Tuesday, October 8, 2024 | Red Balloons Lessons

Lesson #7

Can you believe we're on week number 7? Boy, time sure does fly. Can you believe we are half way through the semester?! Everyone did such a great job of identifying the lines and spaces of the staff. Keep practicing lines and spaces on the staff. Ask your kiddo if the note is on a line or space. Then follow up by asking them which line or space number the note is on. Remember, mistakes are good! Mistakes are an important part of the learning cycle.

Let's Play Music
When we internalize a major scale, we are able to sing in tune. To help us internalize the major scale, we use patterns that have the strongest pull to DO. Repetition of these simple patterns will aid in developing tonal center.

Scotland's Burning
We practiced our solfege hand signs and audiation today in class. Audiation is the ability to accurately hear musical sounds in your head when they are not being sounded aloud. This is a foundational skill that allows students to internalize notes and rhythms and make sense of rhythm or notes that they see written.

Ooooo Halloween
Singing like a ghost is a great vocal channeling exercise, not just noisy nonsense! The “oo” vowel is the best vowel for placing the tone up in the head and forward in the nose. We are practicing a pure, natural head tone while extending the child’s vocal range and helping them to experiment with the sounds their voice can make. This is particularly useful for those who have trouble matching pitch. It is a great voice lesson for a 4, 5, or 6-year-old! Not bad for adults, either!

Distinguishing High and Low sounds
The staff determines pitch - the top of the staff is high sounds, the bottom is lower sounds. The placement of notes (or balloons!) determines if the sound moves up, down or stays the same.

DO is Home 
When we sing "DO is Home" we can help distinguish sounds that are "too high" or "too low", or right on. This skill is intended to develop and train the ear. This will lead the students to developing relative pitch.

Puppet Show - The Magic Lamp
Identifying the melodic classical themes is one purpose of our Magical Lamp puppet show. It aids us in hearing and identify different themes in classical music, which makes the music come alive!

Hickety Pickety w/Sol, Sol, Do on Tone Bells

Because nearly every music system in the world uses the same five notes—known as the pentatonic scale—many people say these notes are “hardwired” into our brains. Howard Goodall, Emmy-winning composer and author of The Story of Music, says these notes are so fundamental that it seems that they were pre-installed in us when we were born. He goes as far as to call these notes a “human genetic inheritance.” In this video, always-entertaining Bobby McFerrin uses the pentatonic scale to “play” an audience, and in the process provides a fascinating demonstration of how our brains are musically wired.   
 
 

Also, with Halloween quickly approaching, we want to encourage you to do this fun Halloween activity with your students!     

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, October 8, 2024 | Purple Magic Lessons

Lesson #7

Thank you for having your children listen to the soundtrack at home! It is so wonderful to have the kids able to sing along in class when we are learning new concepts. Knowing the songs before they know what we're doing with them really helps them to be able to make that connection solid when I explain and demonstrate the songs in class (especially our "Magic Keys" song)!

Please have you child practice and send me a Marco Polo (or text or email video) for the Showtime song "Alouette" this week. I will mainly be checking to see if they know their intervals in the left hand, if they know what to do when they see the repeat sign and where to end the song. It is so much less intimidating for the kids to do it at home, rather than to be put on the spot in class. Also, if there's something your child has been able to play well that they are extremely proud of, I'd love for you to send me a video of it, either Marco Polo or just text (if it is short enough to go through). 

We learned the direction of note stems this week: if it's below the 3rd line, the stem points up, but once it gets on the 3rd line or above, the stem points down. It works the same way in both treble and bass clefs.

We learned about 3/4 time and that it sounds like "lol-ly-pop" (pat, clap, snap) instead of "wa-ter-mel-on" (pat, clap, snap, clap) which is what 4/4 time sounds like.    
     
Celebrate Connection

• Have parent play LH and student play RH in a song, then switch places!
• The parent does 3 jumping jacks each time the student plays a song! Then the student can do 3 jumping jacks when the parent plays a song!

F Major Cadence
How exciting to play our primary chords in a new key! We will learn to strengthen and stretch our fingers in a new way. The fingerings will feel familiar, but we will also need to use our newly acquired knowledge about 'magic keys' as well as our ear training to play our chords correctly.
     
A Royal Problem
Like all of our puppet shows, 'A Royal Problem' (Mozart's Symphony No. 40 in G minor, 3rd movement) aids in the intelligent listening of classical music. We learned to recognize major and minor tonalities, staccato and legato themes, and continued our study of classical ABA (ternary) form. 

F Major Cadence

Note naming on the Treble Clef

Our Royal Problem puppet show is really the 3rd Movement of Symphony No. 40 in G Minor, by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. This work has elicited varying interpretations from critics, but the most common perception today is that the symphony is tragic in tone and intensely emotional. Watch a full orchestra performance below. As you watch with your student, ask them to label the A (problem) and B (not a problem) section for you. This will prepare them for their homework next week. 

  

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 3, 2024 | Green Turtle Shells Lessons

Lesson #6

I have a personal goal for every student to master the skills taught this semester and parental support is the key to success! Completing their homework book activities is the best way to help them master these skills. Even if they only get it out once a week, that's still better than not at all. If you need to break it up into small chunks and do just a couple minutes of one activity and a different activity another day, that is totally fine. 

Celebrate Connection  
A few ideas to bring playfulness to practice time!

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

Bubble Hands

Playing along with the Bubble Hand song on the CD is the perfect opportunity to encourage your child to keep the bubble hand shape while they push down other fingers to play as well as reinforce finger numbers. Once they MASTER finger numbers in order, switch up the finger numbers in the 2nd verse. A fun way to extend this activity is to "write" the finger numbers on their fingers with marker OR “write” the finger numbers on the tops of the fingers on a latex glove which they wear while they play!

Turtle Shells

Speaking of finger numbers, your Turtle Shells discovered that intervals are played with specific finger numbers. A 2nd is played with fingers 1 & 2, a 3rd is played with 1 & 3, and a 4th is played with 1 & 4. Remember “Thumbs are ONES!” The bottom note of every interval is a middle C. It is the most important note because it has its VERY OWN line!!! 

Firetruck

Hurry, Hurry we learned to play a Sol-Fa-Mi-Re-Do! For practice play the song on the CD and let them 'dance' in their seat, then get in C-position and play the ding ding ding part. On each verse alternate between singing the solfege, the finger numbers, ding dings, and even "baby steps go-ing down."

Come on an adventure with Turtle Tom and Turtle Tim as they encounter the sounds of intervals!! (Totally worth looking at this!)

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 2, 2024 | Brown Teddy Bears Lessons

Lesson #6

Research has shown that from birth to the age of 9 years is the optimal time to expose children to music, and Sound Beginnings takes advantage of the earliest portion of this music-learning window. Meaningful exposure to music at a young age means musical skills will be more easily learned and internalized.   

Next week we'll sing these in class:

• Weather Bear
• Baby Bumblebee
• Here is the Beehive
• Snowman
• Major Scale
• Brown Bear, Brown Bear, What Do You See?
• Grizzly Bear
• Going to the Zoo
• Old Brass Wagon
• Flight of the Bumblebee
• Lavender's Blue

In music, solfege is a method used to teach pitch and sight singing and can be utilized at every level of music education. The brain connects more easily with pitch relationships if a syllable is attached, and hand signs physically reinforce those relationships. Singing melodies in solfege helps the student develop inner hearing, musical expressiveness, and a feeling for phrasing.

Learning sign language improves a child's vocabulary, spelling proficiency, and fine motor skills.

Rhythm instruments help children increase gross and fine motor skills, reinforce hand-eye coordination, and help develop a sense of beat and rhythm.

Optional home fun activity: Color the Four Seasons on page 4 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 about the seasons that just happens to also have a brown bear in it! That one is a little long, so here's a shorter video about the seasons!

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:
	Peek into a Sound Beginnings class and you will see skipping, crawling, dancing, and jumping! Full body movement builds large muscle strength, hand-eye coordination, aids brain-hemisphere function, and develops balance in young children.

Have a musical day!  
-Ms. Bethany :)

Wednesday, October 2, 2024 | Bridge Lessons