At Tallassee Elementary School, we are excited to offer our students music. Ms. Sydney Knott is the music enrichment teacher. Throughout the year, pre-k through 4th grade students will have the opportunity to learn the elements of music. Rhythm is one of the most important concepts in learning and performing music, which is why Ms. Knott decided to choose this as the topic for our first unit. In music class this week, students have been learning to visually identify rhythmic note values as well as count and perform them as a class.
Students first learned to identify steady beat as this is the basis for understanding and performing music with accuracy. Students listen to music and bob their heads to the beat before clapping the beat as a class. Learning a steady beat then acts as a segue into reading and performing quarter notes and quarter rests as they are the equivalent of one beat. Students learned quarter notes and quarter rests through call and response exercises as well as giving them each a sound and motion—in this case, quarter notes were given one clap and the sound “TA”/”Maine” and a rest was given the sound “SH” and the students would pull their hands apart (so that no sound was created). Also, they learned that rests were “silent beats” so that we remain engaged through the counting of music even though we don’t make any sound on rests. Once we learned quarter notes and rests, we moved on to eighth notes, which we now know are worth ½ of a beat and two eighth notes together are worth one whole beat. The processes were used in learning eighth notes as were for quarter notes. We gave eighth notes the name “ti-ti”/“U-tah”. The students all had an opportunity to come up to the board and write their own rhythms on the board using quarter notes and quarter rests and then the class performed the rhythms together (this ensured that the students knew what the notes look like and what their values are)
During this unit, students have also begun to learn to sing the songs that we will perform at our Family Engagement Night. We are first learning the words and the speed/rhythmic content of the words before adding the pitches to the songs. While learning our songs, we are focusing on keeping good posture to allow for proper breath support. Ms. Knott explains that slouching compresses your lungs and doesn’t allow for a full breath. (1st grade is learning “Diffendoofer School”, 2nd – “Polly Wolly Doodle”, 3rd – “Green Eggs and Ham”, and 4th – “Read Read Baby”)