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Janine's Music Room

Thoughts from a PYP music teacher

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Exploring Musical Expression using Carnival of the Animals

One of the most important concepts we teach is communication through music, or what we might call musical expression. Music, I emphasize to my students, is not just here to entertain you or fill the silence at the grocery store.

Janine 19. November 201711. March 2018 Assessment, Group activity, Inquiry, Whole class activity No Comments Read more

Teaching with Halloween Songs

Although I’ve found myself acknowledging fewer holidays in my classes over the years, many students are still looking to make connections to some of the more popular holidays. Halloween is one. Last year I wrote about a silly song you

Janine 10. October 201620. October 2016 Song No Comments Read more

Using Music to Develop Critical Thinking

For many teachers, making the change to PYP can be overwhelming, not only with all the jargon, but the complete shift in thinking. It’s not that the concepts are strange—it’s not even that we weren’t already doing these things. The

Janine 24. May 201624. May 2016 Inquiry 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

In the Audience: A How-To

We often spend so much time composing, practicing, and performing in Music that we overlook the role of the audience. After all, music practiced for a performance is generally prepared and performed for an audience. And though music as a

Janine 18. November 201526. July 2020 Thoughts 1 Comment 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 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.

Janine 16. April 201526. July 2020 Inquiry No Comments Read more

Settling In

I have been in schools before where the classroom teacher quietly leads their class, single file, to Music. But more often than not, my classes now come running in, still engrossed in the conversation they had started on their way

Janine 30. January 20151. October 2015 Inquiry, Uncategorized, Whole class activity No Comments Read more

A Halloween Tone Poem

My last post catered to those who are trying to teach to a classroom full of tiny pirates and princesses. If you want to give a nod to Halloween, but you are fortunate enough to have classes that aren’t bouncing

Janine 28. October 201425. June 2015 Whole class activity No Comments Read more

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

Janine 24. October 201424. June 2015 Whole class activity No Comments Read more
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