Things We Learn in 3rd Grade Music

STEADY BEAT

Now that we understand meter, we can explore time signatures. Time signatures tell us how many beats are in each measure, and which note gets the beat.

TEMPO

We’re going to sing, feel, and play with varying tempos. We’ll discover that accelerando means to speed up, while decelerando means to slow down.

PITCH

We’ll continue to expand on what we already know about pitch. Last year, we learned about the pentatonic scale. This year, we’ll be exploring high do.

RHYTHM

We’ll be singing and playing more complex rhythms this year, such as dotted rhythms, syncopation, and an eighth note beamed with two sixteenths.

FORM

This year, we’ll also discover rondo form, which is sometimes represented by letters; ABACADA. We’ll also continue to review binary and ternary forms.

DYNAMICS

We’ll continue to explore many different dynamics, including the symbols for those dynamics. For example, the symbol for a crescendo looks like a stretched out “greater than” sign in math!

TIMBRE

We’ll discover the differences in many timbres this year. For example, we’ll discover how band and orchestra are different and how children’s singing voices differ from adult singing voices. We’ll also continue to hear and identify instrument families.

HARMONY

We’ll continue singing partner songs and rounds to experience simple harmonies. We’ll also be exploring more complex harmonies with our pitched instruments.

TEXTURE

We’ll continue to experience thick textures as we sing in harmony, adding in both pitched and unpitched instruments. We’ll also continue feeling thin textures with vocal and instrumental solos and improvisation.