Happy 2017! January is one of my favourite times of the year because students (and teachers!) are refreshed from a nice break and routines are set in place. For the next 6 weeks, we have a few exciting things planned in Arts Education at ÉCCS!
Grade 1-2: We are exploring a unit on body percussion - which is basically using your body (patting, snapping, clapping, stomping, etc) to create different music patterns. The goal at the end of the unit is to create our own compositions that show an understanding of beat and rhythm. Grade 3-4: Guitar! These students have patiently waited for this unit since they saw the guitar wall at the beginning of the year. We will begin with a basic study of the instrument, and begin learning modified chords on the guitar - perfect for Grade 3/4 sized hands. By the end of the unit, we will be playing some well known tunes, like "Happy Birthday"! Grade 5-6: STOMP - using found objects within our school and homes to create sounds compositions that show an understanding of form. We started our unit by watching this film for inspiration: STOMP Out Loud Grade 7-8: We are changing our focus to the drama strand of arts education. In particuluar, we are exploring humour and how it is used in improvisation, story telling and everyday life. The unit will include lots of fun exercises to build confidence and trust in a drama setting.
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The last week before winter holidays can be tough for students AND teachers. Lack of sleep, too much candy and the excitement before a well-deserved break. I subscribe to an education blog called "Education Closet" and received an update this week. Here is a link to the article that inspired our "Mannequin Challenge" this week! What is the "Mannequin Challenge"? Basically it is a video that captures a room full of people frozen like mannequins and put to music. Here is an example from the article above of Michelle Obama with the Cleveland Cavaliers: Here is our first attempt at the mannequin challenge! The Grade 5/6 and Grade 7/8 French classes have been working on a guitar song of their choice for the last month. They had to choose a song, create a fret diagram based on the chords in the song, practice the chord changes and then share with me or the class. P.S. It was PJ Day when these photos were taken! It is hard to believe it is already December! One of my favourite things to do at this time of year is celebrate the diversity of our school populations by looking at holiday celebrations around the word. There are lots of songs, dances, games and stories that guide this exploration.
Kindergarten - Grade 2: we will be looking at celebrations within our school community and have some fun with the music that makes this time of year so great! Grade 3-4: Last week, we started working on a traditional Iroquois lullaby, "Ho, Ho, Watanay". We are taking the piece one step further on the barred instruments, by learning how to read music on a musical staff and transfer it to the barred instruments. Grade 5-6: This week, M. Ingola's class completed their final guitar class with some performances from students. Both French and English 5/6 classes will focus on a study of rhtyhm vs. beat this week. Beat is the steady pulse and rhythm is long or short sounds grouped together. Grade 7-8: Both French and English classes will complete their guitar unit with final performances and assessment. As a mature student, we are working on how to set goals and improve instrumental skills. For example, if the guitar string is not sounding correctly, how can we fix it? Try pushing down harder on the string, or make sure you are not muting the string with another finger. The Grade 5/6 English students were busy creating and performing their cup song performance this week. The focus was on MUSICAL FORM - using an A section (in our case, everyone did the "regular" cup song pattern) and a B section (something different!). The Grade 5/6 French students ended the week by rehearsing their chosen guitar songs. Each group picked a song and filled out a fret diagram to use for their practice sessions. Next week we will share some of the performances during class! In both French and English Grade 3/4 classes, we started learning a traditional Iroquois lullaby called, "Ho, Ho, Watanay". We added a tremolo (quickly repeating one note) using the bass metallophone, a steady drum beat and a simple rhythmic pattern on the alto xylophones while singing the melody. Next week we will learn how to play the melody on the barred instruments. This will include looking at musical staffs and reading notes and rhythms.
I always love this time year of year at school because we are starting to get into a steady groove in all classes. The first couple months are about developing routines and working on the basic skills (reading rhythms, focusing on our singing voices, etc). The end of the year goal is get students improvising and creating music on the spot. As we head towards the middle of the year, we are working on understanding form in music and how to rehearse compositions.
Kindergarten - Grade 2: Using our voices to add sound effects to stories and poems. This allows students to experiment with their voices and instruments and explore elements of music like dynamics and tempo. Grade 3-4: Students learn a song through the Orff method. They will incorporate singing, movement and instruments and learn how to work collaboratively through music. This week we will focus on exploring the different tone colours of instruments and how they can be used to create a specific mood. Stay tuned for a video of their work! Grade 5-8: Students are working on guitar songs of their choice and preparing fret diagrams with the chords from each song. One of the classes is also putting together a rhythmic performance using cups (based on the "Cup Song") and showing their understanding of form. At this level, students learn how to troubleshoot and figure out ways to improve their performance. Lots of collaboration takes place! This week in guitar with the Grade 5/6 French students, we practiced chord changes AND singing a well-known song at the same time. We started with "Happy Birthday", a song everyone has done a million times. To give the students a little extra push, I told them it was my big sister's 40th birthday that day, and that it would be really cool if we could record the whole class playing guitar and singing 'Happy Birthday' to my sister, Mary. After just 3 classes of guitar, here is a video of the students creating the perfect birthday present for my sister! Happy 40th Birthday, Mary! At the beginning of the school year, a student in Grade 2 French asked if he could bring his harmonica and perform for the class. I love when students share what they do musically outside of school, so of course I was open to the idea! The best part about the talent sharing is that the students took it upon themselves to remember when they have music class and get permission from their parents to bring their instrument to school. #shareyourtalent is completely student driven! It is also a great opportunity to discuss appropriate audience behaviour and practice what we do before, during and after a performance (most importantly, we clap to show our support!).
Here are some photos of one the Grade 2 students playing a few pieces on violin. She also showed the class different parts of the instrument and explained that she has to practice every day. At the end of class, the students were buzzing with excitement! In the coming weeks, we will have a singing performance, dance and some more violin. |
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