This year in Music we will be focusing our learning in three different areas.
1. Music Appreciation - We will be learning about many different important musicians and the music that they made. We will read and watch videos about different musicians, listen to their songs, and check our knowledge by playing quizizz or something similar. Our main focus this year will be learning about the music of The United States of America.
2. Music Reading - We will be learning the language that musicians use to communicate with each other. We will learn about how to read rhythms as well as learning the different pitches and how they are notated on the treble clef and bass clef so we can play rhythms and melodies on musical instruments. We will also learn how to read chord charts for the ukuleles. The skills we learn will help us with our 3rd major area of learning in music, which is music performance.
3. Music Performance - This year we will be singing songs, dancing, and playing instruments. For singing, we will start off by singing our school songs. As the year goes on and we learn about different musicians, we will sing some of the songs they wrote. We will also learn several dances that will help us move our bodies to the beat of the music. Sometimes I will want you to do specific moves during a dance, and I will be checking your skills, but we will also do some dances just for fun. We will also be learning to play several different instruments. As we begin the year, we will be focusing on learning rhythms and playing the drums. After learning about rhythm, we will start studying melody by playing instruments like the xylophones and boom whackers. To learn about harmony and chords, we will be playing the ukuleles. With all of the skills that we learn, we will also use our chrome books to make music with tools such as Song Maker.
My goal is that each student will develop a love of music and work hard toward becoming an outstanding musician. Not everything we do will be easy, but it is important to do things that are difficult in order to grow and improve. I am looking forward to a great year in music, and I hope that you are, too!