Another new year

Hi! Is anyone still reading my blog from University Schools? If you are, I miss you all!

I am enjoying my new job at Park Hill Elementary in Denver, but I also truly miss the students, families, and staff from University. You are all amazing. I hope that 2014 is finding you well and that the changes that have taken place at University have been exciting and fun ones. You are always welcome to leave me comments on any posts if you are reading, and I will get an email notifying me of your comment- I will respond, too! :)

Hope all is well, and keep making music!

Ms. Buckley

Summer time

Hey all,

Anyone still reading out there? I'm back in Minnesota for the summer working on my Masters in Music Education at St. Thomas University. LOTS of homework, reading, and practicing, but I'm loving it.

I have met with the new music teacher for University Schools and I think you will have a fabulous year starting in the fall. I am missing all the students from University and am thinking of my fond memories often.

Please keep practicing, listening, singing, dancing, and enjoying music this summer. Feel free and welcome to leave me comments on any posts- I'd love to read what you are all up to and how life is going. :)

Spring concert and end of the year

I was just sitting at my desk and I realized I hadn't yet written a post about the AMAZING spring concerts! I was so pleased with the performance of all students. The kindergarteners impressed me with their very good concert etiquette and with projecting their voices. The first and second graders were so much fun with "So Cool" and I will always remember that moment. Third and fourth graders brought down the house with their difficult "Annie" piece. Fifth grade sang some impressively difficult songs and rocked some body percussion and tough sign language. Overall, I am so happy with the quality of these performances. Every year I wonder how I will top the year before, but the kids always manage to help me do it. Thank you to students and parents for an amazing experience.

One week left, can you believe it??? It's very sad as I begin to say my goodbyes to the students. I have so enjoyed their varied personalities and styles, and I have been so lucky to share my love of music with them. Thank you, everyone, for your support.

I will leave this blog up and running for students who wish to practice recorder music through this page. I will also update from time to time about how I am doing down in Denver. Students and parents are welcome to read and leave comments. You may have to access the blog directly by going to www.universityschoolsmusic.blogspot.com rather than accessing it through the University Schools website.

Have a great last week!

Less than 1 month!

We have less than one month until our fabulous spring concerts!!!!!! I have sent home two letters of information about this special event, so please ask your child if you have not viewed this information. You may also see the "Concert Info" page- there's a tab you can click on off to the right side of this screen.

K-4: Wednesday, May 8th.
Kindergarten- 6:00pm, arrive at 5:30pm (downstairs lobby)
1st/2nd grade- 6:45pm, arrive at 6:15pm (upstairs lobby)
3rd/4th grade- 7:30pm, arrive at 7:00pm (downstairs lobby)

DVDs will be sold of the K-4 concert for $10. Order forms were sent home this week. This is designed to help raise money for having the concert in the Union Colony Civic Center, which is a beautiful and well-kept facility. The DVD will not include any close ups or editing. It will be one wide shot of the entire performance, K-4.

5th grade: Thursday, May 9th, 7pm. Students must arrive at 6:30pm. There will be no DVD sold of the 5th grade concert, but because this concert is being held at University Schools, recording devices are permitted.

Please contact me if you have any questions. Thanks, and I look forward to seeing you all there!

Concert

Greetings!

The next several weeks will be spent working up concert music for all grade levels. Here's some concert info:

K-4 will perform at the Union Colony Civic Center downtown Greeley on Wednesday, May 8th.
Map to UCCC

Performance times:
Kindergarten 6:00pm (arrive 5:30pm)
1st/2nd grade 6:45pm (arrive 6:15pm)
3rd/4th grade 7:30pm (arrive 7:00pm)

All students must arrive 30 minutes prior to their performance time. Do not be late! Plan some extra time into your schedule for parking and getting tickets at the box office. Tickets are free, but you must obtain a ticket from the box office to enter the performance hall.

No video recording or flash photography is allowed. DVD recordings will be sold for $10. Order forms will be sent home prior to the concert.

5th grade will perform at University Schools on Thursday, May 9th at 7:00pm. Students must arrive at 6:30 and should report to their classroom for attendance.

All students should dress nicely for the concert- please avoid jeans and sneakers if at all possible. Attendance is MANDATORY for all students as this is a school event. I greatly look forward to seeing you all there and sharing wonderful music with you.

Students: find links to videos of songs for the concert below in the section called "Other useful links." Practice, practice! :)

5th graders

5th graders have been learning about the wind instruments of the orchestra- woodwinds and brass.

The main woodwind instruments are: flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, and bassoon.
Listen to them here (saxophone is left out):
Woodwind family

The main brass instruments are: trumpet, french horn, trombone, baritone/euphonium, and tuba.
Listen to them here (baritone/euphonium is left out):
Brass family

Practice identifying the sounds of these instruments because we have a QUIZ coming up! :)

Valentine!

This week we've been having some fun with Valentine's day, among other things.

This week in...

Kindergarten- we played a game called "Messenger" with an envelope that had each student's name inside it. When each name was drawn, that student could choose an instrument and continue the game by playing the steady beat. We also heard the story of how the flute came to be an instrument in Love Flute.

1st/2nd grade- we sang a Valentine song and each student got to come to the board and move their name into the valentine box. We also hid valentines from our music buddies in our hands so that our buddy would have to guess which hand held the valentine. We played some heart rhythms on rhythm sticks.

3rd/4th grade- we did our second self-assessment of our recorder playing on the song "It's Raining." We played the recorder game "We Are Playing in the Forest." Some classes also got to play a Valentine mixer-dance game called "Heel, Toe, On the Line" with bass bars and boomwhackers playing an ostinato accompaniment.

5th grade- we had tons of fun with the poem "The Queen of Hearts." We practiced saying the poem in different ways: sad, surprised, gossipy, Bat Man, scared, cheer leader, French, British, pirate, thug, etc. In groups, students had to practice saying the poem all the same way and at the same time. We then added instruments to this experience and enjoyed a hilarious performance from each group. We also continued learning about the woodwind family of instruments.

Happy long weekend! PRACTICE! :)

What we've been up to

Greetings!

Last week, all grades enjoyed playing the mallet instruments!

Kindergarten- this was our first experience playing the mallet instruments. Students played along with the song "Rover" and "Stars Shining." We also played Simon Says with the mallet instruments and had fun learning the Quiet Stick Game.

1st/2nd grade- we played the mallet instruments with the chant "Jack and Jill." We played musical Simon Says and also made sounds effects with bodies, voices, and mallet instruments to accompany the story "Louis Goes Walking." We also played the cup game with so la mi and practiced echoing patterns with sining and mallet instruments.

3rd/4th grade- we learned to play several bordun steady beat patterns on the mallet instruments to accompany the song "Son Macarone", which we learned several weeks ago to play a clap passing game. We also learned a new song called "Splishing Splashing" and divided the music into parts: bordun, melody, and color part. This was fun to perform as a class!

5th grade- we learned to play the African melody we learned several weeks ago called "Tue, Tue." We also learned an entirely new melody, "Rain on the Green Grass", and learned to play it on the instruments. These activities were great for ear training and allowed students to develop skills in audiation- hearing a melody inside your head.

We also had a great sing along on Friday morning with students from all grades. :)

Back from break!

Welcome back!

This week in....

Kindergarten- we did some fun warm ups with our voices to get started. We listened to a story about two friends called "Wiggle and Waggle" and worked on moving our voices up and down. We listened and move to a fun song called "Doot, doot" and also practiced moving and freezing to music.

1st/2nd grade- we review ALL of our musical opposites, including: loud and soft, fast and slow, high and low, long and short, steady and not steady. We listened to many varying musical examples and wrote down answer to musical opposite questions on our white boards. We also learned how to draw the note "la" on the music staff.

3rd/4th grade- we reviewed several recorder songs and learned the next song in the Recorder Karate series, "Merrily We Roll Along." We took a 7-step process to learn this new song:
1. Listen to it.
2. Sing it with the printed words.
3. Sing it with the letter names of the notes.
4. Sing the letter names and do the fingerings on recorder.
5. Practice individual measures/tough spots.
6. Play the song slowly without the recording.
7. Play the song with the recording.
Try it to learn or re-learn any song!
We also began learning to sing "Count on Me" in preparation for our spring concert on May 8th- very fun! Here is a link to the video, as I promised to the kids:
"Count on Me" -Bruno Mars

5th grade- we reviewed several recorder songs and also tried some sight-reading, which means playing a song right away without working through it first. We also reviewed our sign language for the song "Win", which we will be performing at our spring concert on May 9th. We learned an African song called "Tue, tue", and also a tricky cup passing game to go along with the song.

Enjoy the weekend!

Happy break! Are you PRACTICING?!?!?! Enjoy. :)

Best Christmas Light Shows

Winter Break

Well, break time is almost here and is well deserved for all. I have enjoyed the last few weeks, incorporating lots of winter activities into much class. My Honors Choir took a field trip to some local nursing homes in Greeley to sing and spread some cheer. They also performed at the middle school concert and were very successful.

Here's what we've been up to:

Kindergarten- we took a story book called "10 Shiny Snowflakes" and added instruments and movements to go with it. We read the story "The Jingle Bell Ball" and "Polar Bear, Polar Bear, What do you Hear?" We watched the classic story "Peter and the Wolf" and learned more about instrument sounds. We learned to sing "The Snowman Song", which has fun movements to go along with it. Ask your student to perform this song for you!

1st/2nd grade- we've learned many fun winter songs, including "We Will Jingle", "Mittens and Gloves", "Snowman Jump", and "Hip Hop Reindeer." We played mallet instruments with "Snowman Jump" and had fun with some winter rhythms. We created our own question and answer winter rhythms, as well. We added instruments to the story "There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Bell." We did some carol tune puzzles and some other fun SMARTboard activities.

3rd/4th grade- we learned a bit about the dreidl game played durin Hanukkah. We learned a song called "Dreidl Spin" which we sang and played on recorders. We have also been working on assessing our recorder playing on the Recorder Karate song "Gently Sleep." We have been singing other winter songs, and our favorite is "Winter Again", which we also learned to play on hand bells, boomwhackers, and mallet instruments. We also took some winter rhythms and created our own mini-compositions which we wrote on the music staff and learned to play on recorders. Encourage your student to practice his/her recorder over break!!!

5th grade- we learned several winter songs, including "Winter Again" and "Over the River." We learned to play "Winter Again" on handbells, recorders, and mallet instruments. We created ostinato patterns and movements to go with "Over the River", and we also learned a folk dance to go with the song! We learned to play a song called "Joyous Prelude" on recorders, which is based on Bach's "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring." We made ostinato patterns to go with the canon song "I Love the Mountains" and performed them in groups. We have continued to work on sign language for the song "Win", as well. Encourage your student to practice his/her recorder over break!!!

Are you going to PRACTICE over break? Are you going to sing, dance, and play instruments? Enjoy.

Thanksgiving!

It's Thanksgiving break! Are you practicing?!?!?!

I had a WONDERFUL time at the Orff National Conference for music teachers in St. Louis this past weekend. I will be coming back to school full of inspiration and new ideas that I cannot wait to try.

So, 3rd, 4th, and 5th graders, you should PRACTICE!

Listen to music, sing, dance, play, enjoy. Happy Thanksgiving!

This week (10/29-11/2)

Happy end of the trimester!

A word about grades....

All specials teachers have made a change this year with our grading scale. In the past, we used a numbering system similar to the classroom teachers, 1-4. This year, the specials teachers have decided to make a change to benefit students and families in terms of understanding the grades. We will be using an ESU grading scale. E=Excellent (above expectations.) S=Satisfactory (meets expectations.) U=Unsatisfactory (below expectations.) This should make grades easier to understand for all.

This week in...

Kindergarten- we continued to learn about walking and jogging sounds in music. We reviewed high and low sounds, and we wrapped up the week with a quiz about some of the major concepts covered so far this year: high and low, identifying simple musical patterns, and walking versus jogging music.

1st/2nd grade- students performed a chant from the story Shake Dem Halloween Bones in groups using the expressive characteristics of music (loud and soft, fast and slow, high and low, and also some emotions- e.g. happy, sad, mad.) These were fun to watch! We also played a game with a pumpkin beanbag called "The Pumpkin Picker."

3rd/4th grade- we began to examine our recorder playing and graded ourselves in the 4 categories of tone, rhythm, fingerings/posture, and tonguing. Students used the song "Hot Cross Buns" (the white belt song on Recorder Karate) to gauge their current level of playing. We also had some fun playing a football passing game.

5th grade- we learned about Beethoven and wrote reactions to some of his compositions on our music logs. We also completed another Mad Minutes, which focuses on reading the notes B, A, G, and E on the staff. We reviewed our sign language for the song "Win" (see the link at the bottom of the page under 'Other useful links') and worked on some new recorder songs.

Here's a photo of my pup Wilson and I enjoying the Halloween parade at school!

HAPPY PRACTICING!

This week (10/22-10/26)

This week in...

Kindergarten- we are learning about walking and jogging to sounds in music. We heard the piece "Slavonic Dance" and got to walk and jog along with the different sections. We also played rhythm sticks to walking and jogging rhythms and played a game with the story "Little Red Riding Hood." We learned to sing the song "I'm a Little Ghost" and did some other Halloween activities. We learned the chant "Five Little Pumpkins" and made our voices match pathways of ghosts on the SMARTboard. We even created our own vocal pathway with ghosts on a piece of paper using pencils and crayons and practiced singing them as a class.

1st/2nd grade- we have been learning about steady beat versus rhythm in music. We did several activities to continue to practice the difference between those two things, and we took a quiz about steady beat and rhythm on the erasable white boards. We sang "Apples Red" and practiced clicking the steady beat and rhythm on rhythm sticks. We sang the song "I'm a Little Ghost" and "Pick a Pumpkin" for Halloween. We passed a pumpkin bean bag around the circle to the steady beat in preparation for a beanbag passing game that we will play next week in class. We also had some fun with the classic song "Monster Mash."

3rd/4th grade- we learned to sing two songs: "I Bought Me a Bat" (a spooky rendition of "I Bought Me a Cat" that we learned earlier this year!) and "Autumn Vibe." We also continued to develop our note reading skills with Mad Minutes and played a football passing game. We played a longer piece on recorders called "B A Dancing Zombies", which focuses on the notes B and A. We also played a Halloween quiz game in groups.

5th grade- we played the mallet instruments with the chant I taught last week, "Double, Double." We learned a tremolo, an ostinato, and the melody pattern. We assigned different members of the class to play different parts and turned it into a performance.

There will be a spooky sing along tomorrow morning in the auditorium at 10am! All are welcome to attend.

This week (10/8-10/11)

This week in...

Kindergarten- students listened to different musical selections and had to determine if each had mostly high or mostly low sounds. If they heard mostly high sounds, they circled the picture of the mountain. If they heard mostly low sounds, they circled the picture of the submarine. We also listened to and acted out the story of "Thorn Rosa."

1st/2nd grade- we played the mallet instruments with the song "Apples Red." We enjoyed playing all the same note at the same time, and playing a bordun pattern to go with the song.

3rd/4th grade- we played the note B and A on recorders to the rhythm of the poem "Warm hands, warm." We also improvised our own melodies on mallet instruments to the rhythm of "Warm hands, warm." Several students shared their improvisations as solos.

5th grade- we review a chant we learned called "Let's Play a Game." We learned that the chant is actually a song. We figured out how to play the melody on the mallet instruments. We also took another listen to the song "Win" by Brian McKnight, which we will be starting to learn sign language for next week.

This week (10/1-10/5)

This week in...

Kindergarten- we have been learning all about high and low sounds in music. We stretched up high like a star when we heard high sounds, and scooted down low like a star fish when we heard low sounds. We played a listening game with high and low in which we lined up behind either a picture of a mountain (high) or a submarine (low) depending on what we heard in each musical example.

1st/2nd grade- we learned a dance to go with the song "Shoofly." This was a beginning folk dance and we will learn more difficult versions of this dance soon! We kept the "fly" theme going and listened to "There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a Fly." I then sang the students a story very similar to that called There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed Some Leaves. Students took a quiz with their music buddy on the erasable white boards. Questions focused on whether each musical example had a steady beat or no steady beat.

3rd/4th grade- we continued to be introduced to recorders- see post from last week. Some classes also got to do short call and response compositions with their music buddy. These were also performed for the class.

5th grade- we reviewed B and A on recorders. We also learned about the life and music of Mozart as we filled out our music logs. We learned the following poem:

Deedle deedle dumpling my son John
Went to bed with his stockings on
One shoe off and one shoe on
Deedle deedle dumpling my son John

We learned a body percussion (stomps, pats, claps, and snaps) to accompany this poem. We also made 4 beat word chains and played them on our recorders. This became a fun performance in ABA form. We also listened to the song "Win" by Brian McKnight, which we will be learning to sign in sign class this year. Here is a link to the video:
"Win" video

Happy weekend!

This week (9/24-9/28)

This week in...

Kindergarten- we made animal sounds (mooing and buzzing) and learned that the beginning of the song "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep" sounds same as the beginning of "Twinkle, Twinkle" and "Brown Bear, Brown Bear." We kept the steady beat in many ways up high and down low, and we moved like stars and starfish during high and low sounding music.

1st/2nd grade- we learned how to draw in so and mi on erasable music staff white boards. We listened to high and low music, and made guesses about which instrument between two choices would be higher. We moved around the room to show our musical opposites (high and low, forte and piano, allegro and lento) with our music buddies. We also read and sang along with the story book called "Pete the Cat."

3rd/4th grade- We learned to play the poem "Warm hands, warm" on drums. We would play regular drum strokes for most of the words, and thumb or down strokes for the stressed words in the poem. We repeated our Mad Minutes with the notes B, A, and G and began our work with recorders. We learned about how to correctly sit and use air when we play, and we learned to play the note "B." We played the rhythm of the poem "Thomas A. Tattamus" on recorders and had conversations with our music buddy using only the word "too." This was very silly and fun! Here's the tongue twister we used:

Thomas A. Tattamus took two T's
to tie two tups to two small trees.
To frighten the terrible Thomas A. Tattamus
tell me how many T's there are in that!

5th grade- We played the rhymed we learned last week on drums. ("Let's play a game. Clap and say your name. Everyone will copy you and sound just the same.") Last week, each of us came up with a way to clap and say our name that was unique and the class would copy it. This week, we came up with a way to play on the drum while saying our name. We learned a body percussion pattern to go with this rhyme that included clapping, patting our legs, and stomping. We performed this pattern in canon (2 groups, 1 starts first and the other starts a little later). We also learned to play this rhyme on drums and we later performed it in canon. We began our work on recorders this week as well. We used the same tongue twister as the 3rd and 4th graders (see above!) to learn to correctly use our tongue to start new notes.

This week (9/10-9/14)

What a great first sing along on Friday! I loved it!

This week in...

Kindergarten- we are learning about loud and soft sounds. We discussed the soft ways we use our voice (whispering) and the loud ways we use our voice (calling.) We moved to lots of loud and soft music- tapping or doing something small for soft music, and stomping or doing something big for loud music. We practiced playing drums to the steady beat both loudly and softly. We played a listening game- students lined up behind a picture of a lion if they heard loud sounds and a picture of a mouse if they heard soft sounds.

1st/2nd grade- we are learning about dynamics! Dynamics is the "fancy music word" that means the volume of the music. We learned about loud (forte) sounds, and soft (piano) sounds. We identified pictures that showed forte and piano sounds, and we practiced using our 4 voices- singing, speaking, whispering, and calling. We learned the fun game "Grizzly Bear", which utilizes a medium, soft, and loud singing voice. We played rhythm sticks loudly and softly and heard many examples of loud and soft music. We also explored moving around the room in soft and loud ways, e.g. tiptoeing and stomping.

3rd/4th grade- we worked on mirroring with a partner- facing each other and copying movements exactly. We also worked on shadowing- one person stands behind the other and acts as their shadow. We also did this as a class and in groups of 4 when each person got to be the leader. We learned about call and response form with the song "Way Down Yonder in the Brickyard." Some students volunteered to sing duets for the class with a friend. We began exploring hand drums, tubano drums, a djembe drums with call and response form. I created a 4-beat call, and students improvised their own 4 beat responses.

5th grade- we had another go at our Mad Minutes with the notes B, A, and G on the music staff. We played a fun stick passing game with a song we learned last week called "Zigs and Zags." We began our study of famous composers by discussing the life and some well-known pieces by Johann Sebastian Bach (1685-1750.) We will be completing a year-long project called "Music logs" this year. Every time we learn about a new composer, we will keep track of which pieces we listen to and our reactions to them. This will help us remember all the unique musical styles that we will hear! We also began to learn a new folk dance called the "Galopede."

New school year!

Hello everyone!

I'm so sorry to have not posted sooner in this new school year. As we all know, the beginning of the year is a hectic time. Please take a moment to enter your email address into the white bar at the top of the blog page and hit "submit." You will then receive an email every time I write a new post on this blog along with a link to the blog page- super convenient! This makes it easy to know when to check up on my blog. I will also add new videos and pictures throughout the year, so don't forget to scroll down to check those out.

I attribute my lateness with this post to my sincerest attempt to make the most of including what I learned during my summer training course into my teaching this year. The course I took culminated with a Level I certification in the Orff Schulwerk approach. Orff Schulwerk is a way to teach and learn music. It is based on things children like to do: sing, chant rhymes, clap, dance, and keep a beat on anything near at hand. These instincts are directed into learning music by hearing and making music first, then reading and writing it later. This is the same way we all learned our language. I have been having so much fun incorporating this approach into every lesson so far this year. I even attended a workshop this past Saturday, the 8th, to brush up and get more new materials. That was one of 5 such workshops I will attend through this school year.

So far this year....

Kindergarten- we have been focusing on a few key points: the 4 ways to use our voice (whispering, speaking, singing, calling), being a good audience member, finding the singing voice, and learning about moving through self-space (staying in your spot) and general space (around the room.) We've learned the songs "Hello, Everybody", "Rover", "This is My Space", and "Counting Song". We've also worked with several rhymes and have learned basic technique for playing hand drums. We learned about the new words "conductor" and "solo."

1st/2nd grade- we began the year by coming up with a gesture (a unique body movement) to go with our name. We played a game with the song "Rig a Jig Jig" in which we paired up with multiple different partners in class. We learned a circle game/song called "Wake Me, Shake Me."We came up with lots of ways to move to the steady beat, including body movements (tapping the floor, patting your elbow) and even playing the steady beat on mallet instruments (this is called a bordun pattern.) We had our first experience playing mallet instruments with the song "Stars Shining." We experience playing with two hands together and one hand at a time while we counted the numbers of the stars in the song. We also got to figure out how to play our favorite food answer on the mallet instruments from the song "Breakfast, Lunch, and Dinner." We have begun our discussion of musical opposites, beginning with loud and soft (piano and forte are the music words.) We learned the new words "bordun", "xylophone", "metallophone", "glockenspiel", "piano", and "forte."

3rd/4th grade- we began the year with the rhyme "Acka Backa" and played a game involving moving around the room and meeting classmates. We learned a song and game called "Wind Up the Apple Tree" that got us moving right away and taught us about AB form in music. We also immediately dove into reading notes on the staff, starting with the notes B, A, and G with an activity called Mad Minutes. Students have one minute to correctly identify the names of as many B's, A's, and G's on the paper as possible, out of a possible 30. We learned to sing the song "I've Been Wishing" which we then figured out how to play on the mallet instruments- the students had to find the notes by ear until they could play the melody! We learned a cumulative song called "I Bought Me a Cat" (see video here). We have also learned a traditional folk dance called the "Galopede" which involves a series of movements with a partner facing across from you. The kids had fun with this! We learned the new words "bordun", "ostinato", and "form."

5th grade- we began the year by examining our names. Names are such an easy way to begin the study of rhythm. We each had to find a unique way to say our name and the class would echo. We then had to try to fit our name into one pat, clap pattern. Students were divided into groups of 4 and created their own "name compostions." Students would choose one name to be the ostinato (a musical pattern that repeats over and over.) For example: Da-vid, Da-vid, Da-vid, Da-vid. They then had to choose the order in which to share the 4 names of their group members. For example: Da-vid, Syd-ney, Jack, Al-ex. Students then could decide whether their composition would start with the ostinato pattern or with the 4 name pattern, or both simultaneously. We performed these for the class and transferred the speech to percussion instruments. Students learned a song in a minor (sad sounding) key called "Who Has Seen the Wind?" Students learned a bordun pattern to accompany the song, figured out how to play the melody by ear on the mallet instruments, and also improvised their own new melodies. We also immediately dove into reading notes on the staff, starting with the notes B, A, and G with an activity called Mad Minutes. Students have one minute to correctly identify the names of as many B's, A's, and G's on the paper as possible, out of a possible 30. We have also learned one traditional folk dance called "Lucky Seven." It begins in one big circle but involves some tricky movements that took us several tries to master! We learned the new words "soprano", "alto", and "bass."

Please continue to read my blog throughout the year- it's here for you! Feel free to leave comments and ask your kids to further illuminate/explain/demonstrate some of the activities I summarize in these posts. :) Thanks!

Summer's almost gone!

Hello, again!

I hope everyone is having a great summer, as I am. I have been busy visiting family in MN, and taking care of lots of things back in Greeley. I've spent some time updating the blog with the following:

• some new videos- see "True Colors" video below
• links- see "Other Useful Links" below
• a new playlist- see the blue box below and click play to hear some songs!
• a Spanish translator (this translates all words on the blog into Spanish for families who prefer to read en español!)
• new recorder music (on the 'Recorder Music' tab)

Please explore and enjoy these exciting new features! Happy practicing!