Wednesday, March 21, 2007

Weathers Lesson 5

Dear mums and dads, here we are...at lesson 5 of Weathers. Time really flies when you are enjoying yourself. I know I am....and I hope you and your kids are enjoying yourselves too as we meet weekly to sing, play and dance to music!

We will be having a pretend rainy day play this week. We will listen to songs about raindrops, play the drums to the rhythm of those songs, sing about raindrops and even danced 'in the rain' and have fun playing in mud puddles! We will learn about staccato. In music, staccato refers to sounds that are separated and often short. It's the perfect word to use when we are playing with rain sounds!

We are going to play a rain game It rained a mist. It's a singing game which gives the children a chance to explore basic composing while we visit different places that rained...may be a town, or a farm, or a park. We will have to move with drip drop tiptoe to the different places and the children need to abide by the rule of only moving when we sing. Lots of chance to practice self control here!

After a rainy day, what might you find on the ground? PUDDLES! Yucky, muddy, puddles that is beckoning all kids to please jump in them! We are using the hoops to be pretend mud puddles.

A child is always ready to discover and explore. Exploration becomes play when the child shifts from the question, "What does this object do?" to a slightly different question, " What can I do with this object?" Through repeated exploratory experiences, the child discovers that every object has unlimited possibilities for use. He can then transfer this explorer attitude to other areas of daily life.

The more opportunities children have to do pretend play, the more creative and imaginative they will be and they will carry this 'skill' to other aspects in life as well. You can see that they are able to 'think out of the box" and have strong problem solving skills. If one way doensn't work, try another way!

We will be dancing a new dance today, a dance like the sun and the rain. We are going to move in response to a musical cue of sun ( metallic bright sound) and the rain ( short muted sound). By inviting a movement response to a musical cue, we are helping the children to:

- coordinate auditory and motor skills to specific movements.
-control movement through focused listening over time.
-be involved at different level.


Alrighty....I'll see you all in class! It's going to be a wet class, not unlike the weather we have been having lately!








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