Pink Shirt Day this Wednesday Feb 26, 2020

Pink Shirt Day

February 26, 2020 is Pink Shirt Day.  Students are encouraged to wear a pink shirt (this is not mandatory) to celebrate friendship and kindness.  Students will meet with their buddies for an activity.

And to end this post, a fun few words from Youtuber Kid President!

Learning Highlights

K- gr 2 continued working on rolls, glissandos, and double stops with mallets on the xylophones within the context of a rhyme that they spoke aloud while playing. We also focused on maintaining beat to a pop song in a game called Beat Detective. For our music literacy, Kindergarten students are learning to write sixteenth notes in a group of four in preparation for our music dictation. Grades 1/2 are writing four-beat patterns which contain sixteenth notes by dictation. They also have to play and identify four beat patterns that they hear each other play.

Grades 3-4 continue their recorder unit. They are developing fluency in playing and a gentle warm tone. Those of us with skinny fingers have to work harder to ensure we are covering the holes of our recorder with our finger pads, not our finger tips. We have seen our recorder karate belt songs and we are working on our fourth Belt Song. Soon we will be testing to receive our belts. We will be graded based on the following rubric.

NAME OF STUDENT: BELT:

Skill	Descriptor	Always	Mostly	Sometimes	Not Yet
		4 points	3 pts	2 pts	1 pt
Tone	Plays with a gentle, beautiful tone
Tonguing	Starts the note with “doo”
Legato	Connects notes
Fingerings	Uses correct fingerings
Finger Position	Covers holes completely, uses fingerpads
Rhythms	Plays rhythms accurately
Fluency	Plays complete example on the first attempt
Rehearsal Skills	Student quietly waits turn to play

32 possible points Students Point Total : _____

Comments from teacher:

Grades 5-6 simultaneously continue on recorder skills and learning new notes while also preparing a google slides presentation on a music genre of our choice. Mrs. Lim gave a sample presentation so we would know what was expected of our slides. We have also seen our recorder belt list of songs we will be learning, and we also watched a video of our gold belt song (Happy Working Song, Hedwig's Theme) so we could have an idea of tempo, rhythm, and tone. We are also going to be marked based on the above rubric.

Grades K-6 update for mid February

Earlier in the week, we had Sound Kreations come and do a Slam Poetry residency with students. They worked on their poems of self-expression and introducing the self, and all the poems were finished with a performance by the instructors themselves - what a treat!

As Valentine approaches, students in grades K-2 get to sing a song about making friends. They also coordinate hand clapping patterns and dance movements!

VALENTINE VALENTINE

Valentine, valentine,

Won’t you be my valentine?

Valentine, valentine, 

Won’t you be my friend?

Will you be? Will you be?

Will you be good friends with me?

Will you be? Will you be?

Will you be my friend?

Grades 1/2 have been working on keeping steady beat as an accompaniment for a song called "Lemonade". It is actually harder than it seems! Sometimes we are tempted to play the rhythm instead of a steady beat because we are singing at the same time.

Kindergarten has also been singing old and new songs, all which require executing dance choreography from memory! Our songs require students work on finding a friend or a partner - all social skills adults have internalized and don't need to think about! Younger students must remember eye contact, smiling, looking for a partner, and then immediately dancing the moves!

Kindergarten also continues to work on recognizing instrument families by just sound, and later we will be identifying non-pitched percussion instruments by sound and then grouping them into their families (drums/metals/woods/shakers and scrapers).

Grades 3/4 have been learning different songs using the notes B, A, and G, and they are memorizing notes on the musical staff without labelling them! Students are allowed to take their recorders home to practice their new songs.

Grades 5/6 beginners have started their recorder lessons, and intermediate/advanced students will start next week. At the same time, students are working on a Google Slides presentation where they will introduce three different genres of music to their class. I'm excited to learn about some of the new genres out there!

Families, have a wonderful long weekend!

Mrs. Lim

Genres Research Assignment for Rooms 5 & 6

Students research their genre and put their information into a Google Slide presentation. They will have a chance to present their genre and share one song from that genre as well. We are looking forward to learning about some new music!

K-2 January Update: Dancing and Playing

Grades K-2 have been diligently learning to move to the beat and recognizing changes in musical form in order to execute certain choreography.

Students first sing, dance, then move their song onto the xylophones, where everyone learns an accompaniment that requires growing in dexterity, perseverance, and paying close attention while the teacher teaches the notes.

Kindergartens have worked on playing glissandos and trills, and they are enjoying improvising on a pentatonic scale to a particular beat.

Grade 1-2 have advanced from a straight bordun to a levelled bordun to a cross-over bordun. Now we are working on building speed playing up and down a penta-scale.

We also are continuing to work on recognizing instruments (or instrument families) that we hear in a song.

Recorders and Homework Link

Students grades 3-6 have received their new recorders (or brought back their ones from last year) and have started our new unit.

Students have been briefed on:
1) how to hold the recorder (Left hand on top three holes, right hand for the bottom four)
2) how to tongue a note (blowing gently with a "doo" sound)
3) how to read and play notes B and A on the musical staff for our first songs

More advanced students had a quick review and then tried their hand at the opening line of an electronic song called "Faded" by Alan Walker.

Students will be earning "belts" as they progress through a number of levelled songs appropriate for their years of experience on the recorder.

Your child may wish to bring home their recorder to work on creating a smooth tone or reading notes. Click on the link below:

https://musicplayonline.com/
login: snowpassword: 2020

Click on "RECORDER" in the left hand column.

Select the 3rd tab, "Kit1Kids".
-Practice songs #1-8.

Select 2nd tab, "Kit1Highlight"
Practice songs #1-8.

You are Invited to a Celebration of Learning

Students will be performing their own creations on Friday, February 7th afternoon at 1:30 pm. All parents are welcome!

The SLAM! Poetry Program is an exciting course that aims to re-frame the world of Language Arts and give the power of poetic expression a contemporary spin. The program invites students into a new understanding of poems and poetry, works through the misconceptions of poetry, introduces dynamic writing exercises that will include, reading, writing, grammar, context, imagery, metaphors, and similes. The program includes a focus on how to read dynamically through use of space, body language, vocal projection, and breathing.