Weekly Activities

When we were listening to various music pieces last week, the music evoked more than just feelings in the children. The music triggered their imaginations and they began to tell stories. When listening to Vivaldi, Sasha was very animated and told a story of flowers growing in the sun with princesses in the garden. The music of Bach’s Toccata and Fugue inspired Olivia to tell a story of a “bad guy coming” prompting the children to add their ideas: Kamy – It is dark outside. Andy – Lots of bad guys coming. Aston - I think trains are coming. Connecting to the children’s idea of music and stories, we added sound to the fairytale, Three Billy Goats Gruff.   Each child had a set of rhythm sticks to create the sound effects of the goats trip trapping across the bridge. The children instinctively knew that the smallest goat would have a softer trip trap than the largest goat. Sasha suggested putting on a show. The children enthusiastically went to each group inviting them to...

I am thankful for my sister that lives in America. I am thankful for my daddy and my mom and my sister too. I am thankful for my mom because she kisses me better.  I love her. I am thankful for Grandma. She loves me.

Line of Inquiry: How music and sounds are used to express feelings. What do we know about our feelings? To find out what we know about our own emotions, we played a card game . The cards portray people expressing a range of emotions such as fear, excitement, happiness and sadness.   The children took turns drawing a card from the pile, identifying the emotion, and talking about a time when they experienced that emotion.  We expressed ourselves in front of a mirror so we could see how our expressions and actions look to others. After the game we listened to portions of four pieces of music: - Vivaldi - Four Seasons (Spring) - Beethoven 7th Symphony - Mozart - Figaro - Bach - Toccato and Fugue The children chose to paint to the music of Vivaldi and Bach.  When we were listening to Vivaldi, Andy exclaimed "this is happy!" Olivia and Kamy agreed. Sasha added that the music was making her feel excited. The Bach piece evoked different feelings. Aston "love...

Playing the shaker The children expressed interest in learning about different instruments. The children shared what they already knew about pianos and violins.  To learn more about different instruments and the sounds they produce, we visited the website  http://www.dsokids.com/ .  This allowed the children to visually see the instrument and at the same time hear the sound each makes. Prior to listening to each instrument, the children made predictions as to what type of sound they would hear (high, low, loud, soft).  "Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star" soon became a hit with the group as many of the clips demonstrated the instruments playing that song. The children were each given a shaker to play, They found that moving the shaker fast produced a different sound than shaking it gently. This finding resulted in the children trying many different ways to make the shaker produce sound.  After playing the shakers, the children asked to make their own.  Befo...

The past few group times, we have been learning about song games and their form. Recognizing Aston and Andy's love of trains we started with the song game Clickety Clack.  Learning the song together was so much fun. Using their fingers as trains, the children sang the song as their train traveled over their bodies.  As the children became more confident with the song, they began to tap the rhythm with their fingers progressing to using rhythm sticks. It was amazing at how well the children could tap out the song, stopping on the rest notes and ending when the song ended. From there, we made song maps. A song map illustrates the movement of the song. The task for the children was to start drawing at the beginning of the song and and to stop when the song ended. After using markers to draw the maps, Sasha suggested we use trains to make our song maps.  It was a bit trickier using a train as the trains tended to run out out of paint before the song ended....

Lines We will be exploring art during Friday's group time.  We have begun with the introduction of lines: horizontal, vertical, diagonal, curved and zigzag.   The children were each given a piece of string to make the different types of lines before moving to paint and paper.  The zigzag line was a little tricky for many.  The children were eager to try painting the lines.  As you can tell by the pictures, the children were committed to practicing painting different forms of lines. We will continue to build on this concept.

How We Express Ourselves: Sound Travels An inquiry into how people use sound to express feelings and thoughts. The lines of inquiry that will guide the scope of our inquiry are: ·        Folk song games have specific forms ·        How sounds ar e experienced ·        Environmental sounds cause certain feelings to arise ·        How music and sound are used to express feelings. We begin the unit with a formative week to gather information on what the children’s prior knowledge and current understanding of how people use sound to express feelings and thoughts. Some of the children's thoughts: Aston: Trains make loud noises. Sasha: I do not like the sound of coyotes. Olivia: A lion makes a big roar sound. Andy: Mommy and Daddy talk.  Kamryn: I love the sound of Mommy’s voice. Howling like a coyote! Sound recognition: pla...