Well the weather hasn't been cooperating but Spring is alive in the music classroom and all music clubs as we get ready for some fun performances. Mrs Lindsay and I attended The Massachusetts Music Educators Association Conference a few weeks ago and I got some amazing ideas on how to incorporate jazz improvisation and boost creative expression in the music classroom. We are exploring this concept on all our Instruments and especially with our voices. Kids love it. If you walk buy our room you'll hear some serious scat singing happening!
We just completed our 2 special festivals: Plymouth Children's Chorus and All Town Choir Festival. Twenty amazing students from NMES 4th and 5th grade represented our school. I was very proud of their hard work, respectful behavior and amazing sound. I created a play list of All Town rehearsals and performances on our NMES Music Room Channel. Please check it out! In Ukulele Club we passed out a notice this week about the importance of practicing and playing the instrument at home. Any student is also welcome to bring their own ukulele in the music classroom to get more time in playing. I have students as young as second graders that who now accompany us as we sing our songs at the start of class. It makes me smile :) UKULELE CLUB HAPPENINGS:Practice Letter
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This week Mrs. Hughes came into Mrs. Houston's 4th grade class with Ipads and Dash the robot. Dash wore a xylophone. Student's worked cooperatively in groups composing melodies that Dash later played. It was really fun! Check it it out: We just entered the month of February and we are making great progress in learning our American Folk songs, Chorus songs and Ukulele. Our grade 3-5 chorus is sounding fantastic singing in 2 parts. We focused on "Bound For Glory/When the Saints Go Marching in" in both Chorus and the 3-5 Music Classroom. I color coded the lyrics to help students stay on their section. We traded parts and had a lot of fun doing it.
In ukulele club 90 students came at 8:15 Friday morning. This is the most I've had in my club to date. We are learning the D and A chords and are experimenting with finger picking styles. Many club members are working on their own and performing for us. Video clips can be found on our Youtube site. Please Subscribe I am so excited for some of our ukulele players who are really challenging themselves at home. There are so many instructional videos out there that can help you. Below I will include some fun videos for you to try. Be patient. Play a little every day and it will get easier. :) This video is called Travis picking. It sounds cool and it's fun! We had another great week at school!
All grades are learning a fun circle game called "Sally go round the Sun". Older students are working on playing it in a three part cannon. Younger students are concentrating on rhythm and moving in time with the music. UKULELE In our ukulele world in the classroom and also in our club we are working on a C, C7, F, F7 chord pattern to the American folk song "Crawdad Hole". Many students have mastered this. Students with their own ukuleles are encouraged to practice at home. Chorus NEWS Both Grade 1&2 Chorus and Grade 3-5 Chorus are sounding fantastic! We have room for more students to join if they are interested. All chorus members are encouraged to practice songs at home. Song lyrics and music is provided on this website to sing along with. Excitement level was high at 8:15 am this morning when we started our first NMES ukulele club practice of 2017.
We have some players who were so helpful in tuning brand new member's instruments that were Christmas gifts, many with the tags still hanging off the shiny new ukuleles. I love seeing all the different styles and colors. Some of our friends even made their own designs from kits. Some things to keep in mind:
Rock on! Ukulele makes me smile ;) |
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