I am so excited to begin my second year at Willard. Over the summer, I took three graduate level courses at DePaul University focusing on music education. The second course was the second level of Orff training with Cyndee Giebler and many other talented instructors. I am so excited to apply what I learned this summer in the Willard and Orrington music classrooms!
I spent most of last week working on our classroom. It is my goal to post photos soon! Looking forward to seeing you all soon! ~Mrs. Bjorklund What an incredible two weeks for Willard's fifth grade and the Willard Chorus! I am incredibly proud of everyone's hard work as we presented three total performances of "School House Rock: LIVE" the musical. The younger students at Willard loved our performances and everyone did great! Also to the Willard School Chorus: I am so proud of everyone who generously gave up their Saturday afternoon to perform at YEA! This festival does much to promote arts education in Evanston, and you all demonstrated young singing and musicianship so well. I am so excited for Wednesday night and our world premiere of "Listen to the Mustn'ts". Remember, everyone: with hard work and perseverance, anything can happen, anything can be!
Ms. O'Hara's class came in singing so beautifully this week, I couldn't help but record it to share! They've come so far since the beginning of the year. I'm so proud of all of their hard work and for how brave they've been solo singing and responding to feedback! Enjoy! This was a busy week in the Willard Music Room. Fifth grade jumped into their second week of ukelele and many learned their second chord. Third grade stepped out the absolute letter names on a giant staff across the room in preparation for recorder karate note reading. Fourth grade learned "ti-tika" and "tika-ti" (an eighth and two sixteenth notes; two sixteenths and an eighth note). Second grade labeled the "mi to la" leap, first grade continued with our quarter rest, "sleepy z" and kindergarten practiced all of the musical opposites they know so far.
Wednesday half days for professional development can create a challenge for fine arts. It is so important for District 65's teachers to have time for development. However, the fine arts department only get to see our students once a week, and catching up can be a challenge! Our primary students have missed several lessons already due to our Wednesday half days. This week, a schedule change was proposed in an effort to be more fair to the primary grades. Luckily, I got to see my Wednesday afternoon kiddos in the morning! The flip side is that we missed 3rd-5th grades! This is why our music classes are so action packed. Seeing my students only once a week (when I saw them twice at my previous job in Texas) has taken some serious getting used to! In spite of these challenges, I appreciate how hard my students work each time they come to class: their intense focus, their behavior choices so we get maximum "game time" each class, and the joy they bring every time I see them. Singing games are a huge deal in our music classroom. Children learn so much through play and the multiple repetitions possible when a song is in "game format" help the students really "own" the song. This makes analyzing the musical concepts in the song much easier to do! Below is a video of the class performing one of their favorites "Chicken on a Fencepost", a song we use to practice four sixteenth notes! |
Mrs. Bjorklund
Music teacher @ Willard & Orrington Schools in District 65. Archives
February 2015
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