What's New in Musicplay with Denise Gagne

With less than two weeks until Valentine’s Day, the Musicplay Online team has been busy preparing some NEW activities available on the site. The great thing about these activities – they are so versatile. This week we will share with you some ways to integrate these activities with a variety of songs and how they can be used in different grade levels. 

Mother’s Day 2018  is May 13th

Find the Easter Basket

Wow!  In one week, we’ve celebrated Valentine’s Day, seen the start of the Winter Olympics, and started Lunar New Year celebrations – including Chinese New Year on Feb. 15th!

In this newsletter I’m going to share the process I use to teach ties, using the song Obwisana.  When first writing and recording songs for Musicplay in 1999, the internet wasn’t the wealth of information it is today.  I asked everyone I knew in Red Deer, Alberta (not a very multicultural city in 1999) if they know someone from Africa who would teach me some African children’s songs.  I finally was able to connect with “Nana” who was a health inspector in Olds.  I had some songs in secondary sources, but wanted some that came right from the source.  Nana had been born in Ghana, lived in Botswana, then emigrated with her family to Canada.  She remembered singing Obwisana as a child.  She didn’t have a literal translation for the song, but remembered that it meant, “Grandma, the rock hit my finger.  It hurt.”