Music Teacher Coffee Talk

Music Teacher Coffee Talk · MTCT #174: Post Performance Ponderings   Announcement! We are starting up a new Membership site on Buy Me a Coffee. We have two membership options: Solo Single Shot ($5/month) and Duet Double Shot ($15). Check out our  Buy Me a Coffee membership site  for all the details including the perks you get with each level of membership. We appreciate you supporting our work! Main Theme: Post Performance Ponderings In this episode, Carrie and Tanya talk about recent performances they've led at their schools. We talk about the general outline of our performances, what went well, what we would change if we did this performance again, and tips that we learned along the way. Tanya did a performance with 2nd grades all about weather. She used songs and poems that relate to the 4 seasons. Each class got to perform 2 songs related to one of the seasons. Students got to play instruments and read poetry. Carrie did a performance with 5th grade inspired by the ...

Music Teacher Coffee Talk · MTCT #164: Peek at our Week: 2nd Grade Main Theme: Peek at our Week: 2nd Grade Tanya: These are the songs and activities I am using to practice tika-tika (16th notes), practice so/mi/la, and prepare do. Of course we are also including some Halloween songs. Little Leaves Are Falling Rondo alla Turca (Tanya recommends the Glenn Gould recording Use scarves to sway on the steady beat Two Rubble Tum Bell Horses Black Cat  (check out Amy Abbott's blog for suggested activities) Say Hello: New opening song learned from Tom Borden Carrie : These are the songs and activities I'm using to practice 2-beat meter, practice rest, and practice so/mi/la. Bounce High, Bounce Low Students bounce and catch a racquetball to demonstrate 2-beat meter. Zapatito Blanco Ickle Ockle Blue Bottle We also did our first stations day in 2nd Grade. Here's what I did: Station #1: Linda McPherson's Dracula Dance interactive game Station #2: Rhythmic dictation with rhythm bl...

Music Teacher Coffee Talk · MTCT #143: Primary Lesson Segments: Recipes for Sucess Pt. 1 Main Theme: Primary Lesson Segments (Recipes for Success, Part I) We are starting up a new series all about lesson planning called Recipes for Success and today's episode is all about lesson segments for primary grades.  Think of daily lesson plans as a layer cake and the lesson segments are like the foundational layers of the cake. What are lesson segments? Lesson segments are the foundation of your lesson and include the songs, games, and activities you do in your room. Lesson segments can be tied to a specific conceptual focus, or can just be for joy and musicking. In a Kodály-inspired classroom, the songs and conceptual focus of lesson segments are chosen from song lists and concept plans and are laid out time-wise from your yearly plans and/or district pacing guide.  How many lesson segments should there be? How long should they be? In a Kodály-inspired classroom, a typical 45-minut...

Music Teacher Coffee Talk · MTCT Episode #86: New Favorites in 2nd Grade In this episode, Carrie and Tanya discuss our new and renewed favorites for 2nd grade. We talk about our general curriculum for the year, and a few specific songs and activities that we have done this year, or will be trying soon. Main Theme Carrie started her 2nd grade year with a focus on SEL through music, identifying emotions in music, and reviewing instrument families and instruments of the orchestra. If you are interested in ideas and resources for teaching about instruments of the orchestra, check out our Episode #31 . Next we moved into rhythmic review of ta, ti-ti, and rest. One new favorite for teaching/reviewing rest is Zapatitos Blancos. After reviewing rest, we moved on to new material and I presented half note, aka "two." One favorite song for this are Button You Must Wander, assuming you are using the version that holds out the half note rather than a quarter-rest. In the second part of ...