What's New in Musicplay with Denise Gagne

This class was taught to 3, 4, and 5 year old students in a Montessori school.   This was the second in  a series of 5 lessons that I’ll be doing with them.

I realize that I’m a week behind, but I’m going to teach April week 4’s lesson next week, even though I know it’s going to be May.  I wanted to teach the entire month’s lessons and it’s going really well.

I’ve been working on a preschool curriculum this year, combining what I think are the strengths of John Feirabend’s First Steps, and the curriculums that use instruments more extensively – Lynn Kleiner, Music Together, Kindermusik.  My hope is that Musicplay Preschool will be an easy to follow curriculum that will encourage students to enjoy singing, listening, playing instruments, moving, and creating.  I’ve spent the past 2 years with the preschool students in my grandsons preschool.  The first time I visited, they introduced me as Hunter’s grandma, and so for two years I’ve been Grandma D to 24 three, four and five year olds in the preschool.

Assessment - Rhythm

In Musicplay K-6, many assessment ideas are included. In this newsletter, I’ll highlight some easy ideas for assessment of rhythm reading and writing. Students in elementary school are most often able to read language and literature at a greater difficulty level than they can write. The same is true of rhythm. In assessing students ability to read and write rhythms, include assesment of both the ability to read, and the ability to write or notate a rhythm that they have heard.