🪩 1st Quarter Music Newsletter 🎶

We have had a BLAST in Kindergarten music! We have learned about our classroom, school, rules, and listening and learning. While going over these important concepts, we have been exploring different genres of music and different kinds of beat. Students have practiced identifying steady beat in different objects, identified fast and slow beat, and kept the steady beat to music using our bodies in different ways. We just wrapped up the first quarter with our 5 Green and Speckled Frogs Project! You may have even seen a frog mask come home. 🐸 It was a blast! We are looking forward to a great year in music and will begin preparing for concerts in the second quarter.

We started off the year by identifying loud and soft sounds in music and the world around us. We even worked on reading music signs for when to sing louder and when to sing softer. We have also been learning how music has a lot of different signs that tell us how to perform! Some of our favorites to practice is when the music gets faster, slower, or when to stop. We used a musical stoplight to practice these skills. Most recently we have began working on identifying long and short sounds. We will pracitice identifying, performing, and creating our own patterns with long and short sounds.

Our concert is just around the corner! We have excitedly began working and preparing for our Winter Holiday Concert already, and cannot wait to be back on stage performing for you! 🤩

This quarter we have worked hard on distinguishing beat vs. rhythm. They all have done a great job powering through the confusion of switching from beat to rhythm in different activities! It's a challenging skill to switch, and I am very proud of the progress we have made. On Fridays we are working on reading beat through icons and will soon transition to reading rhythm patterns that we have learned with different icons. To help us better understand our voices and how we use them, we also did a unit identifying to four different voice types - whisper, talk, shout, and sing. There were some fun games spent practicing identifying the voices, and the students all had great ideas for examples of when we should use each voice. We're especially excited to start practicing with our singing voice for the upcoming Winter Holiday Concert!

We started the year off with a big review of rhythms. We reviewed note names, note values, how to count rhythms, reading mixed and differing rhythm patterns, and playing rhythms with out rhythm sticks. Rhythm Fridays are back this year, and have been a great routine practice of these skills for all students! We also started a unit on different dynamics in music. (How loud or soft to play/sing) Students will be practicing these skills with the expanded vocabulary we have been working on as we prepare for our upcoming Veteran's Day performance and Winter Holiday Concert. All students have been working SO hard and it shows! I'm very excited to share all their hard work with you soon!

If your student would like to practice their concert songs, or is looking for a song from in class, they can all be found on my classroom website!

Our 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders will join in with the JSHS students for our Veteran's Day Celebration! More information will be sent via email as the date gets closer.

All upcoming concert songs are now available on the Music Videos page of www.mrsstuckymusic.com !!

Pumpkin Bones

Thanksgiving at Our House

Gobble, Gobble

Cray Cray Christmas

It is my goal to create a safe space in my classroom for all. In order to do this, I have a set of expectations that I ask students to follow. These expectations are also taken from our music curriculum - Quaver.

The Quaver 5:

• Be Safe: Hands and feet to yourself, controlled bodies, stay in your space

• Be Polite: Using kind words and manners, raising your hand, listening ears

• Be Cooperative: Following directions, working together, taking turns

• Be Responsible: Do what you're supposed to do, taking care of materials/instruments, participating

• Be Kind: Treat everyone with care and respect, using encouraging words, think before you speak

By following these expectations during class each day, students can work together to earn a brownie point for their classroom's pan.

We will have two major performances, one each semester.

• Winter Holiday Concert - Tuesday, December 1st

• K-2 - 7:00 PM

• 3-5 - 7:45 PM

• Spring Concert - Thursday, April 1st

• K-2 - 7:00 PM

• 3-5 - 7:45 PM

Students will be graded on these performances. Each performance is worth 50 points of their grade. If you have a conflict, please let me know as soon as possible. A makeup assignment will need to be completed for missed concert attendance/performance.

QuaverEd Information

Quaver Music Information

Grading Policy - Students in K-5 music will be graded on a weekly basis. They will be awarded points based on their participation, behavior, and skills.

Each week students will start with a total of 10 points (2 points each day). Students will keep these points as long as they are following classroom expectations, participating in activities, and practicing the skills being taught. Student who refuse to participate, do not follow classroom epxectations, or do not show their skill level on the desired skill, will lose some or all of their 2 daily points. Reasons for lost points will be noted on PowerSchool.

Brownie Points - Every day each class has a chance to earn a brownie point for their pan by following our expectations. Each pan holds six brownies. Once the brownie pan is full, the class can pay me their brownies for a Reward Day. Reward days can consist of games, extra recess, instrument play alongs, etc.

Music Facebook Page - We would love for you to connect with us on Canton-Galva Music Department Facebook page! If you haven't like us yet, please do!

Amazon Wishlist - If you'd like to donate to our music classroom, here is a link to our Amazon Wishlist.

- Mrs. Stucky

stuckyc@usd419.org

Did you know you can make music with vegetables? Check out this creative musical performance featuring instruments made from everyday ingredients! It's a fun reminder that music is all around us and that creativity can turn almost anything into an opportunity to make music.

Challenge your family: What other everyday objects do you think could be turned into musical instruments?