Grade 2 recently learned about many different cultures in their classrooms. Now they are learning about the music in those cultures in music class!
First students learned about Brazil, then Greece.
Below is a video from a Greek Children's Game we played called, in English, "Where is the Ring?" A student walks around the circle during the song and secretly drops the ring into a student's hands. Then someone must guess who has the ring.
3rd graders learned about Native American music this week since they will be doing a Native American unit soon in their classrooms.
Students learned a Hopi Basket Dance, which is a dance to celebrate the harvest used by the Navajo Native Americans.
Here is Ms. Lantz's class performing the Hopi Basket Dance with paper plates as their baskets.
Students also learned a song called Gitsigakomim, from the Blackfoot Nation. Gitsigakomim means "I love you" or "I honor you." And Na-a means mother. After learning the song students were able to substitute "Na-a" for the name of someone or something that they would like to honor.
Grade 2 is doing a cultures unit in their classrooms so we are doing the same countries in music class!
Our first stop is China! Here are students doing a Chinese ribbon dance. Students also got to play the woodblocks and the Chinese gong!
Mrs. DeLuca's Class Ribbon Dance
Ms. Sallade's Class
Mrs. Downs' Class
We visited Antarctica in music and did some fun activities revolving around penguins. Students played instruments while reading rhythms during the poem "Four Little Penguins". The penguins keep counting down until all the penguins were playing underneath the ice!
3rd graders learned about Native American music last week to correlate with learning about Native Americans in their classrooms. They learned a Native American folk song called "Land of the Silver Birch". The lyrics are:
"Land of the Silver Birch. Home of the beaver.
Where still the mighty moose wanders at will.
Blue lake and rocky shore, I will return once more.
Boom-di-dee boom boom, boom di-dee boom boom,
Boom-di-dee boom boom, boom."
Students played the xylophones, drums, and bells. Bells and xylophones used a "Beat, rest" rhythm while the drums played on the steady beat. After each time singing the song students rotated to a new instrument.
