"It's May, it's May, and summer's on its way," so goes one of the songs we're singing in third grade. And indeed summer's almost here, and we're all gearing up for some exciting end of year concerts.

 

The kindergartners continue to learn new songs, games and speech pieces. Through these songs, especially the songs about spring, they have been matching pitches and learning the concepts of loud and soft, and fast and slow. 

 

In the next few weeks, the students will be exploring the Orff instruments through the book "Jump, Frog, Jump" by Robert Kalan. They will begin to work on basic mallet technique and respond to the high/middle/low ranges of the instrument. 

 

Our second grade students are working very hard on "La Mariposa" a nursery rhyme from Peru. This is a new and rather challenging project. The students are choreographing their own dances to the song. Through the song, they are learning the Rondo form. They are also learning to improvise on the pentatonic scale and practicing new mallet techniques on Orff instruments such as simple, broken and level borduns (accompanying patterns).

 

The third graders are continuing to advance on their recorders. They are beginning to improvise and create melodies based on the pentatonic scale for the recorder. They are also learning about different musical forms such as the Ternary (ABA) and Rondo forms and are creating "introduction and coda" to the pieces of music that they play on the recorder. Their concert is on Thursday, June 6 at 11:30 a.m. in the Oak Knoll Gym.

 

It's ukulele time for the fourth graders who are in the Orff Ensemble. The students are learning to read ukulele charts and strumming patterns and are using the instrument to accompany new and old songs from their repertoire. Fourth grade students are also busy rehearsing for their upcoming musical "A Village Day". Their concert is on Friday, May 31 at 12:30 p.m. in the Oak Knoll Gym.

 

And of course, the fifth graders are getting all excited about their "clap-out" program. This is their final performance at Oak Knoll and they all want to do well, so they're working really hard. The program will showcase most of the music and musical activities they have learned this year.

 

I'll have to say that this has been a most exciting and rewarding year. I continue to be amazed at the creativity and imagination demonstrated by your child has in all our projects. It has been such a pleasure teaching them.

 

Thank you for your continuing support and have a great summer!

 

Bee Tee

 

"Experience first, then intellectualize"

--Carl Orff