Tuesday, October 29, 2024 | Red Balloons Lessons

Lesson #9

Let your kids have fun coloring your new puppet show pages! You can download them from your student portal. Please let me know if you have trouble logging in! No parents in class next week.
   
The kids are doing great! Parents, thank you for being so consistent and supportive to your kiddos. You help me, as the teacher, to add another layer of knowledge each week because you have so nicely cemented the previous week’s concepts and skills. Keep up the good work! Your kids will thank you for this. You’re creating smarties!

Tuition is due today if you are paying monthly. If you can use Zelle, it will save me from paying Venmo fees (just use my phone number), but you are still welcome to pay that way if you want.

Hear How the Bells
When a child is introduced to harmonious sounds of music, a physical and emotional reaction. Harmony is an excellent stimulation which increases brain activity musically and academically.

Baby Step, Leap
We sing, dance, and notate on the staff board a step and a leap when we sing this song. The students are subconsciously learning intervals. In the second year, we will bring this knowledge to their conscious mind by labeling the steps and skips.
   
Waltz of the Flowers
Today I performed our new puppet show for the whole class! This activity helps train our ears to hear patterns and how music is put together. We call this classical form. Research shows that emotions are actually vibrations felt within the body. Music is also a vibration. Music helps us process our emotions by feeling them more deeply and more profoundly. As you come to class with your child, your shared emotional processing will lead to a greater connection, trust, and bond.
   
Echo Ed
We used Echo Ed to give the children a chance to independently imitate a melodic pattern. Singing develops the ear too!
   
Ooooo Halloween
Ooooo Halloween allows us to hear in our heads (audiate) the beats that aren’t played aloud. This activity subconsciously teaches the students how to feel a steady beat and anticipate the beat. It's so fun!

Click here to watch this video and learn interesting facts about the composer of the song Waltz of the Flowers! 

 

Also, I've added the Waltz of the Flowers Coloring book for you to download. Log in at www.musikandme.com and you can download and print these two pages out and let your child color the characters as you discuss their favorite part about the puppet show! (Don't forget to listen to the music while coloring!)

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 :)

Thursday, October 24, 2024 | Green Turtle Shells Lessons

Lesson #1

Next week is PARENT WEEK and tuition is due for those of you paying monthly! You can scan the QR code to the right in your banking app to pay via Zelle (or just use my phone number).

The children will be coloring in their piano books! It's completely acceptable and we will color more in class!   
    
Celebrate Connection   
A few ideas to bring playfulness to practice time!

• Play the first measure of a song, *piano* and the next measure *forte*, the next measure *piano*, and the next, *forte*, etc.
• Video record (or voice record) a song and send it to your LPM teacher (or Grandparent!).
• Have parent sing words while child plays.

Primary Chords Song
Do you want to build more snowmen? Combinations of intervals build chords. We will use ‘snowmen’ to teach the 3 common shapes of chords throughout the 2nd year of Let’s Play Music.
    
A ROUND snowman shape represents the Red Chord built with two stacks of 3rds.
A TOP-HEAVY shape represents the Blue Chord built with a 4th on the bottom and a 3rd on the top.
A BOTTOM-HEAVY shape represents the YELLOW Chord built with a 3rd on the bottom and a 4th on the top.

We can find melodic patterns in many songs! In your Student Portal, download the melodic pattern flashcards to become pros at hearing, singing, signing, AND playing them! Here are the patterns in some of the songs we are learning this semester.
    
Sol-Fa-Mi-Re-Do: Dings in Firetruck, end of Row, Row, Row Your Boat, end of Bunny's Birdhouse
    
Mi-Re-Do: Solfege Seafriends: end of octopus line, end of Farmer in the Dell, end of Sally Go Round the Sun
    
Sol-Sol-Do: Solfege Seafriends: end of whale line
    
Sol-La-Ti-Do: Say, Say Oh Playmate: ending

I have added the SFMRD pattern cards to the student download portal. It's called "SFMRD_addition". You can add those to your first set of cards from last year.

If you didn't downloaded those yet, just download the one called "5_melodic_patterns_game". It will have all 5 melodic patterns in one file.

Play "Memory" with them. ANY cards that have the same pattern are considered a match (see photo for examples of matching cards). Have your child sing and/or sign each pattern as the cards are turned over, even if it's your turn! Or just mix them around face-up and see how quickly you can pair them with each other. Then do it again and see if you can beat your time!

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, October 23, 2024 | Bridge Lessons

Wednesday, October 23, 2024 | Brown Teddy Bears Lessons

Lesson #8

Are you wondering why we have so much fun in class? It’s because research shows that play is the most effective pathway to learning. During play, failure is not a deterrent to trying again, problem solving takes place through testing and evaluation, and repetition builds security. As concepts and skills are presented in a playful, joyful setting, children absorb knowledge and ability. 

Next week we'll sing these in class:

• The Four Seasons
• Name the Instruments
• Major Scale
• Flight of the Bumblebee
• Baby Bumblebee
• A Tisket, A Tasket
• Old Brass Wagon
• You Are My Sunshine

Sound Beginnings builds its curriculum upon seven elements proven to stimulate growth in areas particularly crucial to the development of the young child: Literacy and Kindergarten Skills, Rhythm and Beat, Vocal and Pitch Development, Fine Motor Skills, Gross Motor Skills, Classical Music Experience and Parent Bonding. Together these elements give children a rich foundation for further music study, school, and life.

The letter of the day activity allows us to focus on recognizing a single letter, its sound, and its ASL sign. You can build on this activity each week by looking for things that start with the letter of the day at home.

Dance is not only great exercise, it incorporates gross motor skills and improves balance, coordination and spatial awareness.

Optional home fun activity: Make the bee puppet on page 31 in your workbook    
(Remember, these activities are optional but can be a great bonding experience to do with your child during the week.)  

Here's a video of another Let's Play Music teacher singing a happy "sunshine-y" song! 

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:
	A child learns when he or she feels loved. In class, purposeful touching, eye contact, partner activities, and generational nostalgia help develop the all-important parent/child relationship.

Have a musical day!  
-Ms. Bethany :)

Tuesday, October 22, 2024 | Purple Magic Lessons

Lesson #8

Next week is PARENT WEEK and tuition is due for those of you paying monthly! You can scan the QR code to the right in your banking app to pay via Zelle (or just use my phone number).

There is magic in the air! We've learned everything we need to know to play "Magic Keys" the whole way through! Please be sure your child is using the correct fingers on the chords and on the transitioning scale. Remember to play B-flat any time you see a "B" in the key of F! Please let me know if you have any questions about this!  
   
Celebrate Connection

• Have parent sing while child plays, then switch places! Now both sing together!
• Name that tune! Child closes eyes and parent plays the first notes of a song... in how few notes can the child name a song?

Song of Joy
After experiencing it with our bodies, your child is ready to execute this tricky upbeat rhythm with their fingers. This song is also an opportunity to play as part of an ensemble in class and to audiate the model in their head while playing on their own. 

Speaking of playing as an ensemble staff, check out this live instrument flash mob of Ode to Joy in Spain! 

How's it going with your flashcards? Have you shuffled in the treble clef lines yet? Click here for an online game to quiz your student on all of the treble clef notes we have learned so far! 

You may also take advantage of my Quizlet games that I've set up on my website! 

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 :)