Welcome! Picture books are a fantastic way to develop creative thinking and musical thinking in the elementary school music classroom. If you are looking for ideas to connect music learning to a picture book, you have come to the right
Soundscapes with Listen to the Rain
This is my second book recommendation this month! With no singing allowed under strict covid-19 restrictions, I’ve been diving into more books. Bill Martin, Jr.’s Listen to the Rain provided a great backdrop for my Pre-Kindergarten classes to explore all
Vocal Exploration Through the Town
I always take time for vocal exploration in my early years classes. It’s so important to get them comfortable with their voices, and work on their flexibility. We focus just on echoes for a while, and then we think about
Revisiting Culture
Well, apparently my iceberg post was recently discovered and has been shared around quite a bit, not only in education circles, but also political science, health, and social justice communities. I love that I’ve gotten some great feedback about it
The Listening Walk, Part II: Making Sounds into Music
Following our inquiry into environmental sounds (inspired by Paul Showers’ The Listening Walk), we explored how that might translate into music. Sitting together as a class, a few students shared some of the sounds they had drawn/written in their journals,
The Listening Walk, Part I: Exploring Sounds Around Us
My Kindergarten classes have been exploring sounds, and an unexpected discussion led us in an interesting direction: How do the sounds in our environment inspire us as musicians? Cue The Listening Walk by Paul Showers, illustrated by the fantastic Aliki.
Halloween Fun
Halloween as a fun, dress-up, skeleton-filled holiday is a pretty American phenomenon, but I’ve found that many international schools embrace the fun side of it as well. (Others, bear in mind, find Halloween to be a negative thing, so you’ll