Mallets and Note Reading

Kindergarten:
Students are working on holding the mallet with proper grip and at a proper angle in order to play glissandos on their xylophones/metallophones.
We once again practice listening and counting in our songs, and we add actions to help us remember the words to our songs. This week we are singing "I Go Up the Apple Tree" and we are reciting the poem "Swing, Swing, it's a Beautiful Thing".
We are also watching different clips of brass instruments to learn about the Brass Family.

Grade 1/2:

Students are using listening logs to convey what they can "observe" about the mystery music piece. Students are asked to circle their answer, but grade 2s get a bit more practice writing their answer too. 

We're also singing a famous Sesame Street song called "Sing, Sing a Song". Feel free to play it at home for your child to sing along with!

We also continued with 'Lucy Locket' - writing its rhythms and copying out its lyrics.

Grade 3/4

After dancing and singing the song 'Tideo', students are learning how to play the melody on mallets. 

We also did two rounds of "Mad Minutes" for recorder notes, getting ready for our recorder unit. Students found themselves vastly improving in how long it took them to label every note. 

RECORDER UNIT is coming. If your child has found their old recorder, please have them label it with a sharpie or tape and pen and have them bring it to school (in a ziplock or original cloth case.)

Grade 5/6

This week students challenge the Mad Minute, where they label 30 notes (that they will be using in recorder songs) as fast as they can. Most students, because of our prior practice in our note naming game, can label all thirty in less than 2 minutes. We will challenge a second Mad Minute to see if we can improve our speed! 

We also learned a new word regarding music tempos: accelerando. It means to gradually increase speed. We watched a video of a song and dance that employed accelerando, and we learned a song to sing, dance, and play on xylophones that gradually increases in speed. This song requires playing three separate parts and maintaining the beat in order to match everybody else in the ensemble. It requires more than just skill in hitting the right notes, but skill in listening to those around you!

RECORDER UNIT is coming. If your child has found their old recorder, please have them label it with a sharpie or tape and pen and have them bring it to school (in a ziplock or original cloth case.)