Read about the musical skills, concepts, and activities each grade learns about throughout the year. 

Pre-K students will learn songs related to classroom themes and listen to a variety of multi-cultural folk and classical music.  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, sing the resting tone in major and minor tonalities, 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. 

Louis Armstrong

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 and read macrobeats ("big" beats) and microbeats ("little" beats) and rests in duple (du, du-de, and rest), and will experience singing/moving to music in triple meter and performing the resting tone and tonal patterns in major and minor tonalities.

John Philip Sousa

Second Grade students will review rhythm notation and rhythm syllables for macro- and microbeats in duple meter (du, du-de, and rest) and will be introduced to notation for elongations in duple meter (half note or du-u), as well as singing/experiencing music in triple meter.  They will learn sing tonic and dominant patterns in major and minor tonalities (combinations of do-mi-so/so-fa-re-ti and la-do-mi/mi-re-ti-si) and will learn to read the major tonic pattern and the pitch re on 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 - in coordination with 2nd Grade New Jersey science standards. 

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

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 (do-mi-so) and the pitch re, and will be introduced to the pitches fa, la, and ti as well as 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. 

Mbira (thumb piano)

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 review 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 also learn to play the recorder and participate in a practicing incentive program called Recorder Karate. Fourth graders will sing and digitally record patriotic songs, listen to the music of ragtime composer Scott Joplin, learn about holiday music from long ago, and listen to and learn about music by jazz saxophonist John Coltrane. In coordination with the 4th Grade social studies curriculum, students will also learn about musicians from New Jersey including Frank Sinatra and Bruce Springsteen and will collaborate to compose a song or rap using facts about the state of New Jersey.

Scott Joplin