Tempo!

Over the past week, each grade has been discussing tempo.

• My 4th and 5th graders played a relay style game to match the English definitions to the Italian musical terms (for example: Walking to Andante). 
• My 3rd graders played Heads Up, Tempo Up where they basically played Heads Up, 7 Up, but each student was assigned a tempo so when you had to figure out who put your thumb down, you also had to define their tempo.
• My 2nd graders are just starting to learn that when you are discussing if music is fast or slow, then you are talking about the song's tempo. In order to reinforce what tempo refers to we played a Hot and Cold style game where one student hides their eyes and another hides a stuffed animal in the room. Then the rest of the students  got to yell "TEMPO!" to signify that the game had begun and then had to stomp their feet to help the student #1 find the stuffed animal. The faster they stomp, the closer student #1 is to finding the stuffed animal.

• Sadly I don't have a specific activity that stands out with my 1st graders. I have been finding it difficult this year to stay focused on the lesson plan and keep the students interested and learning. 
• Kindergarten is having fun finding the steady beat in songs and speech pieces (like the Bubble Gum Beats mentioned previously). Now they are taking it a step further and playing with the speed of the steady beat. We had a lot of fun showing fast beats with bongos!