Kindergarten
Welcome to Kindergarten Music Class! We meet once a week for 40 minutes and do lots of fun activities each week! Kindergarten music class is designed to prepare children to become musical in three ways:
1) Tuneful - to have tunes in their heads and learn to coordinate their voices to sing those tunes.
2) Beatful - to feel the pulse of music and how that pulse is grouped in either twos or threes.
3) Artful - to be moved by music in the many ways music can elicit an emotional response.
Here is an example of what we do in a typical music class
Pitch Exploration / Vocal Warm Up - Here is where we prepare our voices for music class. We do things such as echo a slide whistle or say "yee-haw" like a cowbow.
Fragment Singing (Echo Songs / Call and Response Songs) - These are simple songs that I sing and have the class echo. We also take turns giving each student an opportunity to echo by themselves.
Simple Songs - These are short, simple songs that the students will eventually be able to sing by themselves.
Arioso (Child Created Tunes) - Here is where the students get to be creative and make up their own short songs. We start the year by learning about our speaking, whispering, shouting and singing voice. After a few weeks I might then sing a short pattern on neutral syllables (bum, bum, bum...) and the students have to sing a pattern back to me that is different using their singing voices. We may also do something like passing out 2 stuffed whales and having 2 students have a "whale conversation." We then do activities where students need to come up with something to sing by themselves, such as singing about 3 things that they are wearing or 3 toys that they like to play with.
Movement Warm Up - Here is where we do various activities to prepare for the following movement songs and chants. For example, we might practice fast and slow movements, or pretend that we are elevators and practice being at high, middle and low levels.
Finger Plays and Action Songs - These are songs or chants that have hand motions to them. They include songs like the Eensy Weensy Spider and Five Little Pumpkins.
Movement for Form and Expression - This is where we listen to a piece of classical music and copy motions that I am leading in front of the class. Once each month we do a song where students create their own movements.
Beat Motion Activities - Students keep a steady beat individually while playing an instrument, such as a tambourine, wood block, or guiro.
Movement with the Beat - We listen to another piece of classical music and tap the beat in groups of twos. (Later in the year we will do this in groups of threes.) For example, we might tap twice on our lap and then twice on our head and continue to do that for a portion of the song. We might then switch and tap the beat on alternating knees.
Song Tales - We end the class listening to a story that I sing to the students. It's a good "cool down" activity before the class heads out with their teacher. We have some silly stories including one about a man who was mad and jumped onto a cat, a harp, a pig, a pickle and many other things!
And we do this all in a 40 minute period!