It's a New Year! Time to make some music!

Post date: Jan 8, 2013 9:03:19 PM

We are back to school again after our two week break, and it's time to get back to music learning. The Holiday Program was great fun, but because we were working with the same three songs for awhile, it was a little difficult to keep learning new things.

First graders will now be immersed in a rich environment of songs and chants in a variety of tonalities and meters. These "classroom" songs and chants are short and usually done without recorded music accompaniment.

We will learn how to label our music vocabulary by using tonal solfege (e.g. “do-mi-so”) and rhythm sofege (e.g. du-de) for all of our pattern instruction. In learning a solfege system, this helps us to organize our musical thoughts and express ourselves musically in a deeper, more meaningful way. We will continue to learn about same and different, but in a hands-on approach. Instead of discriminating differences, we will perform tonal and rhythm patterns that are different. We will begin to have “musical conversations” with one another.

We will continue to develop our concept of meter and beat. In first grade, we learn about macrobeat (downbeat) and microbeat (subdivision of the macrobeat). By audiating, moving to, and labeling the macro and microbeats in music, you child is able to discriminate whether music is duple (e.g. 4/4 time) or triple meter (e.g. 3/4 time).

We will also begin to explore the “ingredients” of a melody. We learn that every melody has a tonality and a resting tone. By audiating the resting tone, your child is able to discriminate whether a song is in major or minor tonality.

We will begin to learn about harmony and the two basic chords in major and minor tonality: tonic and dominant. We will perform melodies with harmony both alone and in small groups.