http://mgrondin.edublogs.org A pre-school music teacher's search for high-quality activities Wed, 07 Oct 2009 11:47:06 +0000 http://backend.userland.com/rss092 en Ever since I was a young child walking around the block to the library I have gotten a huge amount of enjoyment out of beautiful picture books. My joy persisted through my high school and college years working in a lovely independent bookstore and into my career as a ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/10/07/new-picture-books-for-young-children/ As music teachers we all face the same struggle at the beginning of the year: having to learn ALL of those names.   Knowing the names of your students is very important for building a relationship with your students and classroom management.  Particularly here in the preschool building I have ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/09/09/using-iphoto-to-learn-student-names/ Danny Nicholson (@dannynic) recently tweeted about a post to his blog that is packed with great ideas on how ot use an IWB in the music room.  Danny's Twitter stream always contains a lot of great tips on IWB stuff! Extra thanks to him for editing his post to include a ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/07/29/iwb-resources-for-music-teachers/ This is something I have wished for basically every time i use a SMART Board file in my room. I always try to let as many kids have turns as possible, and I almost always have another class coming to do the same activity right after the last one.  I ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/07/29/reset-button-for-smart-notebook-pages/ So of course teachers have been making their own games for years, it's nothing new.  They are very useful for review and if you have several different games that are pertinent to your curriculum you can set them up in centers and add some variety to your classroom routine. I thought ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/07/18/make-your-own-boardgames/ There are always a ton of tech questions on the Teachers.net music teachers chatboard, and recently one came up regarding transferring sounds from casette tapes to computer files and/or CD's.  I'm sure many of us have recordings of concerts or other things from "the old days" that we would enjoy ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/06/16/transferring-casettes-to-digital-files-and-cds/ I don't like to show too many videos in my classes. It seems to me that students experience such limited music instruction in their school life, we shouldn't waste even a single second!!! That being said, there are times when I find a short (10-15 minute) video that reinforces ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/06/01/united-streaming-okey-cokey-karaoke/ I strongly believe that incorporating school events and themes into the music classroom is important, particularly at the primary level.  It is good for the kids, reinforces their learning across the curriculum, builds positive relationships between music teachers and their colleagues and, lets face it, makes everyone look good to ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/04/22/celebrating-earth-day/ I looooove podcasts.  They are perfect for the car, or the treadmill, or to listen to while knitting.  Most of my favorites are from NPR (This American Life, Wait Wait Don't Tell Me, The Splendid Table.) I also love music and love technology, so imagine how much a L-O-V-E something that ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/04/16/musictechnology-podcasts/ One of my favorite things about teaching preschool music is that the skills we explore are very fundamental. I feel this open sup the possibility for all sorts of play-based learning and I get to do a lot of fun things with the kids. At the moment we ... http://mgrondin.edublogs.org/2009/03/23/five-things-loud-and-soft/