Wednesday, September 11, 2024 | Brown Teddy Bears Lessons

Lesson #3

All "Home Fun Activities" are optional, but if you choose to do them, remember to keep the puppets and other props in your tote bag so that your child can use them class. We won't use them every week, but when we do, your child will be thrilled to participate with their own creations!    

Next week we'll sing these songs in class:

• Weather Bear
• Fall Is Here
• In My Class I Have Some Bells
• Little Boy Blue
• The Teddy Bears' Picnic
• Going to the Zoo
• Grizzly Bear
• Weather Dance
• Lavender's Blue

Learning to keep a steady beat is foundational to learning to perform rhythms. In class we use both our bodies and simple instruments to keep the beat and we imitate simple rhythm patterns with our voices. As the heartbeat is the child’s most familiar natural rhythm, we reference it in class to introduce the concept of a steady beat. 

The beat mat is a wonderful tool for teaching steady beat and emergent literacy skills (such as tracking left-to-right, identifying the number of syllables in a word, and developing fluency by emphasizing a steady flow). The red hearts represent strong beats, and the pink hearts represent the weaker beats.

Learning about the seasons helps children understand the passage of time and teaches them about change.

Optional home fun activity: Make the Zoo puppets on page 33 of your workbook - you will have the opportunity to use them during class next week!     
(Remember, these activities are optional but can be a great bonding experience to do with your child during the week.)  

Here is a video with our class story about the teddy bears having a picnic! Enjoy!

Sound Beginnings is education through musical play! It prepares children for success in Kindergarten and Let’s Play Music. Sound beginnings provides research-based elements that stimulate growth in the areas particularly crucial to the development of the young child. These elements make up the foundation of the Sound Beginnings curriculum.  Here is just one:
	In class we experience steady beat and imitate rhythmic patterns with our voices, bodies, and through hands-on use of instruments. We incorporate Eurythmics, which is movement-based rhythm training that is perfect for toddlers!

Have a musical day!   
-Ms. Bethany :)

Tuesday, September 10, 2024 | Bridge Lessons

Tuesday, September 10, 2024 | Purple Magic Lessons

Lesson #3

By the time the children are in 3rd year, they begin to pick up on different skills at different times. You can help your child the most by practicing the skills they are less sure on FIRST, then have them end with those things they are more confident in.

The parent note in the homework book will remind you to add the flat, sharp and natural signs to your flashcards. While you are at it, be sure to ask your child to show you a flat, sharp or natural with their bodies and voices! (Ask them to tell you the bicycle story too!)

For our theory homework this week, this activity will be much more beneficial by color coding (use any colors you wish), rather than drawing lines from the notes to the keys:   Celebrate Connection

• Stand on one foot while your parent plays a song, then switch!
• Play "air piano" style by playing on the piano cover or with the keyboard off.

Flat, Sharp and Natural Game
We won't just learn the names of these terms and how they work, we use our bodies and our voices to truly internalize and understand how each of these terms can affect any of our regular music alphabet white keys.
   
Our Bugs Are So Fun
Your student is now ready to recognize rhythm notation using 'real' note names and counting terms. This song will help keep that fun! Reading the lyrics while listening can help them learn the words faster! 

Get inspired from one of the very first Let's Play Music graduates! She graduated from her 3rd year of Let's Play Music back in 2001 , and look at her 12 years later!
 

Here is a link to all the skills videos as well as the link to be able to purchase a class video to make up for a missed class. (tap or scan)

Have a musical day!
-Ms. Bethany :)

Tuesday, September 10, 2024 | Red Balloons Lessons

Lesson #3

Next week, just drop off your kiddo with their completed homework and we’ll be ready 45 minutes later! :) They really do just fine without the parents in class...I promise!
   
I’m so thrilled at how good the kids were this week. Thanks for participating and enjoying your time together with them. Keep in mind, when you come to class, the children do act slightly different. Just remember to be actively engaged in what I’m doing and don’t force their participation, just encourage. What a gift to spend quality time with your precious child, bonding and creating fun music memories! This is SO much fun!!

Barnyard Boogie
This peppy song is even more fun when you realize we are imitating and identifying complex rhythmic patterns! The brains of young children are designed to extract patterns from complex layers, making more connections with each exposure. Start with playfully clapping the animals separate from the audio track at a slower speed. Soon they will clap right along as the music plays!
   
Primary Chords Song
The three chords in our song make up about 90% of all the music we listen to. Developing an ear for them is so important! Learning to describe how they sound will help us do this! (For those of you with a musical background: red=I, blue=IV, yellow=V)

DO is Home
Our purpose here is to match pitch, and eventually, to accurately pull that middle C out of thin air with no cues! WOW! We are developing perfect pitch! Some are born with this ability, but it can be developed with enough correct exposure and if taught from a very young age. This process will take six months to three years, so we'll work on it every week during our three years together.

Staff Awareness
In Let's Play Music we experience things before we label them. Experiencing and playing with the music staff is a great way to understand how it functions. When we start to add things to the staff like notes, and key signatures, the students will have information stored in their brains that they can connect it to, so identifying lines/spaces on the staff is the beginning of our visual love of the staff.

Play an ostinato on the bells - harmony training
An ostinato is a repeated musical pattern that is played at the same time as a separate melody. We did this today as we played DO SOL on the bells while singing the song “Hear How the Bells”. Our ears are getting SO SMART!

Three Blind Mice
Audiation means hearing musical sounds in the head. Audiation is the foundational ability that precedes all harmony skills such as singing in harmony, aurally distinguishing two or more notes sounded at the same time, harmonizing a melody. The ability to audiate is the focus of most of the activities in the first year of Let’s Play Music. Unfortunately, we can’t be positive if the children are audiating, but the results of audiation will reveal themselves down the road.

Why do we use folk music in Let's Play Music? This question is an important one. Read HERE to find the answer! Also, Click HERE to read about one of our Let's Play Music graduates!  

Here is a link to all the skills videos as well as the link to be able to purchase a class video to make up for a missed class. (tap or scan)

Have a musical day!
-Ms. Bethany :)

Wednesday, September 4, 2024 | Green Turtle Shells Lessons