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Saturday, April 27, 2019

Weekly Review 4/22-4/26

We have less than 40 days of school left! Despite the rain this week, we had a lot of fun in music. Here is what we did.

The first grade students discussed the instruments of the orchestra and talked about the song, Carnival of the Animals. This hilarious musical suite which consists of fourteen movements is composed by a French composer, Camille Saint-Saëns.  Each movement is about a different animal (except for the little joke) and features different instruments of the orchestra. The animals are having a carnival and everyone is invited to participate, even our own students! After discussing each part, the students had a lot of fun moving around to the music of the various animals. We went over 10 of the animals. Next week we will finish the rest and hopefully a student can figure out the joke!

Second grade students are busy getting ready for their Memorial Day Concert on Friday, May 24th at 10am. We continued to work on You're a Grand Old Flag and Remember You.  Classes also learned This Land is Your Land and Yankee Doodle Boy. Next week, we will be coming up with dance movements for these songs.

Our third grade students are progressing really well on Recorder Karate. We went over the Red Belt song- Oh When the Saints, which in my opinion, is of the most difficult songs in this series. If your student still needs help, feel free to have them ask one of us.

Our fourth and fifth grade students are in performance mode. They are so excited to perform for you all on Wednesday, May 8th. The evening concert will be held at 6pm in the cafeteria. Students should have their songs memorized. Mrs. Rzasa and I also sent out a notice home (yellow paper) on Thursday and Friday explaining what students should wear and what time they should report to school. Just incase, here is the letter:

Dear Parents/Guardians,

The music department at Memorial presents:

Stories of My Life
Wednesday, May 8th, 2019
6:00 p.m.
In the Memorial School Cafeteria

Your child has been working very hard towards this concert and we hope you and your family can be there to support them. Feel free to email or call us if you have any questions.

  • Concert Attire:  
    • Morning - Students may wear regular school clothes in the daytime, but please no t-shirts with logos or words.
    • Evening - Please have your child wear the color voted on by their homeroom class:
      • Conceison - Yellow
      • Burns - Blue
      • Rabazzi - Green
      • Warford - Red
      • Gonzalez/Faliti - Purple
      • Weinberg - White
      • Harlow - Black
      • Olshaw - Grey
    • If your child does not have or cannot borrow a shirt for their assigned color, please have them wear black and white.

Note:  This is a performance, so all students should look nice.  We do not want jeans, sweatpants, or sports gear at the evening concert.  Thank you!

  • Call Times:
  • Band students will report to the music room at 5:40 p.m.
  • String students will report to the lesson room at 5:40 p.m.
  • Chorus students who do not play an instrument will report to the kindergarten wing at 5:50 p.m.
    • Unfortunately, if you bring your child to the school early we will not be able to monitor them until the times listed above. Please stay with your child until these times. Thank you for your cooperation!

  • Please note: ALL 4th and 5th graders must attend the Spring Concert. The students have been working so hard since September to prepare for this performance, and we need all of their wonderful voices and instrumental skills in our ensembles!  (Please contact us in advance if you have a conflict with attendance)

* We look forward to seeing you there! *

Sincerely,
Mr. Napierkowski, Mrs. Niu, and Mrs. Rzasa

Have a wonderful weekend and stay dry!




Friday, April 12, 2019

Happy Spring!

We hope you have an amazing spring break!

When we return, we will be wrapping up concert details for the fourth and fifth graders, continuing Recorder Karate with 3rd, working on Memorial Day music with 2nd, and studying the Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns with the first graders.

Don't forget: Our Spring Concert is on Wednesday, May 8th for all 4th and 5th grade students! We hope to see you there :)

Saturday, April 6, 2019

Weekly Review 4/1-4/5

Congratulations to our 4th and 5th grade students who participated in the 2nd Annual All-Town Chorus this past Thursday night. Here is a video of former Memorial students at the middle school leading warm-ups along with some pictures:










There was a short BCAT feature of the concert:





Our fifth and fourth grade students have been busy writing compositions to go along with their assigned pages from a book. The fifth grade students are composing music to the story Where the Wild Things Are while the fourth grade students are composing music to The Adventures of Beekle. In a few weeks, we will be performing to a first or second grade class.

Third grade students learned two more new notes this week: high C and high D. These notes are on the red belt song. We also tried out a new interactive program called Recorder Ace. This program reinforces note reading and tone using familiar folk songs.

Our second grade students are starting to prepare for their Memorial Day concert on Friday, May 24th. Mark your calendars! We learned why Memorial Day is being observed and two patriotic songs; Grand Old Flag and Remember You. 

First grade students learned a fun song and game called, "The Button and the Key." One student comes forward to the room and closes their eyes while the rest of the class sings the song. Another student is in charge of distributing the button and the key before the solo parts. Whoever has the button will sing, " I have the button" and whoever has the key will sing, "I have the key." The student in front of the room has to guess who had those items. It was exciting to see how each student guesses and sang their solo parts.

We hope you have a wonderful weekend!







Tuesday, April 2, 2019

2nd Grade Composition

Here are the compositions from our second grade students who together in groups of two, added lyrics to their class composition.   Each group focused on making sure the syllables of each word in their song matched up to the rhythm in the composition. We have so many creative composers in second grade.



Doritos are the greatest food in the whole world.


Once a dog played with his friends and ate donuts, yay!


Once a boy went to eat some potato salad.


A hacker dog is stealing ice cream pop, Jen!


Once a dog named Gilbert was a cute chihuahua.