Good morning!
The assignment for our first week of distance learning is posted to Google Classroom. For this week, your child will watch a video about what music class will be like during this time and fill out a “Check-In” which has a few questions to answer about the video. If your child is in band or orchestra, a separate assignment has been posted to the Google Classroom for your child’s instrument. Be sure to also check your email about signing up for a free SmartMusic account! This will be the primary tool used in band and orchestra while we are distance learning. Please let me know if you have any questions! Have a great day! Mr. Verno
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Dear CSE Students and Families,
Before we begin our first week of online learning, I wanted to let everyone know a little bit about what I am planning for music class. Just like in school, I want our online music class to be a chance for students to engage in joyful music-making. Each week, I will be making a simple presentation that will be easy to go through and complete. It will give your child a chance to make some music, share their musical knowledge, and also have some choice in what they decide to do. Our first week, which will be posted on Monday morning, is almost entirely a video showing everyone what music class will be like. I do not plan to teach any new musical concepts online and only plan for students to be able to share what they know, as I want this experience to be as simple and as joyful as possible. At the end of each lesson, there will be an assignment in Google Classroom that I will call a “Check-In” for students to complete to show that they completed their music class work for that week. This will be where they list their name and their teacher and answer a few short questions about the lesson that week. I will be also sharing in the Google Classroom some music websites, apps, and other fun things online that I have found for students to try out if they want. I will try to be as clear as possible with which thing is the assignment for each week and what is just for fun. If you ever have trouble with an assignment or have any questions, please do not hesitate to reach out for help. I have already posted a few fun things in Google Classroom for you to check out. I hope everyone is staying safe and healthy! Sing-cerely, Mr. Verno Welcome to the 2018-2019 school year in the music room! Now that the dust has settled from the first several weeks of school, I'd like to share with you some things going on in the music room. 2018-2019 Concert & Program Schedule This year's schedule is still being put together, but each grade level will have some type of performance! Some performances will be after-school concerts, others will be in-school programs, and even others will be in-class "inform"ances. Check for your child's grade below: Kindergarten & 1st Grade "Inform"ances For these grades, I invite you into the music room to see what we do in a typical music class! Look for more information soon about what day and time you can come see your child's music class. These will take place sometime during March 2019. 2nd Grade The Winter Program featuring 2nd Grade does not have a definite date set YET, but it will most likely take place on Friday, December 14, 2018 during the school day with CSE performing in the morning and Evergreen performing in the afternoon. This program will showcase the various types of activities we do and learn in music class all tied together with a winter theme! Expect to hear some singing, see some games, an instrument piece, and maybe even some dancing! 3rd Grade The highlight of 3rd grade music class is the recorder. This year, we are going to change things up a bit from our tradition of the past few years. 3rd Grade will perform a Spring Program featuring a recorder performance. However, expect to hear some singing, other instruments, and even some dancing! 4th Grade Chorus In 4th Grade, students participate in Chorus as well as a typical music class each week. The 4th Grade Chorus Concert combines all 4 Gateway Elementary schools in one big choir! This has been a fantastic event and experience for our choristers the past few years. This concert will take place on Tuesday, May 14, 2019 at 7:00pm in the Robert A. Read Performing Arts Center (Gateway High School Auditorium). Be sure to look for more information about each grade's performances coming home soon! You can also always check here on Mr. Verno's Music Room Website for more information in the Concert Corner (which is to the right side of the screen) and also in the For Parents section on the Concert Calendar Page. As always, do no hesitate to contact me with any questions you might have! 1st Grade Folk Dance at CSE!We have been practicing what we learned in Kindergarten to get ready for 1st Grade musical concepts. One thing we've done recently is this dance from Kindergarten. We call it our dance from Queen Caroline's ball. Check out Ms. Ackerman's class! 4th Grade Play Party at CSEIn 4th Grade, we recently learned about American play parties. A play party is a social event in which people gather to sing and "dance." Play parties began in the 1830s in the United States as a route around strict social practices banning dancing and the playing of musical instruments. The areas most influenced by the practice were the Southern and Midwestern parts of the United States. Folk songs were used as means to give the attendants choreographed movements for each phrase. No instruments were played at the events, as they were banned by the social movements of the area. Singing and clapping were used to convey each song. Because dancing was banned, the movements took on the quality of children's games. A popular play party from Tennessee is Alabama Gal. Below, you'll see pictures of Mr. O'Reilly's class in 2 longways sets performing the play party! Check back soon for more exciting things happening in the music room!
Sing-cerely, Mr. Verno I was so glad to see so many people come to music rooms at CSE and Evergreen during Open House these past 2 weeks! If you weren't there, he's what you missed. I had a bunch of questions for you all to ask your kiddos about things we're doing in music class. Here's a picture of the whole board. Here's what you can still do at home! Kindergarteners just learned about fast and slow. We have been preparing to learn it over the past several weeks by relating different speeds in different songs and rhymes to a turtle and a bunny. This past week, we decided when a train goes up a hill, it goes slow, and when it goes down a hill, it goes fast. Ask your kindergartener to recite Engine, Engine #9 for you. You can also ask them about this awesome book, Over in the Meadow, and about the Ice Cream Sundae. 1st and 2nd Grade both are currently learning about rhythm. Last year we learned about the steady beat, and now we are seeing how they are different. We recently began relating rhythm to short and long sounds. The red and blue lines you see below are showing the rhythm of a music room favorite, Engine, Engine #9. The circles are showing the rhythm of a new song, called Bounce High, Bounce Low. Things are getting tricky in 3rd Grade to prepare us for learning to play the recorder. We are currently learning about meter. Meter groups strong/weak beat patterns into measures with barlines. Have your 3rd Grader read you the rhythm below. 4th Grade is working on a new low pitch in the solfa (or solfege) scale. We also are working on different things in Chorus. Check it out. That's all for now! Check back soon for more updates on what is going on in the music room!
Musically yours, Mr. Verno A few weeks ago, 1st Grade wrapped up working on a musical version of The Very Busy Spider by Eric Carle. Many of Eric Carle's books provide a great opportunity for us to create our own musical accompaniment to go along with the book. Here is what we did. First, we read the story while I added the song "The Spider Didn't Answer" by Linda Ahlstedt. Of course, as soon as everyone caught on to the song, we all sang throughout the book. Once we finished the story, we pointed out the things throughout the book that make sound. There are several animals and other sound effects that are perfect for adding instrument sounds. Next, we listened to several of the unpitched percussion instruments in the music room to see which ones might sound like one of the sounds in the story. Once we found matches for all of the sounds we listed, each student in the class got a job to perform while we told the story. Here are the sounds and instruments we used in the order of the story: The End Cymbal These instruments are a general outline of the instruments that were used in each class. The beauty of activities like this is that each class can decide on a slightly different set of instruments. Many of these instruments are the perfect choice for the sound in the story, so all of the classes decided on the same one, but occasionally, variations do occur. It all depends on the creativity and imagination of the class! Some classes with more students also added other instruments to other parts of the story as well. Some classes added a "ta-da" on the piano when the spider finished her web. Others added a woodblock sound with the spider caught the fly in her web "just like that!" Many classes also used the sand blocks for the sound of the fly. For the next class, we added a very simple part on Orff instruments during "The Spider Didn't Answer." First, we practiced tapping on our laps on the "swer" part of answer and at the very end after "web." Before the kiddos arrived, I set up the Orff instruments in D "LA" pentatonic. PENTAtonic means that there are 5 pitches in the scale. You can see the 5 pitches on the instruments below. "LA" as opposed to "DO" pentatonic means that the home pitch is LA. When the home pitch is LA, the song is in minor; when it is DO, the song is in major. Minor music tends to sound more sad, mad, or mysterious, while major music sound happy, excited, or hopeful. Once we learned the Orff part, we combined it with the story instruments and practiced again. Finally, we took a video of our production and evaluated how we did. Below is a video of Mrs. Luffey's Class at Evergreen performing their arrangement of The Very Busy Spider. Enjoy! Before I close, I want to point out why this lesson is meaningful. Critical Thinking, Communication, Collaboration, and Creativity are 4 big important 21st century skills. This lesson engages students in all of these "4 C's."
The students engage in CRITICAL THINKING several times throughout the 3-4 week lesson, but it mostly occurred at the end with the final product. Before we took the video, we created our own set of criteria for what a good performance would sound like on video. Afterwards, we evaluated ourselves to see how we measured up. Some classes even recorded a second video to try to do a better job. In any ensemble, the students must COMMUNICATE with each other and the director in several ways. In creating the video, the students had to learn to communicate with me nonverbally so that I did not have to speak during the video. In learning to communicate with each other by listening, the students also learned to COLLABORATE. No musical performance would be possible without collaboration (unless it is a solo performance, that is). Lastly, as I mentioned earlier in this post, the students had an opportunity to be CREATIVE by choosing the instruments they would use to help to tell the story. Wow! That was a long post. I hope you enjoyed learning about our musical journey with The Very Busy Spider! Enjoy your summer vacation! It's just days away! Musically yours, Mr. Verno |
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