Music Theme September 10-14, 2012

This week was a little low on theme activities, but that happens sometimes when we get busy with other things or when the kids get into their free play and let me accomplish things around the house.  This week the kids also had a little TV time (they watched Sesame Street if you're interested) when I was doing other things.

Monday:

Morning (during Kindergarten):

• Playground
• Grocery Shopping
• Put Groceries Away
• No time for Theme Activities

Afternoon (after Kindergarten):

• Homework
• French Horn Coloring/F worksheet (L wanted a french horn to color, RJ saved his for another day)
• Lego organization (our new lego drawer set arrived so that took away any time left for theme activities)
• TV time/Free play during dinner prep
• RJ's Gymnastics Class

Tuesday:

Morning (during Kindergarten):

• House Cleaning
• Blowing on recorder on the route to and from K pickup - (L)
• Musical Instrument Exploration during free play (L) - banjo, maracas

Afternoon (after Kindergarten):

• Homework/Coloring
• Big-Kid Co-op at J's for RJ
• House Cleaning, Free Play/Attempted Nap/TV time for L

Wednesday:

Morning (during Kindergarten):

• L Gymnastics Class
• L Play Date

Afternoon (after Kindergarten)

• Homework
• Chores
• TV-time
• Free Play

Thursday:

Morning (during Kindergarten)

• Hosted Little Kid Co-op

• Instruments out on the table for exploration
• Toilet paper rain sticks with beans - Kids poured beans and then decorated with paint.
• Note: Beans turned out to be a great sensory experience as well as a great mess all over the floor!  They loved shaking their rain sticks too!
• Musical Ice in Water Table (from: http://playathomemom3.blogspot.com/2011/06/musical-salt.html )

• Note: this didn't really make much music unless a massive amount of salt was poured on all at once.  However, the children did enjoy a wonderful sensory experience with the ice and salt and water as it melted

Afternoon (after Kindergarten)

• Homework
• Chores
• Read
• TV time
• RJ made his rain stick on his own during Free Play

Friday:

Morning

• L and I played "drums" on recycled pirouette cookie tins with pencils
• Concepts: rhythm  He repeated some simple patterns (1, cross; 1, 2, cross; 1, 2, 3, cross)
• Played with the felt board notes
• Concepts:
• whole note, half note, quarter note, eighth note, sixteenth note,
• I showed him that the notes translated to sounds on the recorder, labeled the notes with the letters

Afternoon

• Homework/Coloring (brief since we mostly finished it!), also music worksheets from last week (RJ also wrote the names of the instruments by request)
• Chores
• TV time/make dinner time
• Swim lessons

Fun Musical Lunches this week:

French Horn Tortilla

Tuna Salad Sushi Roll Oboe

Web Sites for future reference:
http://www.classicsforkids.com/games/
http://www.sfskids.org/templates/home.asp?pageid=1
http://pbskids.org/music/
http://www.teachingideas.co.uk/music/notevaluechants.htm

And we're back...for now...with Dinosaurs

My son recently used a gift certificate from his birthday to buy a set of dinosaurs and we were delighted that his selection actually printed the names of the dinosaurs on their bottoms.  This led to me starting a very loose theme on dinosaurs.  With my younger son becoming mobile and very curious about everything, AND refusing to take a morning nap in his crib, it has been increasingly difficult to actually conduct any messy or involved projects with my preschooler without interruption.  (Don't get me started on the great finger painting incident which required a whole wardrobe change and a blue/green Technicolor mouth).  Even reading a whole book is difficult, which is frustrating for both of us.  I know this phase will pass soon, when mobility is less of a novelty, and when the little one is ready for a little more than eating art mediums and chewing on the Brachiosaurus' tail.  In the meantime, we try to play with the dinosaurs a lot (while my 10 month old is "pretending" to be a carnivore "eating" the herbivores) while I embed facts about them.  We also read books when we can (even if by the page as we did with "An Alphabet of Dinosaurs"), and try to utilize some weekend time to have one-on-one big kid projects.  Also, we have started allowing a little TV time on a regular basis, so PBS's "Dinosaur Train" is appropriate and fits the theme.  Although now I have to explain that Dinosaurs do not really travel by train, nor do Tyrannosaurus Rex babies EVER end up in a Pteranodon nest and make friends with them.

The assessment materials for this theme are available here.  I do hope that someday I will get some long stretches of uninterrupted time to transcribe and code all the assessments, but at least for now, I have them recorded.