First Week of School

August 13 was our first official day of school. I teach at two different schools. For the past 3 years I have split them up so that I went to one school on A weeks and the other on B weeks. This year, they decided that I should switch schools every day. So I'm at one school on Mondays, Wednesdays and every other Friday and the other school on Tuesdays and Thursdays. This is WAY more exhausting than I was expecting. However, it is nice to be able to see all of my students every week though. :)

This week we got to know the rules, the classroom and each other.

Here are some Kindergarteners coloring their School Shoes after hearing Pete the Cat: I Love My White Shoes. They loved the song! I think Pete may be my new best friend.

We played a game called "Remember Me?" where one person hid their eyes while another described themselves in a silly voice and the first student had to guess who was talking. I loved how the students turned my piano into their shield.

1st and 2nd Grades did a Music Room Scavenger Hunt. This was a great way for students to get comfortable in the space. I changed some things around, so even if students remembered where everything was last year they still had fun looking for new things.

Since my name changed from last year, one of the things on the Scavenger Hunt was to find my new name spelled out. They found it!

Let's Get It Started!

I got back to school and what did I see? A great big mess staring back at me!

Needless to say, I was a little overwhelmed. I had two days at each school to get everything ready. Thanks to Pinterest and music teachers from all over the place, I had a lot planned. And guess what? I got it all done! I'm very excited for this upcoming school year. And here are some of the reasons why...

Rockin Behavior Chart idea stolen from The Inspired Apple.

Welcome Bach! (I love puns)

Last year I had a bulletin board for Musician and Instrument of the Week where I put up a new fact every day. To start of this year, I thought I would put up those facts and see if they students could name the mystery instrument! I went easy on them for this first week of school.

Dynamics Vocal Chart

Autograph Wall as seen in my room last year. Originally from Wendell Elementary.

I finally added labels to my instruments! 

 Double Bar at the end of my line.

Treble Clef to show the start of my line. Yay for reinforcing vocabulary and recognition!

 View when you walk in the door at school #1.

 Rules, Rewards, Consequences and Rockin Behavior at the front of the room.

View when you walk into the room at school #2.

Found a Converse Key Chain to match my shoes! I also bought Pete the Cat (who also likes to wear Converse). I can't wait to read the story to my students and have them color their own school shoes!

Now to wait until Monday.... :)

So Long, Farewell...

Another school year is over. I cannot believe how quickly time flies! Packing up is always a little sad for me. I try to take everything completely down so that I will have a clean slate at the beginning of next year and will be encouraged to try new things.

One new thing I tried this year that was a success was the

Musician of the Day Rock Star Autograph board. 

I had this up all year, and as you can see, I had to add more paper! The kids loved finding their names or getting to figure out a way to make their name stand out.

I rewarded students who had gotten straight As for me in music with the best behavior box again. Here are two girls showing off their "stinky feet" and a boy who chose "pet shop" and got to sit with my big stuffed Baghera for a whole class period!

I has put up the "We <3 Music" board way back in February. I like to think of it more as creativity rather than laziness that I came up with the idea to have students add Post-It notes with why they love music. Some notes include: Singing, Dancing, Drums and Games.

Here is my room at one of my schools.... 

See you again in August!

What We've Been Up To

I have totally been slacking on keeping this blog updated. I got married in April and am still playing catch up on anything that wasn't mandatory. So here are some things that we've been up to in the music room.

Lots of instruments!

3rd Grade got to learn the parts of a violin and how to hold it. 

2nd Grade learned about Glockenspiels and even got to play them as a part of their PTO performance this year. They did a sound story of the song Little Bunny Foo Foo.

First grade used different instruments to show songs that have two parts. 

The big drum was a big hit!

We've also been doing a lot of moving! 

 4th Grade learned the Macarena

 5th Grade did a conga line.

1st Grade played a bridge game.

We had our K-2 PTO performance in April. Our theme was Holidays. 

Kindergarten sang about New Years Day and Martin Luther King Jr. Day.

1st Grade sang about Groundhog's Day, President's Day and Read Across America Day.

2nd Grade sang about The First Day of Spring, Earth Day and Easter.

Line Up: UPDATE!

At the beginning of the year, I decided to try something new. Line-up Songs! It was such a big hit, that I decided it needed a little bit of an update. Let me introduce my line up song iPod...

I eventually added a play and pause button too and the kids make sure I always hit stop when we're done singing. 

I also added a stop light by the door as a reminder for the little ones. All I have to do is say "red light" and they all face forward to look at the stop light. I'm thinking I might have to splurge and try to get a real one instead of a poster that I drew. :)

I just found a new idea from Mrs. Dennis about putting a treble clef where the line leader should stand. This not only reinforces music vocabulary, but it also helps students make the connection that a treble clef is the beginning of a line. Genius! I can't wait to try this idea next year.

Instruments!

Pre-K and Kindergarten worked on steady beat this week and played rhythm sticks.

1st Grade made their own rhythms using their body and their chairs.

One of my 2nd graders brought in a toy guitar to share with the class. They rocked!

3rd Grade added accompaniment to some of their favorite songs. These guys were beating drums to Beat It by Michael Jackson.

4th and 5th Grade worked on reading the staff and playing songs on handbells and mallet instruments.

Bonus photo: Trumpet!

Random Pictures

I don't really have a theme for this particular blog post, I just have some pictures that I would like to share.

First of all, I received a new file cabinet at one of my schools and it feels so amazing to be more organized!

Here are some 4th graders doing a football themed worksheet to prepare for the Super Bowl. They had to add up the music note math problems to find out how many touchdowns and field goals they had. 

Our Musician of the Week last week was Michael Jackson. Here are some of my 1st graders showing off their moonwalk skills!

My February/March Bulletin Board. I'm glad that Music in Our Schools month is right after Valentines month so that I get to keep my board up! I plan on letting the students decorate the board with post-it notes filled with reasons why they like having music in school.

Finally, I am getting married in April and one of my students (the son of another teacher) gave me this very cute card.