She's taught for 55 Years! Advice for Music Teachers
Advice for Teachers by a Veteran Teacher
Fun in a Minor Key
I loved Halloween when I was a kid - maybe even more than my birthday or Christmas. But the world has changed and with our diverse school communities, not all classes and not all schools celebrate Halloween. What I've tried to do in Musicplay is to provide songs that have the "flavor" and "sound" of Halloween without including lyrics about ghosts or witches. Alternate words are provided for other songs. Fun songs in a minor key are inclusive for those kids who celebrate Halloween and those who don't. The Bony Skeletons is a new song in Musicplay PreK (pt 1). It's online at http://musicplayonline.com/ and is available in the Book/CD as well. When I did this with my preK class, it was May, and they loved the song. One of the students suggested being zombies, so we added a zombie verse.
Christmas Around the World Ideas
Christmas Around the World
Classroom Management
One of the biggest challenges every teacher faces is classroom management. Your most challenging class might be a kindergarten class with many behavior challenges or it might be a Grade 5 class with attitude. In this newsletter, I’m sharing some tips that have helped me with classroom management.
Long Term Planning with Musicplay
Long term planning for K-6 music classes is a time consuming challenge. There are new provincial curriculums, new Nafme standards, new district and school expectations to deal with, and there isn't any more planning time for the teacher OR instructional time for the students. Where to start?
Create a Dance Lesson Plan
The newsletter this week was prompted by a question posed in the Musicplay Teacher's group:
Rhythm Assessment
Quick and Easy Ideas for assessing Rhythm Reading and Notation
June 12, 2016
Carnival of the Animals Unit
The Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saëns is one of the most loved works for elementary students. Selections 6-19 in the Listening Resource Kit 1 and the Listening section at musicplayonline are from this work.
Peter and the Wolf Unit
Peter and the Wolf Lessons
Get Them Listening!
We are surrounded with sound all day every day. But are our students actually listening? Every teacher in your school would like to have students in their classes that are better listeners. Here are some ways that music teachers can really help the students improve their listening skills.