Weekly Review 10/5 - 10/9

This week, the first graders reviewed the Loose Tooth chant, then switched their body percussion movement to hand percussion accompaniment!

• "Loose Tooth" clapping = hand drum
• "Wiggly Jiggly" patting = guiro
• "Thread," Bed," "Head" snapping = triangle

They also learned a new solfege syllable: "la."  This was perfect for our new song "Apple Tree," which uses so, mi, and la solfege.  Once they learned the song, we played the Apple Tree game!  As a movement activity, the first graders did mirror movement with a partner to Beethoven's Für Elise.

The second grade students sang a song called "Alligator Pie."  The lyrics are so funny, and the students loved singing in a minor tonality.  They also helped us come up with new lyrics for the third verse.  To help reinforce our composer of the month, the students listened to Beethoven's Moonlight Sonata.  They closed their eyes and imagined a story.  Then, they wrote down a sentence about what the piece made them think of, and drew a picture of it.  They did a great job with this activity!

In third grade, the students sang a song from Uganda called Dipidu.  There is an A section and a B section, each with a different meter!  The A section is in 3, and the B section is in 2.  To help feel this change, we added movement.   Then, we played an elimination game along with the song - it was awesome!  The third graders also completed Venn Diagram to compare and contrast two pieces by Beethoven:  Sonata in G and Moonlight Sonata.  

I wrote a post about it yesterday, so you can read more about the activity and check out the photos HERE!

The fourth graders finished the folk dance they started last week - they did a fantastic job!  Then, they started a new song "Thank a Vet." This will be their featured song during Memorial School's Veteran's Day celebration.  

The fifth graders finished their Boston Tea Party dance.  The "under - over" section was tricky, but they all got the hang of it!  Then, they watched the Beethoven biography movie.

In chorus this week, all students finished "Jingle, Jingle Jazz."   It feels good to have one song completed for our December concert!  Then, everyone worked on their grade level featured song.  Fifth grade sang "Cool Yule," and fourth grade rehearsed "Once Upon a Wintertime."

It was a great week, and we hope you have an amazing weekend!