fascinated by how they look real even though they are digitally created.  Here are some of their favorite clips:

The students worked with partners to combine their ideas and sketch out their instrument.  Afterward, they wrote a story, letter, or advertisement telling about their product.  Check out their creative projects:

Thanksgiving Rhythms

High Shoals students had a blast notating, performing, and composing Thanksgiving rhythms! 

First and second grade classes learned the song "The Dinner Was Delicious" by Deanna Stark (found on her website: http://deannastark.weebly.com/ ).

Students then worked in pairs to notate the rhythms for various foods found on the Thanksgiving table!  The students not only enjoyed discovering the rhythm of the words, but also discussing which foods were their favorite.  ツ

After the students had notated each rhythm, they categorized each word according to it's rhythm pattern.

Then, students created patterns using their "food cards" and practiced clapping them.  After experimenting with various patterns, each group chose their favorite 4-card pattern and performed it for the class.

At the end of class, we created a rondo by singing "The Dinner Was Delicious" and adding in each group's pattern for the "B" sections.  I couldn't help but smile when I heard "Mrs. E, I am really hungry now!"   ツ

Musical Pumpkins!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 



Halloween Sound Stories

Halloween is one of my favorite times of the year because there are so many fun and engaging activities we can do in music!  One of my favorite lessons is using Halloween poems to create spooky sound stories.  A sound story is using instruments or various objects to add sound effects to a story, poem, or book. 

In Second grade classes, we started by learning a Halloween poem together as a class.  Once we read through it a few times, we decided which words needed a sound effect.  They discovered that important words and onomatopoeias were great choices.
 

 

Next, I showed the students a collection of sound effects instruments and the students chose appropriate sounds for the words that they had circled. 



Then, the students performed the poem collaboratively using the instruments. 

 

The students then got into small groups and began working on their own Halloween sound story.  The groups followed the same steps that we had followed together as a class.

 

 

The groups received a bucket full of classroom percussion instruments that they used to create their sound effects.  It was so neat to watch each group's creative process! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Each group performed their sound stories for the class.

 

 

  

 

 

 They definitely got me into the spooky Halloween spirit!! ツ

 

Musical Terms Centers

As the culmination of our "Musical Terms" unit, the second graders are participating in centers.  I love using centers to help my students practice particular skills or concepts and also to assess their knowledge at the end of a unit.  They love it because they get to play fun games!

 

 

Station 1:  Simon Says Symbols - The students take turns choosing a question...

 

 

And circle/highlight/underline the correct symbol on the musical example using a creative pen!

 

 

 

 

Station 2:  Musical Terms Board Game - Students will draw a card and answer the question about a musical term.  If they answer correctly, they can roll the dice and move their game piece.  I put the questions on the outside of an envelope and the answer on an index card inside the envelope so that they can check their answers easily.  By the way, I found this board game at the Dollar Tree.  

It's a great place to get ideas for centers. :)

 

 

Station 3:  Musical Terms Scavenger Hunt - The students work together to find musical symbols in their music textbook and record the page number on their worksheet.

 

 

 

 

Station 4:  Musical Terms Hangman - The students draw a card and write the correct number of blanks on their dry erase board.  The other students in the group take turns guessing letters until they figure it out!  Most of the students already know how to play hangman and any time you can get a dry erase board in their hands it is a good thing!

 

 

Station 5:  Musical Terms Bingo - I created a "playlist" of music passages using Audacity where each clip features a particular term.  When the students identify the term that they heard, they place a Bingo chip on that symbol.  For example, if the students identified the musical clip as being loud, they would cover up "forte" on their Bingo card. 

 

 

 

I hope you enjoyed a sneak peak of some of our fun music games!  Check back soon for more musical centers!