Second Grade January 2012

Tempo is our current unit of study!

Freddie the Frog

Second graders were introduced to Freddie the Frog and Eli the Elephant in Sharon Burch's book.

It is a great way to relate the concept of tempo to a story! 

You may click on the link above to visit the website which includes games.

Activities for this unit include:

Name That Tempo listening game

Writing a Tempo Story and creating a Visual Map to go with it

Performance of a friend's Story Map

First Grade January 2012

The Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra by Benjamin Britten

I am very excited to use this website as a teaching resource for the first time this year with the first graders! It is interactive learning which we do as a class on the SMART Board. The best part is that your child may do this on their own at home as well. I have provided the link above.

Along with learning more about the instruments and their families, we have begun learning the songs for our upcoming program We're Making Music by Teresa Jennings which will be performed in the Evansville High School Performing Arts Center on Thursday, March 1, 2012.

Kindergarten January 2012

Kindergarten Music students are learning about the 4 families of musical instruments and their common characteristics.  Woodwind Family: most have at one time been made of wood, use a piece of wood called a reed, and all use WIND or breath to play.  Brass Family: All are made of metal called brass, have a cup shaped mouthpiece and you need to buzz your lips to play.  String Family: They all have strings!
Percussion Family: instruments are played by Striking, Shaking or Scraping.  The students are also grasping the concept that the smaller an instrument is, the higher its sound, and the bigger an instrument is, the lower its sound.
This month students will experience the story of The Musical Life of Gustav Mole, and the book and video of Tubby the Tuba.

"We Will Jingle" by Teresa Jennings is a HUGE Hit!

Playing the Jingle Bells with it is a lot of fun!!

Mrs. Mohns' class demonstrates!

The Role Music Plays in Movies....2nd Grade

2nd graders participated in a great discussion about how music has a starring role in movies and can even give us clues of what is going to happen!  We then experienced Igor Stravinsky's Firebird as background music for Maurice Sendak's book Where the Wild Things Are, and how it is portrayed in Fantasia 2000 in a very different story.

The Sorcerer's Apprentice in First Grade

The First graders have had a wonderful time watching the "Sorcerer's Apprentice" from Fantasia 2000, and then acting out the story taking on the roles of the Sorcerer, the Apprentice, the main Broom, and the Broom Army! They have enjoyed learning how music can "tell the story" with the images and no dialogue.

Music Fun This Week

The Sorcerer's Apprentice by Paul Dukas is one of my very favorites. I am excited to share it with the 1st Graders (and 2nd graders who didn't experience it last year). I will read the story from a book that was my dad's (when he was a little boy) and play the music in the background. Then we will watch the video clip on Fantasia 2000 and even act out the story with the music.

Kindergarten Kids are finishing up the Carnival of the Animals with a video set in a zoo with live orchestra and animals.  2nd Graders are moving on to Stravinky's Firebird Suite with the book Where the Wild Things Are by Maurice Sendak and video clip on Fantasia 2000.


Music That Tells A Story is such a fun unit for me to teach!  :)