Teaching Notes, 3rd grade, 20110915

A funny thing happened today - my first class (the one with the substitute teacher last week) didn't show up. There was no explanation, and no student who dropped by to inform me that the teacher had forgotten. I would later learn that during that afternoon another school staff person was leading the class, and that individual didn't know that music class was supposed to take place that afternoon. This means that that first class is going to be at least one week behind the other class, and probably more given what took place during Week 1.

As such, I only taught one 3rd grade class. I did however, also teach a Kindergarten class for the first time, which I'll cover in a different blog entry.

I had the students arranged in roughly a 3/4 circle, with the part of the circle closest to the board/front of the room without children. I was also wanted to turn the piano so that the keys faced away from the class. However, as I discovered later, having the piano available could be a tremendous asset.

Hello My Friends Hello	Lead students into the room in song
I led the students singing, and a few students sang along. Since I only had a 3/4 circle, I motioned where students would stop, and I modified the lyrics appropriately. They were seated pretty quickly. We sang the song once through in English and in full echo, and then I had the students sing it all together. I had pre-written "Hello, my friends" on the board, and after we had completed singing, I wrote "Bonjour" underneath "Hello" in a different color, and I taught the students how to say it and what it means. I then wrote "mes amis" next to it, and I had the students figure out what that phrase meant. We then sang "Bonjour, mes amis" together. I pointed out that with English, Mandarin, Spanish (for some children, natively), and now French, the students knew 4 languages.
Well Enough Said	Teach the interjection
Last week, I very quickly taught "Well Enough Said", and I don't think many of the students remembered. I sang the phrase, and hardly anyone responded. So, I spent a minute or two reteaching the response, and I practiced the response a few times during the rest of the class.
Do Re Mi…	Introduce the names of the notes and hand signs
This exercise is loosely based on Bobby McFerrin's demonstration of the pentatonic scale, but of course I'm doing a standard scale. I first sang Do, while doing the hand sign. After a few repetitions, I walked to my left and sang (and signed) Re. I'd go back and forth between the two notes, and then I'd introduce Mi to the (my) left of Re. At that point, the teacher offered to play the notes on the piano as well, and so I immediately had an accompaniment! I made it up to La before stopping, as the class I think getting a little bored.
Everybody Oughta Know	Teach song, zipper like crazy
This worked out pretty well. I taught the song first by echo, got the students to not echo the 3rd line, and then I started asking the students about their day. We zippered things like ice cream (there was an ice cream party), to pets, to family.
The Longer The Faster	Have student do the exercise
This is another exercise that always works. I had the students arrange themselves loosely in a circle, and I had them count to 8. I then paced myself from one side to the other within the counts of 8. There were a couple of students who tried to walk while I walked and I had to remind them that only one person would be walking at any one time. Then, we talked about the shoulder tap on 8, which we practiced a few times. When the music was on, I found myself quickly directing traffic and having kids wait so that they could start walking at the next set of 8 beats. After the exercise was completed, we had a chance to talk about the exercise, what worked, and what made the exercise become more difficult with time (as the song sped up).
Donut Song	Sing to the class as they lined up, have them respond at the end
I felt like I needed something lighthearted to end the class, and so I searched through the MfM 3rd grade sample plans for ideas, and I found the Donut Song. It apparently is a pretty funny song/poem set to the Turkey In The Straw. You can search online for various different variations. The song ends with "Thanks for the donut… Good bye!", and so I told the students that they'd have line that simply was "Good bye", but they'd have to wait for my signal to sing it. When I got to the end, the students had forgotten their role! So, I had to repeat that last phrase to get them to sing.

This was a fun class. The only other thing that I had in the back of my mind was to introduce rhythm sticks, but I'll do that next week. I also plan on having the students sing "I Think You're Wonderful", which I know they sing during the Wednesday minimum day assemblies.