Halloween Festivities!

Hello all! We've been really busy in music class learning all about music in our classroom!

Here's some things that we've been doing in our classroom!

This is our first week where we really experimented with creating our own accompaniment with music! Since it's Halloween season, I've always loved teaching the kids "The Ghost of John" and they really loved learning it! They had a great time creating their own spooky accompaniment and singing the song too! Their teachers were so impressed! Great job, 2nd-5th grade!

 I extended this song into an round activity. The students really did a good job on a hard musical task like singing a 3-part round on their first day of learning what a round was! I wanted to include Orff instruments to really make it sound great, but we ran out of time having fun because the kids wanted that 3rd-part challenge!Great job, 3rd-5th graders!!!

 

In K-1st grade we got to go outside and do a fun singing game called, "Witch, Witch!" Oh the kids LOVED it! It became a great assessment tool for me because it allowed each kid sing by themselves as the witch/wizard (they didn't even realize they were being assessed because they were just enjoying the game of tag!) They had a really great time learning the song and the game!

I also extended this activity for K-1st graders to start talking about different contrasts in music, focusing on high/low sounds for this particular week. Since the song is a solid 'Sol-Mi' defined melody, I created small witches on broomsticks to let the students visually and aurally see the notes they were singing. The line (and notes/witches) above obviously indicates that it is higher pitch than the line (and notes/witches) below it. They really did a fantastic job and were really smart at listening and finding out which notes were higher and lower! It's also nice to dress up like the witch every now and then! AWESOME job 1st grade!

Even outside of the music room, students are learning and being challenged in music! Our October bulletin board outside the classroom has really challenged the students to keep the learning going by asking them to read the different rhythms on the board! It is a great feeling seeing them learn in other places besides the classroom!

We're having fun in music and staying on T.R.A.C.K. here at LTN!