The Mitten

One of my absolute favorite lessons each year goes along with the children's book, The Mitten, by Jan Brett.

I got this idea from my mentor teacher years ago and have adapted it and tweaked it over the years. I use it as a way to culminate the major units that my first graders have been studying throughout the year - rhythm patterns and basic mallet skills. It is also a great way to ease them into preparing for their Spring Musical.

First, I read the story to the students and we discuss the various characters in the book. For each character, we learn a rhythm pattern and I have the students practice playing the rhythms on various percussion instruments.

Then, I teach the students a song that goes with the book. We add a simple bordun and an octave glockenspiel part at the end of each phrase.

Finally, we add some actors! I choose students to represent each character and they follow the narration of the book. I created some masks that I printed from Jan Brett's website, laminated them, and added some elastic bands.

I used a cheap white sheet and cut it into the shape of a mitten for the actors to sit on top of during their performance.

After the students have practiced all of the parts, we put together a performance that we show to their classroom teacher. As the story is read, one student plays the rhythm pattern on the percussion instrument while that character "gets into" the mitten. When the bear sneezes in the story, the actors toss the mitten up into the air and pretend to fall into the snow while the percussionists play all together. We begin and end the performance with our mitten song accompanied by the mallet instruments.

 

If you have larger classes, you can add actors for Nicki and his grandmother, Baba. You can also double instrument parts and even add sound effects on the sneeze part (think: crank, vibraslap, slapstick, etc.) This activity makes a great "informance" piece at PTO meetings or other school events.

The students LOVE it and it is definitely a crowd-pleaser for teachers, too. Fun and learning - that's how we roll at HSES! :)

A Special Concert at HSES

How lucky are we at HSES?? Our new principal, Mr. Eddy, is a musician and former band director so our 2nd grade classes were treated to a special concert performed by him and his family! The Eddys demonstrated the clarinet, oboe, saxophone, flute, piccolo, and violin. Since our 2nd graders are currently learning about the Instruments of the Orchestra, they loved being able to see the instruments up close and hear their sound in person. Here are a few pictures from their performance:

The Snowy Day... on the Mallets!

I love the book, The Snowy Day, and so do my students! First graders have been experimenting with various sounds they can make with the mallet instruments. I thought this activity would be a perfect way to give them experience on the instruments as well as allow them some creative expression.

First, we read the story and talked about all of the things Peter did in the snow. Then, I had the students partner up and I assigned each of them an action from the story...

The students then worked with their partner to create a sound effect that could represent that action in the story. It was so neat to see the ideas they came up with!

After each group shared their ideas, I re-read the story and had the groups add their sound effect at the appropriate point in the story.

An extension idea could be having half of the class play the sound effects and the other half act out the story. Maybe we'll try that next! :)

Shut the {Music} Box!

My 3rd grade students have been working on remembering their note values. We've played several games recently to help them work on this skill, including "Rhythm War." After finding the "Shut the Box" game on Pinterest, I decided to give it a whirl and my students have really enjoyed it!

To play, students work with partners and take turns trying to mark off as many numbers in their row as possible. They roll the dice and can either mark off the note values separately or add them together. For example, if they rolled a half note and a quarter note, they could mark off a 2 and a 1 or they could add them together and mark off 3. The object of the game is to get the most boxes crossed off.

(You can see the original blog post at Notable Music Studio and print off the game board here: http://sherylwelles.blogspot.com/2013/05/shut-box.html)

Tennis Ball Rhythms

To go along with our Rhythm unit, 4th and 5th graders have been talking about subdividing and how music note values are related to fractions.

Classes have really enjoyed this tennis ball rhythm activity! Each note has a different movement that goes with it to represent that note value. It helps to reinforce steady beat, how the notes are related to each other, and how they fit in the measure. Here are some pictures of the students practicing:

Whole Note: tennis ball goes around the body in a large circle for 4 counts

Half Note: bounce tennis ball for 1st count and catch ball for 2nd count

Quarter Note: toss the tennis ball up and catch on each beat

Eighth Notes: toss the ball back and forth between each hand on each half beat

You can find this activity here on YouTube:

(In addition to "Stars and Stripes," I have the students try the activity with a variety of styles)

Oh Opposites!

First graders at HSES have been working on a musical opposites unit! They have learned about loud/soft (quiet), fast/slow, high/low, and long/short. They have had so much fun doing various games and activities to help them identify these changes in music. Here are a few pictures of our fun...

After hearing a fast/slow story about a school bus, students move their buses fast and slow to the music.

After learning about fast and slow music, students participate in a quick check assessment.

Learning about loud and soft -  boys pretend to be grizzly bears hibernating

... and wake up when the song gets loud!

And then the girls get to be the grizzly bears!

So. Much. Fun! :)

Using scarves as paintbrushes - painting long and short sounds

Using sticks to play "violins" when they hear long sounds...

... and playing "drums" for short sounds.

Pretending scarves are taffy - stretching them out to long sounds.

Rules and Rhythms!

It's the beginning of the new school year and the time to talk about rules and procedures in the music room. I took some advice from Aimee from "O For Tuna Orff," and combined our rules talk with reviewing rhythms!

First, the students were divided into 6 different groups and they were given one of our music rules. They were asked to work together to figure out what the rhythm of their phrase was and they displayed their answer on their beat sheets using rhythm cards.

After practicing their rhythms, they performed them for the class. Next, was their favorite part: adding instruments! We were even able to perform these rhythms together as ostinato patterns. This will lead wonderfully into our first unit about performing contrasting rhythm patterns together.

This activity made learning and reviewing the rules so much more fun and meaningful!