I have been spoiling you with pictures.. None today. Today I was just too busy teaching to stop and take a picture. Yesterday and today were great days of teaching. My MMAH is a group of 8 gorgeous, sweet 5 year olds and we had so much fun! I love the new curriculum revision. Following them was a small cycles class of three sweet girls with Moms and the children couldn't get over the fact that I could talk to Mr. MacDonald on an imaginary phone. Then I taught an MMK book 4 class and the three children just flowed through the lesson plan. I have been focussing more on beautiful sound at the piano and finding the graceful movements that accompany beautiful sound. These children took to these ideas like birds at a bird feeder. THEN a private lesson with a MG graduate and we made music for an hour and laughed alot.
Today was more about getting my Baby's class going. I had three babies and three mothers, a father and two grandparents. Oh, and a two year old and a three year old. Always a challenge to adapt material. I sweated through that class.
For both my toddler class and baby class I am going to give a parent ed class immediately after the 2nd class. I will have a snack for the children and I hope we can sit out on the lawn and I plan to create a 15 minute presentation. This is crunch time. It is much easier to say it in 60 minutes than in 15 minutes....
This afternoon I started a MMK1 class. Four girls. They were thrilled there are NO BOYS in the room. We floated and danced and sang and giggled through class. I had them making beautiful wrist motions at the piano and we worked on floating up from the keyboards after the end of Debka hora. I have been bothered by the tension child exhibit in their hands and their bodies and I spent a lot of time working on connecting their senses to what relaxed feels like in their arms and wrists. It was hard to convince them to let the tension out of their fingers. I think it comes from holding pencils too much in class.
Today was the first day of my post MG class. Four children signed up and we started with pentascales in all keys playing the rhythm of the first excersize in Book 1 of Dozen a Day. I first worked on 16th notes (using Gordon) and worked back to 8ths and quarter notes. Then we reversed. I worked them up to hands together. Then we went to the floor and I brought out my favorite rhythms cards from Music Mind Games. The cards show each note in relation to the other. We discussed the names and compared the notes and then I had them create to measures of 4/4 time using any combination (include quarter note rests). Then they each spoke their rhythm in Gordon language and then I would speak it with the counting system, which they all exclaimed they learned in public school music class. It was interesting to hear them fluently speak the Gordon and then awkwardly try the counting system. Then each moved clockwise to their neighbors rhythm and sang that rhythm. They moved until they were back to their rhythm again.
We worked on verbally stating the finger for I and V7 chords. That was difficult for them. Remember, we are up to developing grammar. The musicianship is in place. They could play the chords but describing what they were doing was hard. I would supply the words and them repeat them. BY the end they had it down.
Then I gave them the "A Little Melody" I create for my book 4 class. However, I realized I printed it in landscape mode and it wouldn't fit in their new notebook, so I reprinted it in portrait mode and renamed it "A little Taller Melody". They all need to learn it on their own by next week.
They also gave me a list of the music they want to learn. Mostly broadway songs. I will probably make arrangements . Then the hour was up. So much to do Too little time.
Then I taught two private lessons. Tomorrow I will put up pictures I did take this morning (OK I lied earlier in the post.)
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