Read about the musical skills, concepts, and activities each grade learns about throughout the year.  Scroll down to the bottom of the page for 4th Grade Recorder Karate!

Pre-K students will learn songs about and listen to music about trains, the ocean, and bugs and other animals.  Songs and activities will give students experience in the important basic skills of finding their singing voices, keeping a steady beat, exploring large and fine-motor movement skills, and developing creativity and expressiveness. 

Kindergarten students will learn songs about animals and listen to music from French composer Camille Saint-Saëns' Carnival of the Animals.  They will also learn about jazz trumpeter and singer Louis Armstrong, and listen to music that tells a story.  Songs and activities will help students to find their singing voices, keep a steady beat in both duple and triple meters, explore large and fine-motor movement skills, and develop creativity and expressiveness.  Students will also learn about dynamics (loudness/softness), tempo (speed), melodic contour (high/low direction of a melody), phrases (building blocks which make up a song), and identifying same or different patterns in music. 

First Grade students will continue to develop steady beat skills through songs, games, and moving to march music by John Philip Sousa.  They will also learn about Native American music, learn about jazz saxophonist Charlie Parker, and listen to the musical story of Peter and the Wolf by Russian composer Sergei Prokofiev.   Students will learn to perform macrobeats ("big" beats) and microbeats ("little" beats) in duple and triple meters using rhythm syllables (du, du-de, and du-da-di), and will learn to sing tonic triads in major and minor tonalities (combinations of do-mi-so or la-do-mi). 

Second Grade students will review rhythm notation and rhythm syllables for macro- and microbeats in duple meter (du and du-de) and will be introduced to macro/microbeats in triple meter (du and du-da-di).  They will learn to sing tonic and dominant functions in major and minor tonalities (combinations of do-mi-so/so-fa-re-ti and la-do-mi/mi-re-ti-si) and will be preparing for reading these pitches from the staff.   They will also be listening to music by Austrian composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, including excerpts from his opera The Magic Flute; listening to music from and watching an excerpt of The Nutcracker ballet by Russian composer Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky; learning about jazz singer Ella Fitzgerald and the 'scat' style of jazz singing; and singing patriotic songs by American composer George M. Cohan.  They will also learn about the science of sound - how things make sound and how sounds can be changed. 

Third Grade students will review rhythm notation and rhythm syllables for macro- and microbeats in duple meter (du and du-de) and elongated rhythms such as half notes (du-u), and will be introduced to macro/microbeats in triple meter (du and du-da-di).  They will also be introduced to syncopated rhythms and division rhythms (du-ta-de-ta or 16th notes).  They will review staff notation for the major tonic triad and will be introduced to dominant triads and minor tonality.  Third graders will be learning about, singing songs, and listening to music from Africa, Caribbean, and Mexico, and will learn folk dances from Mexico and other cultures; listen to music by jazz trumpeter and band leader Miles Davis; listen to the music of American folk singer and songwriter Woody Guthrie; and learn about musical instrument families. 

Fourth Grade  students will review notation for quarter notes (du), 8th notes (du-de), 16th notes (du-ta-de-ta), half notes (du-u), and syncopation (du-DE-de), and will learn to read duple rhythms with our new rhythm syllable format.  They will also be introduced to rhythms in triple meter.  They will review staff notation for the pitches do, re, mi, fa, so, and la, and will learn to place these pitches in major and minor tonic and dominant functions.   Fourth graders will listen to the music of ragtime composer Scott Joplin, learn about holiday music from long ago, listen to and learn about music by jazz saxophonist John Coltrane, and compare/contrast music by two female composers from different time periods:  Clara Wieck Schumann and Carole King. 

RECORDER KARATE!

4th grade students will earn colored “belts” (lengths of ribbon) as they learn new songs for the recorder.  Belt testing will be done one to two times each marking period during music classes, and students may also test or practice with Mrs. Nowmos before 8:30 most mornings.  Here are the belt testing songs. Click on the song title to download an mp3 music file to play along with!

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