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Janine's Music Room

Thoughts from a PYP music teacher

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Back to remote learning?

Happy new year! I’m enjoying the last few days of my Christmas break, but also starting to put some details into my plans for the upcoming term. We’re having one week of online learning at my school, to give people

Janine 5. January 20229. January 2022 Teacher Tips 4 Comments Read more

Using picture books to develop musical thinking

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

Janine 12. July 202114. July 2022 Uncategorized No Comments Read more

The most important back-to-school reflection

No doubt you finished the last school year completely exhausted. Now you are preparing for a new year (or already in it). You’re thinking about your curriculum, your classroom setup, classroom management procedures, and myriad other things that need your

Janine 15. August 202015. August 2020 Thoughts No Comments Read more

10 Tips for Using Learning Centers in Specialist Classes

I’ve been experimenting with learning stations, or centers, in my music classroom. I’m always intrigued when I walk into classrooms that are set up with exciting experiments, games, and other provocations for learning. But a long time passed between admiring

Janine 16. September 201820. July 2019 Group activity, Teacher Tips No Comments Read more

15 Fun Ways to Learn About Rhythm

I’m totally immersing myself in the philosophy that children need to experience music and internalize it, understanding it with the whole body, before we start “teaching” the elements. In addition, we need to present the learning to our students in

Janine 26. January 201823. January 2021 Whole class activity No Comments Read more

Don’t Teach

I’m trying to incorporate more singing games and play parties into my music lessons. They are a great way to teach not only singing, but beat, pattern, form, etc. They also develop social skills, like eye contact, holding hands, taking

Janine 2. November 201710. March 2018 Group activity, Song, Teacher Tips, Whole class activity No Comments Read more

Composing with Body Percussion

It’s a frustrating thing the day you realize that your Grade 4 students are still confusing beat and rhythm, and that they don’t read rhythms quite as well as you imagined they should. I dare say—and feel free to challenge

Janine 11. January 201626. July 2020 Group activity, Inquiry, Unit No Comments Read more

Halloween listening (in any subject)

Yes, Halloween is very North American, but it seems that the tradition of costumes, candy, and spooky things is seeping into many other places as well. And if you want to weave a bit of Halloween fun into your lessons

Janine 23. October 20151. November 2015 Inquiry No Comments Read more

The Listening Walk, Part III: Following a Score

Now that the students had inquired into how they could make their observed environmental sounds into musical sounds (inspired by Paul Showers’ The Listening Walk; see my Part I and Part II posts), we took it a step further. We visualized the

Janine 30. April 20159. August 2015 Group activity, Inquiry, Performance 2 Comments Read more

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,

Janine 24. April 201521. July 2015 Group activity, Inquiry 4 Comments Read more
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