Journal # 12

I really enjoyed working in groups for this project. I feel that our group worked really well together and took different jobs on well.
Even though most of us hadn't been 100% health wise while working on this project but we all knew what we had to do and did a great job at it.
We did not do our presentation on the first day but the groups that did go were amazing, you could really tell that they cared about the project and put a lot of time and effort into making the lesson a great one.

I think in the future doing my group projects in this class will be beneficial to the students in the class.

Journal # 11

This week we learned the concept of binary form. We started out on Monday by dancing to the Mariposa song. A song in binary form has two contrasting parts, a chorus and a verse. During the verse, we held hands and walked to the right, and on the chorus, we stopped and clapped our hands to the beat and flapped our arms like beautiful butterflies. On Monday, the concept of binary form was imparted to use by performing to the Mariposa song in class. On Wednesday, we learned how to play percussion instruments with the story, The Sleeping Bed. It was really great hearing all the people playing different instruments and actually making good sounding music!. On Friday we played home made instruments to the story Thunder Cakes and we learned two more notes on the recorder, C & D. It's important for us to learn these concepts because we can understand how to teach them to the kids. Children can benefit from these all-in-one story telling, acting, dramatizing projects because kids learn differently and the different styles of teaching will benefit the different types of learners. Hopefully, playing musical instruments can help some of these kids to become more excited about learning. I think this is something i will really be able to incorporate in my classroom...even as a classroom teacher and not a music teacher, as long as it is well planned out and doesn't take to long to organize and get ready.

Journal # 10

This week we worked on reading books while also incorporating sounds into the story. Through using music while telling the story it keeps the children engaged in the flow of the story as it is read. This is important not only for teh management of a classroom but also to enhance the learning of the children over time. Giving each child a noise or instrument to play for part of the story will keep him/her "tuned in" to the story and the sounds that others in the room make.It is important for us, as students, to learn this information to improve the learning ability of every student in the classroom. It is important for us, as future teachers, to learn that to keep a child engaged in a story, we must use means that we never thought good ideas before. In learning how to animate a story with sounds made not only by instruments but also by the students body parts we have learned that there are many ways to tell any story.It is important for children, especially young children, to learn how to animate a story with sounds to foster their creativity with music and other art forms. It is also important for children to understand the relationship between the words and sounds those words represent that they hear each day. Centering the learning of the story and the sound making around the student will aid in the student retaining the meaning behind the story and keep them engaged in the story itself.