March 19, 2019

Greetings Findley,

Since the last time I posted, life has been very busy. We had a third grade concert, I went to a music teacher’s conference in February and have unfortunately had to be out of school several times for one reason or another.

Today’s blog post will attempt to recap some of the things that each grade level has been working on over the last month or more.

Fourth and Fifth Grade

In February, the fourth and fifth grade continued working on the ukuleles for a few weeks, getting to the place where they could play chords while singing. I placed stickers on the fretboards of the ukuleles, which made it easier for the students to learn and retain chords. We played two chord songs in the third week of February, and then we stopped ukuleles to move on to other things. Ukuleles are likely to come back in some form after Spring Break.

In the last several weeks, we have been working through a composition unit. It started out with students working through identifying the underlying rhythms of words that they speak, and then stringing those words together to make a longer rhythm. Those word strings didn’t often make much sense so we moved on into writing rhythmic phrases, which could be a rhyme or simply a saying.

In the process, I discovered that I needed to alter the assignment for the fourth graders, as it was taking them much longer to do the same assignment that the fifth graders were working on. So now, all but one fourth grade class is using a modified assignment that is somewhat of a musical mad-lib, meaning that they had to fill in blanks or make a choice of words in some of their rhythms. It made it a much faster process for them.

Classes should be completing those assignments this week or the week after Spring Break, which means that you will get to hear their composition on Seesaw. We will be taking the rhyme, adding rhythm, and then adding instruments.

Third Grade

Third Grade had a concert at the end of February. Most of that month was working with the various classes on their specific concert needs. All together it was a wonderful event. I now consider it one of the top three concert experiences I’ve had at Findley.

In the last couple of weeks, I’ve been working with the students on mallet skills on the xylophones and glockenspiels. We were reminded of proper care of the instruments, how to hold the mallets, and playing in a respectful way. Students are right now playing music based on the pentatonic (5-tone) scale. This reflects the ear-training that we’ve done in class, and will be reinforced in future weeks.

Second Grade

February began with the final performance of The Noble Duke of York, which we put on Seesaw.

Following that week, we focused on black history month for one week with some videos on Jazz music and the book Follow the Drinking Gourd.

In the third week of February, I used a rhythmic rhyme to do a name activity with the students that was connected to the focus on names in the mother tongue that was happening across the school that week.

In recent weeks, we have introduced the music for the Volunteer Celebration that will be happening in May and had some lesson time with hand drums. When we focused on hand drums, we worked through the proper technique of how to hold them, gave students time to explore different sounds and then finished with an activity where they had to step to the beat and play the rhythm on the drum at the same time.

Last week,  we focused on two diverse areas: mirroring in movement and Mi-Re-Do on the barred instruments (xylophones and glockenspiels). For the first part of class, we worked through mirroring the movement of a partner. This is a great starter activity for developing musical expression in young students. The latter half of class was spent working through ear training with the first three notes of the scale, and then transferring those notes to the xylophones and glockenspiels in a specific song.

First Grade

Looking back, I see the first week of February had a variety of rhythm and melody activities. We worked through basic first grade level rhythms (quarter note, paired eighth notes and quarter rest) in various combinations. We also began some activities that introduce the note La in our ear training along with So and Mi. Again with ear training, the goal is to train the ear of the students to understand the melodic relationship between those notes that we know already. We started with So and Mi, the first two notes that many students hear in a “playground” relationship.

Following that week, we focused on black history month for one week with some videos on Jazz music and the book Follow the Drinking Gourd.

In the third week of February, I used a rhythmic rhyme to do a name activity with the students that was connected to the focus on names in the mother tongue that was happening across the school that week.

Since the end of February, first grade students have begun working on music for their first grade concert mid-April and music for the Volunteer Celebration in May.

Kindergarten

In the first week of February, we had an alphabet theme. Students read the book Chicka Chicka Boom Boom and acted it out. We also made the shapes of letters of the alphabet. This is to help us practice expression in music. A final activity that week was an organized dance called The Skaters. Not every kindergarten class got to that activity.

Following that week, we focused on black history month for one week with some videos on Jazz music and the book Follow the Drinking Gourd.

In the third week of February, I used a rhythmic rhyme to do a name activity with the students that was connected to the focus on names in the mother tongue that was happening across the school that week.

In recent weeks, we began learning songs for the Volunteer Assembly in May. I focused on those songs for two to three weeks in my classes (depending on the class day), and will return to practicing them in late April or May.

In the last two weeks, we have been practicing songs that use long and short sounds, getting students used to the basic premise of rhythm, that sounds can have different lengths. We have also been practicing some basic beat-keeping activities together.

As always, if you have any questions, please let me know. Until next time…

January 24-31

Fifth, Fourth and Third (Buckley and O’Mara) Grade Students can:

Play ukuleles together with others while

1.Strumming along with a play-along song

2.Placing fingers on the right places to create chords

This week the students began to transition to strumming chords while singing. We introduced the C7 chord, which requires students to place one finger in a specific spot and then we played a song along with Lime in the Coconut.

From there, we practiced the C major chord, where we had to move that finger two frets away and then practiced strumming to some easy songs while we sang.

If successful, students were:

1.     Holding instruments correctly,

2.     Placing their left hand on the right string and fret position

3.     Strumming with their right hand, and

4.     Singing a song.

That’s a lot for those young brains to do all at one time! This week was mentally taxing and hard on the strumming hand. About half of the classes did not have the stamina to play the entire class period. I found that as the week went on, I took more time in the lesson, spent more time on tuning the ukuleles because it was obvious that many classes were tiring out before the end of a 45-minute lesson.

(Potocki and Wellborn)

Third Grade Students can:

1.     Play xylophone music cooperatively with others.

2.     Play correct notes at the right time.

The Potocki and Wellborn classes are continuing to work on music with xylophones in preparation for our concert at the end of February. Both classes are doing a terrific job at learning their parts!

Second Grade Students can:

1.Perform an alley dance appropriately (The Noble Duke of York)

2. Sing and move to choreography with a song. (Ritsch Ratsch)

The majority of time this week was spent improving the dance that we learned last week. Last week the students learned the basic form, or movements to the dance. However, there were a lot of mistakes and other issues that needed to be cleaned up. The dance is just complicated enough that it doesn’t really look good on SeeSaw unless we spend some time to clean it up.

Every class knows that they are going to demonstrate the dance on SeeSaw for next week’s lesson.

With the time remaining we played a short rhythm game called Ritsch Ratsch. In my curriculum it is supposed to lead to another lesson next week. I’m thinking that I will modify that lesson as it has not always been a successful lesson for me in years past. I hope I can report a success next week!

First Grade Students can:

1.Accurately sing So-Mi patterns back to the teacher

2.Identify So-Mi in a song. (Teddy Bear)

3.Imitate rhythm patterns

4.Improvise movement to an accompaniment (What Shall We Do?)

All the first grade classes are now caught up with each other after our day at the zoo and my own absence day.

The first and second learning target were part of melodic training. I’m working through training the ears of the students to hear, identify and respond through motions or by singing the appropriate notes in a melodic sequence. In first grade, we start with Sol-Mi, the 5^th and 3^rd of a musical scale. Those notes are the most often notes used in children’s self-initiated play (playground songs) so are a natural place to start melodic training.

We started the lesson with students echoing simple melody fragments. I’m seeking to hear the students sing the correct pitch while showing the correct motion (up and down) along with the note they are singing. With later classes in the week, I progressed to doing hand motions only and they sang the pattern back to me. There were varying levels of success with that particular exercise! As that concluded, it naturally led into the next learning target.

I introduced the song Teddy Bear by using the solfege syllables for the song, then teaching the song piece by piece, including motions. We progressed to the group competency at singing the song with motions along with me, then motions only with no singing (not always easy! It requires having the song playing silently in their head), and then singing the song with motions without teacher help.

Class finished with a song What Shall we Do? Students came up with ideas for activities they do outside and then they improvised movements to those activities during the B section of the song. So students were performing the song in a two-part form (which could have been a secondary learning target) by standing and singing on the A part and improvising motion on the B part.

Kindergarten Students can:

1.Use my own body to make shapes. (Alphabet Fun)

2.Move creatively in response to a story. (The Snowy Day)

3.Explore and Respond to the four vocal qualities. (ABC Song)

Students in Kindergarten learned about the four kinds of voices this week. We discussed which voices are musical (singing and speaking) and which are not (whispering and shouting). We talked about that when we ask kids to sing louder, that does not mean yelling. Students practiced using all voices on the ABC song.

We brought back the book The Snowy Day from last week and used it to pantomime movement to the motions suggested by the book. Improvised movement is the way a student can show creative expression at this age.

We continued on that theme of exploring motion by showing the shapes of letters of the alphabet with our bodies for the song Alphabet Fun.

January 16-23 in Mr. Swardstrom's Music Class

Fourth and Fifth Grade Students can:

Play ukuleles together with others while

1.     Having correct posture          

2.     Holding the instrument well

3.     Placing fingers in the right frets

4.     Reading tablature songs

5.     Performing a prepared piece

This week the fourth and fifth grade students continued their work on playing the mystery tablature songs together, culminating in a group performance for the rest of class.

In the process, students worked cooperatively with others to understand how and where to place their fingers in order to play the songs they were given. There are students in every class who still need help understanding where to place their fingers and I found myself making the rounds to students around the classroom doing check-ins with the groups as they were working together.

It’s really great when a student in a group has such a good understanding of the concept that they can help others. I found that many times the group was in good hands and I could move on to the next group. Conversely, there were a few groups where all of them needed help visualizing where to put their fingers on the fingerboard of the ukulele.

The discovery here is that while working last week, one or two in each group may have been able to play enough of the mystery song for them to figure it out, that doesn’t mean that all within the group mastered the ability to transfer what they see on the paper to the instrument they have in their hand.

So this week has really helped to sort that out. Most kids in every class now have a clearer understanding of where to place their fingers on the neck to produce a sound described by the tablature on the paper.

All in all, many groups had fractured performances, which is why this didn’t end up on SeeSaw. More often than not, students dropped out, made mistakes, or went at different speeds than the other kids in their groups. My message to the kids was that two months ago, nobody knew how to do any of this, so this is all progress in my eyes and that they were to just do the best that they could.

Was the goal accomplished? The learning targets are stated above. Personally, I was really looking for students to get more familiar with placing their fingers on the fingerboard of the ukulele. That familiarity was important for the next step, which will be playing chords. So for the vast majority students, yes, we accomplished the goal. I saw a handful of students that sat and did not play while their friends went ahead and performed. I will be keeping an eye on those students in coming weeks and trying to give them some extra help.

(O’Mara and Buckley)

Third Grade Students can:

Play ukuleles together with others while

1.     Having correct posture          

2.     Holding the instrument well

3.     Learning to strum chords for the first time.

This week was to be our introduction to strumming chords on the ukulele. I was absent on the day I was supposed to see O’Mara. However, Buckley’s class did well. We discussed strumming and finger placement for two chords. We started out with the C7 chord and moved to the C chord. Those two chords require one finger to be placed on a single string at a specific place. After over half the class needed my help on the C7 chord, only a few needed help with the C chord. We played along with the songs: Lime in the Coconut, Bow Wow Wow and Rain Rain Go Away.

(Potocki and Wellborn)

Third Grade Students can:

1.     Play xylophone music cooperatively with others.

2.     Play correct notes at the right time.

Wellborn and Potocki are continuing to work on their xylophone and glockenspiel music for the concert. The Wellborn class played all the way through their song this week three times along with backing music, but they still has several wrong notes that need to be fixed and need to work to play independent of that backing track. The Potocki class also made it through their piece. We should be able to have Mrs. Enghusen’s class come over and sing with us next week.

Second Grade Students can:

1.     Use a chord drone to accompany a song. (Taxi Taxi)

2.     Use color instruments to accompany a song. (Taxi Taxi)

3.     Learn the form of an alley dance (AB). (The Noble Duke of York)

This week second grade students worked through two very different skills. The first was taking the first steps toward using the classroom instruments to create accompaniments for songs that we use in music class. We used the song introduced last week, Taxi Taxi, to introduce a chord drone and color instruments. A chord drone is when the 1^st and 5^th note of a key-center (C and G in the key of C) are played over and over on quarter notes. When played while we sing a song, it provides a very stable foundation which can be built upon. We also added a little color by having glockenspiels add a little zing on rests of our music.

The second skill was to perform an alley dance to the song learned last week, The Noble Duke of York. The challenge here is that there are specific motions for the dance and everyone has a responsibility in order to keep the dance running smoothly. Students really need to focus to keep it running well. This week we learned the form. Next week, we will concentrate on doing it well and consistently with a focus on appropriate actions.

Dow’s class missed this lesson as I was absent for their class. I may do this lesson for them next week. We shall see how that goes.

First Grade Students can:

1.     Identify So-Mi in a song. (Teddy Bear)

2.     Imitate rhythm patterns

3.     Accurately sing So-Mi patterns back to the teacher

4.     Improvise movement to an accompaniment (What Shall We Do?)

This lesson above was only actually done by the Stroeve class this week. The first graders had a field trip on 1/17 (Rumple) and I was absent on 1/22 (Arcangel). On 1/23 (Antich), I decided to delay the implementation of the lesson by a week, and went to a lesson I use as a back-up for occasions like this, using songs that are instant favorites for kids this age. All three involved singing with motions. I’ll likely use that lesson – or parts of it - again with Stroeve’s class on 1/25 to allow the classes to all be on the same lesson by the following week.

I’ll discuss the above lesson next week.

Kindergarten Students can:

1.     Identify High and Low notes. (Handy Dandy)

2.     Listen attentively to a book (The Snowy Day)

3.     Move rhythmically with the teacher and then by myself. (Ten Little Fingers)

This week brought the return of the rhythmic rhyme Ten Little Fingers. I wanted to see if the kids would improve in the performance of Same-Different-Same after being introduced to it last week. We spoke the rhyme with actions, then did actions only, then spoke the rhyme with actions again. Part of the objective was to get the students to accomplish this rhyme independent of the teacher, and another part was to start embedding this idea that music has form into them.

We also used the song Handy Dandy to have students show with their actions whether they were hearing a high note or low note. We sang a short song walking about the room, froze and listened for a sound. They then had to respond by showing a high or low shape. Performance of this task was improved after students were allowed to work with a partner. This interaction allowed them to have a check on their own response.

We finished with reading the book The Snowy Day, which will return next week. Today was simply for them to hear it once. The book is filled with actions taken by the main character and next week they will be responding by pantomiming actions in response to the story. Actions like this are a way for students to show their artistic response at this age. This same skill develops into musical improvisation in the future.