What's Happening Wednesday - December Edition

So I know many of you enjoy my What's Happening Wednesday posts and I haven't done one in a while. I thought I'd explain why. For the past month my brain has been on over drive. This is the time of year that every day I think to myself "Why did I sign up for this?" Being split between districts means that concert season is a really crazy time of year. I mean concert season is ALWAYS crazy, you all know that, but it is extra crazy when you have two districts that do things two very different ways. Most of the time by this week I'm not if I'm going forward or backwards.

So, here is just a brief overview of what is happening all December (and what kind of started last month already):

School #1
Kindergarten
Kindergarteners have been tested on all their voices and have started working on opposites of music. Recently my Kindergarteners were tested on the difference between fast and slow. We will continue working on opposites the next couple weeks and continue into January.

This week: Christmas sing-along preparation for December 19

1st Grade
1st graders worked hard on quarter notes and eighth notes using multiple different song files. We just started preparation for the quarter rest, but will not have time to introduce this concept until January.

This week: Christmas sing-along preparation for December 19

2nd Grade
2nd graders just finished working really hard on learning about half notes, half rests, whole notes, and whole rests. In fact we just finished a test on this today. To practice all of this we used a lot of these fun files:
Fun on the Farm
Bake Me a Cake
Au Claire de la Lune
Phoebe in her Petticoat
All Through the Night
The Water is Wide
Who's That
Here Comes a Bluebird
Frere Jacques

Next week: Christmas sing-along preparation for December 19

3rd Grade-5th Grade
A couple weeks ago we were introduced to our concert material for January!

Next week: Christmas sing-along preparation for December 19

School #2
Kindergarten-5th Grade
All grades are practicing for their big Christmas concerts on December 15.

Rockin' Resources Linky Party

I have been wanting to blog for quite a while. I actually was nominated for a blogging award that I'm still trying to get around to blogging about. This time of year is just crazy. I spent the last five days off traveling around and visiting family, family, and more family. I promise that once my life settles down I will get back to blogging more often.

Anyways, by now you know all about the Teachers Pay Teachers big Cyber Monday and Tuesday sale. This is my favorite day of the year! This was the first sale I was a part of last year and it is so exciting to be around again this year. My wishlist is already chalk full of fun stuff! I'm going to share three products with you that I think you should add to your wishlist: one is from my store, one is from a fellow music teachers store, and one is from an awesome clip artists store. I'm doing this as part of Music a la Abbott's Linky Part


First, from my store I would suggest adding my MEGA-Bundle Half Notes/Rests and Whole Notes/Rests Songs and Activities:


This bundle is full of all sorts of fun resources for preparing, presenting, and practicing half notes, half rests, whole notes, and whole rests. There are 10 song files with games and activities:

There are interactive and printed games:

And soon there will be worksheets!

You can get all of this for an amazing price during the big site wide sale!

Second, I'm really excited to buy this product from Jena Hudson's shop:

I loved all her other glyphs and since Carnival of the Animals is a set of songs I have to teach I thought this would be a great piece to add. If you haven't used any of Jena's Listening glyphs in the past make sure you check them out.

Finally, I'm always excited to grab some fun clip art during a sale. I'm planning on buying this clip art from Whimsy Clips:

That's all for now! Have fun shopping!

What's Happening Wednesday - Week 5

Here is a glimpse into my week:
Kindergarten
This week we will continue to work on our five voices. However, this week will be more about students demonstrating and naming voices. We will do a couple examples by singing songs like we did last week, but I'll also pick students to demonstrate the voice and students will have to guess the voice used. This helps me assess how well students are actually getting this concept and how much more time needs to be spent on this. Some classes pick up on the five voices in a matter of just 3 or 4 lessons, others could take several months.

Songs we are singing in Kindergarten this week:

• Chop, Chop Chippity Chop
• Frog in the Meadow
• She'll Be Comin' Round the Mountain
• My Aunt Came Back
• Engine, Engine Number Nine
• William He Had Seven Sons
• Puff the Magic Dragon

1st Grade
We have kept the beat to several songs the last few weeks and now we are finally going to be introduced to following the way the words go. We are going to take a look at Cobbler, Cobbler and look at how when we follow the words we end up with long and short sounds. Not only will I be using the song files linked below, but I will also be using my Beat vs. Rhythm Presentation, which you can find a link for below as well.

Songs we are singing in 1st Grade this week:

• Cobbler, Cobbler
• Lucy Locket
• Apple Tree
• Bee, Bee Bumblebee
• Bobby Shaftoe
• Beat vs. Rhythm Presentation

2nd Grade
This week students will be learning about our new note: ta-a. We will start by looking at Frere Jacques and finding all the long notes, but will then practice finding the rhythm in the other songs we know. If we have time, we'll play the half note game that is included in my Frere Jacques file.

Songs we are singing in 2nd Grade this week:

• Frere Jacques
• Here Comes a Bluebird
• Who's That Tapping at my Window
• Phoebe in her Petticoat
• Rocky Mountain
• Au Claire de la Lune
• My Father's House

3rd Grade
Will continue to review half notes. We will not only take a look at the songs they know and put the half notes where they belong, but we will also practice clapping these patterns.

I'm also doing an activity with chair beats. I got this idea from a colleague and I'm going to give it a try. I put four chairs in the front of the room and explain that each chair represents a beat. Then I arrange students in the chair to represent different rhythms. One child in a chair is a ta. Two children sharing a chair is a ti-ti. One child stretched over two chairs is a ta-a. Empty chairs are rests. I'm having students create the rhythm patterns I write on the board to fit the chairs, I'm also putting kids in chairs and having them figure out the rhythm. Hopefully this will help with some of the beats of different notes.

Songs we are singing in 3rd Grade this week:

• Frere Jacques
• Here Comes a Bluebird
• Au Claire de la Lune
• My Father's House
• Who's That Tapping at my Window
• The Water is Wide

4th Grade & 5th Grade
I'm finally past reviewing ti ta ti and we are now working on introducing low so and low la. Scotland's Burning is a great song for introducing low so and we will take a look at that this week. We are going to sing the song and start to recognize where the notes are going up and down. We will then do the same thing with the other songs that we are learning.

Songs we are singing in 4th Grade & 5th Grade this week:

• Scotland's Burning
• Canoe Song
• Chicken on the Fencepost
• Lil' Liza Jane
• Tideo

Back in the Swing of Things...Almost

We started back at school January 2nd after the Holiday Break, but it has taken me until now to finally feel back in the swing of things.

Why? Because after Thursday and Friday we had an arctic wind hit Wisconsin where we experienced down to -65 degrees Fahrenheit at times. It was so cold many buses weren't working and one of my school districts cancelled school for THREE days in a row!

The cold weather definitely has made it difficult to get back to business and focus on the task at hand. This is my 4th year of teaching and I have to say that though it doesn't always get easier with each year, I do feel much more focused and have a clearer idea of what I want to accomplish each year.

This week I'm going to share two things I'm doing in my classroom as part of Steph's 2/4 Tuesday Linky Party:

1) Introducing Low Do using Peas Porridge Hot:
Now that we are back from break and done with concerts it is time to add another note to Music Street. For my 2nd graders the new note was low do. To teach about low do I put together an interactive powerpoint where students reviewed notes they knew and learned about low do.



They even got to learn about the Do Key!

Then for extra practice students used the staff dry erase boards to write the notes on themselves. This was great for me because it allowed me to see how each individual student was doing. It also helped me see if it was a large group that needed the extra practice or just one or two.

You can get the file I used for teaching Low Do in my Teachers Pay Teachers Store HERE.

2) Reviewing Half Notes
I've also been spending some time working on counting half notes. To continue practicing this I have been using Lindsay Jervis's Dashing Through the Snow game (click the picture to buy it yourself).

She has a similar rhythm game for Valentine's Day HERE. My students love this game, but for right now I'm having them play it a little bit different than the way it is described. My 2nd graders just learned half notes, so instead of racing one by one I am having students work in a group. I clap the rhythm and as a group they try to find the answer. If their group gets the correct rhythm after I clap it three times I give EVERY group with the right answer a point. Eventually I will make it more difficult by clapping it less times or making students work individually, but this seems to be a simpler way to make the game work and they still really enjoy it.

I hope you find these tools and resources helpful! :)

Just a quick reminder that I am holding a 100 Teachers Pay Teachers Followers Giveaway, as a celebration of reaching 100 followers on my Teachers Pay Teachers account. For more details on how to enter you can click the picture below: