Second Grade

In addition to building on concepts from earlier primary grades, second grade is introduced to the recorder.  A wind instrument provides students a new understanding of a new family of instruments they have not experienced.  More specific activities and concepts are listed below:

• Learn and demonstrate classroom rules and routine through music

• Use good listening techniques using recordings of various songs and classical music

• Use various aspects of the voice using good vocal technique

• Use proper playing technique for the recorder, including proper posture, tonguing, and using the correct hands and fingers to cover the holes of the instrument

  • Read rhythms and pitches in the staff using the recorder

• Read and write more complex rhythms including whole rests (4 beats of silence), half rests (2 beats of silence), half notes (ta-ah), quarter notes (ta), quarter rests (1 beat of silence), eighth notes (ti-ti), and sixteenth notes (ti-ka-ti-ka)

• Define and identify chorus and verse

• Keep a steady beat while creating various motions to songs

• Sing solfege syllables DO, RE, MI, FA, SO(L), LA, and DO'

• Identify parts of the staff and their purpose in reading and writing music

• Learn and demonstrate various music terms including dynamics, tempo, and pitch and their importance in music

  • Define Italian music terms for tempo including Allegro, Moderato, and Andante

  • Define Italian music terms for dynamics including forte, piano, fortissimo, etc.

  • Learn the pitches of the music alphabet (i.e., A, B, C, D, E, F, and G)

• Sing various songs for holiday, seasons, and events (e.g., "Pass the Witch's Broomstick," "Birds and Bats," The Turkey Game, "Hanukkah, O Hanukkah," etc.)

• Identify and define major and minor in music

• Define the term timbre

• Play various percussion instruments using call and response, games and activities, and reading rhythms

• Learn about and listen to music from various composers including Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig van Beethoven, Antonini Respighi, George Gershwin, Dmitri Shostakovich, Camille Saint-Saëns, Edward Elgar, Igor Stravinsky, and Benjamin Britten

• Learn about the instruments and families of the orchestra through Benjamin Britten's Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra

• Define the roles of conductor, composer, and musician

• Sing in a round using various songs

• Differentiate between high and low sounds and identify the direction between two pitches