Ostinato Lesson

I've been doing a music residency with a grade 1 and 3 class at Grandview Elementary in Red Deer for the past week. I've seen the children every day for 35-45 minutes, and have had an amazing time with them!

One of the lessons that went really well was a lesson on ostinato using the singing game, Musicplay 3, #6 Plainsies Clapsies.

I taught the song by rote. This is a traditional ball bouncing game, but to make it a little more useable in the grade 3 classroom, we did the moves with beanbags. We played the game the way Leise Warner from Ontario showed me.

Plainsies: toss beanbag and catch
Clapsies: toss, clap and catch
Twirl about: Toss, do arm rolls and catch 
To backsies: toss, touch both shoulders and catch 
Right hand: toss and catch with right hand
Left hand: toss and catch with left hand
Toss it high: toss higher in air and catch
Toss it low: toss low and catch
Touch your knees: toss, touch your knees and catch
Touch your toes: toss, touch your toes and catch
Touch your heels: toss, touch your heels and catch
And under you go: toss under your leg and catch

The students were excited to try out the moves themselves! The first day there were just a few students who were able to do all the moves, but by the second day, most were successful. On the second day, we tried several of the ostinato patterns on the slide, chose one of them, and decided on body percussion.

They chose Run! Run away! and decided on this body percusion: pat rest clap clap clap for it. We decided to do the ostinato twice, then the ostinato with the song, then the ostinato twice. They were very successful! (Videos will be posted soon on www.musicplayonline.com)

We discussed what the form of their composition was. Ostinato 2x - ostinato+song - Ostinato 2x

I used the form tool at www.musicplayonline.com (on the left hand menu) to illustrate the form.

In the next few lessons we'll be perfecting the game, and using the song to practice reading and writing and creating with la-so-mi and ta ti-ti.

This is one of the lessons that I'll be sharing at the Artie and Denise workshop in Chicago!

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