Week of September 17

Next week will be the first Paw Store of the school year!  Students have been earning paws for following our ROAR expectations, and they can choose to spend them at the Paw Store next week.  This will take place in the classrooms.  Items range in price from 10 paws all the way up to 750 paws.  They can purchase things such as a pencil, hat day pass, extra music time, extra time on the iPad, sit with a friend at lunch, pajama party, and much more.

Kindergarteners played a singing game with a song called "Apple Tree" this week.  They figured out the rhythm of the song using iconic rhythmic representation.  (For example, "apple" has two syllables, so they showed it by putting two apples on the beat line.  "Tree" has one syllable, so they showed it by putting one tree on the beat line.)  They liked working with partners for the rhythmic dictation portion of this activity.

First graders were excited to play the Orff instruments this week.  They learned that xylophones have wooden bars, metallophones have thick metal bars, and glockenspiels have tiny metal bars.  They focused on playing the high and low sounds on the instruments as they performed nursery rhymes.  For example, when Jack and Jill went up the hill, they started on the lowest note and "walked" up the instrument, one pitch at a time.  Mrs. Crutchfield's Twitter account, @ecrutchfield112, features pictures of students in Mrs. Ruiz's class doing this activity.  Mrs. Sagat's class was excited because many principals from China observed their class playing the Orff instruments on Monday!

Second graders improvised in C-pentatonic this week.  (A pentatonic scale has five different pitches: do, re, mi, sol, and la.  Many elementary music pieces use a pentatonic scale.)  Students shared their musical ideas for how to play the first phrase of the poem "Peas Porridge Hot."  Students voted on their favorite, and that will be used in the class composition of this song.  You can see photos of students in Mr. Meekhof's class working on their instruments on Mrs. Crutchfield's Twitter account, @ecrutchfield112.

Third graders began learning about the earliest written music this week.  They looked at some very early music, and they learned about Guido d'Arezzo, who created the first system of written music notation.

Fourth graders began learning the letter names of the notes on the treble clef staff this week.  They learned that the lines (going from bottom to top) are E, G, B, D, F.  There are many phrases that they can use to help them remember this, but one I like is "Elephants Go Belly Dancing Fridays."  The first letter of each word is the name of the next line up.  The spaces spell the word "Face," going from bottom to top.  They will continue more practice with this next week.

Fifth graders began singing their fourth concert piece, "A Whole New World," from "Aladdin."  Many students have seen the Disney movie version, so they were particularly excited to learn this song!

As always, please feel free to contact me with any questions or concerns: ecrutchfield@nssd112.org.