This week is our LAST Kindermusik class for the semester. This year, we have talked about all kinds of weather---and we have related everything to a musical concept---The "wind" gave us a good connection to smooth and legato music, as well as gave us reason to talk about wind instruments. "Rain" gave us a connection to the short, staccato sounds in music. It also helped them learn about musical dynamics, crescendo, and diminuendo--how rain starts out soft, grows louder, and goes back to soft. The musical rainbow helped us learn about colors, but also helped us practice singing musical pitch, as each color represented a note on the major scale. This week, we will end with SNOW! Usually by this time in the year, we HAVE some snow----but for this week, we will just have to pretend! :)
Backing up to Halloween week---
We had some fun doing Halloween inspired activities. We did a poem about 5 little pumpkins using a special glove that they could take a pumpkin off or put one on, depending on the words of the poem. With the older preschoolers, we also did some simple arithmetic using the pumpkins as math manipulatives.
It went like this:
5 little pumpkins sitting on a gate
The first one said, "Oh my! It's getting late!"
The second one said, "I see witches in the air"
The third one said, "But we don't care!"
The fourth one said, "Let's run and run and run!"
The fifth one said, "It's just Halloween FUN!"
Then ooooooooh went the wind! And OUT went the lights!
And the five little pumpkins rolled out of site!
Falling Leaves
We did an activity called falling leaves---It helped us to learn lots of different movement words, like swishing, twirling, twisting, swaying, drifting, etc. Then we used these cool ribbon wands to do those movements as we imitated leaves drifting down to the ground! It also helped us SEE what wind looks like as it made our ribbons twirl and swirl!
Then, we practiced MAKING wind, using deep breaths! Each student had a ping pong ball painted like a pumpkin. We all tried to take a BIG breath and blow our ball onto the ground. This was super fun, but it also showed them how to use all their lung capacity to blow the farthest!!
We used the song Colors of the Rainbow to learn the rainbow colors, but we also used it to learn how to sing a C Major Scale. Each color was a new note in the scale. We made necklaces to help us remember how to sing the scale, and we also made some rainbow puzzles. We had some cool creations!
Do-Re-Mi-Fa-Sol-La-Ti-Do!
Singing a C Major scale was a big goal for this group! We used the old favorite "Do-Re-Mi" to learn the solfeg scale. Then we played the song on the resonator bars. They did a great job knowing when to come in! They learned that the smaller the bar, the higher the note on the scale. I had them pick a bell, and then they had to arrange themselves in the correct order, low to high, to make the scale. It was great to see them compare with one another to see who was higher, and who was lower. Then, we had to test it out! We were able to HEAR our mistakes if we were in the wrong order! :)
I thank you GREATLY for the opportunity to work with these precocious preschoolers! I appreciate your value in early childhood music ed! After this week, we will be "on break" until February. I hope you will sign up for our Spring semester of Kindermusik. Our unit will be called "Cities---Busy Places and Friendly Faces" and will focus on the City--sights, sounds, and city occupations. I know they will LOVE all the action in this fun unit! :)
