Teaching Tolerance
Community Arts Showcase
An art showcase encourages class members to explore the themes of social justice and tolerance. They create an original artwork, engage in group discussions, and journal writing. The art gallery also provides a chance for families and...
Teaching Tolerance
Artistic Expression Showcase
No one is too young to create a masterpiece. Elementary artists delve into the topic of social justice with original artwork. Scholars keep journals to reflect on their experiences before putting paintbrush to paper. Final artwork is...
Teaching Tolerance
Musical Movement Showcase
Young performing artists create a song or choreograph a dance to illustrate a theme in a text they are reading. Step-by-step directions are included.
Acoustical Society of America
Musical Instruments: Part I
Pupils construct and play various musical instruments made from straws and bottles. They investigate how changes in their instruments result in tone changes. Learners change the lengths and amount of water in the instruments and record...
Acoustical Society of America
Musical Instruments: Part II
String together how instruments produce sound. Using pieces of string, learners find ways to create sound. They investigate changes to the string and the effect of adding a cup. Finally, pupils experiment by changing the way to create...
Lexington Children's Theatre
Play Guide: A Charlie Brown Christmas
What's your favorite seasonal tradition? Before viewing a stage production of A Charlie Brown Christmas, language arts students explore the music and literary themes of the story. After they have watched the show, learners compare...
Purdue University
Design of Music Instruments for a Rock Band
Can you create a rock band? Scholars learn about the creation and transmission of sound in a hands-on STEM activity. First, they explore the transmission of sound using a tuning fork. Then, they must solve the problem of missing...
Tune Into English
Yellow Submarine – The Beatles – Notes
Enhance English language skills using the fan-favorite song, "Yellow Submarine" by The Beatles. Scholars predict what the song is about then listen and mark specific words they hear. Playing the song again, participants unscramble lyrics...
Pace University
The Harlem Renaissance - The Journey to Freedom: An Interdisciplinary
The Harlem Renaissance if the focus of a carefully crafted, interdisciplinary unit designed to introduce middle schoolers to the contributions key figures made to American art and culture during the period. Class members select...
BBC
The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky
Over the course of six lessons, scholars try their hand at composing and dancing after a thorough examination of the famous ballet, The Nutcracker, by Tchaikovsky. Participants watch and discuss the performance of two dances, create and...
Canada's National Arts Center
Vivaldi and The Four Seasons
Did you know that Vivaldi’s orchestra was largely made up of girls from an orphanage? Fun facts like this fill a 34-page teacher's kit designed to accompany a cross-curricular study of Vivaldi's The Four Seasons.
Canada's National Arts Center
Vivaldi and The Four Seasons: Teacher Resource Kit
Did you know that Vivaldi wrote "Winter," the final concerto of his The Four Seasons, in the key of F minor to echo the sleigh ride pieces popular at the time? A teacher resource kit, designed to support a study of the work, is packed...
Penguin Books
Up Close: Ella Fitzgerald
A reading of Tanya Lee Stones' biography of Ella Fitzgerald lets middle schoolers get up close and personal with the First Lady of Jazz. Stone recounts details of Fitzgerald's life from her early days through her experiences as a teenage...
Google
Music Mixer
Here's an activity sure to be music to your ears. Pupils create a music composition using block-based computer coding. They add different sound rings, and then adjust the number and speed of sounds to create their composition pieces.
PBS
Hidden Messages in Spirituals
Slaves laboring in the cotton fields of the old South singing joyously may have convinced overseers that their workforce was happy and content, but in truth, these spirituals contained secret codes. After viewing a short video about...
Core Knowledge Foundation
Ray Charles
Introduce young learners to the read-aloud process with a short biographical passage about Ray Charles. After listening to the passage, class members respond to factual, inferential, and evaluative questions, and then create a timeline...
Smithsonian Institution
Our Story: Duke Ellington and Jazz
Get parents or guardians into the swing of things with a jazzy homework assignment. A detailed six-page guide provides before, during, and after reading suggestions for Duke Ellington: The Piano Prince and His Orchestra, Andrea Davis...
Historic New Orleans Collection
Exploring Primary Sources: Music in New Orleans
Looking for a new and exciting way to teach young historians the art of primary source analysis? Jazz up your activity with a resource that asks class members to analyze photos, travel documents, and letters written by some of New...
Look! We're Learning!
Ella Fitzgerald Biography Mini-Unit
Before there was Beyonce, before there was Madonna, before there was Cher, there was Ella. Introduce Ella Fitzgerald, The First Lady of Jazz, with a reading comprehension exercise that presents a brief biography of her life and then asks...
Beatles Story
The Beatles Story: Learning Resource Packet
Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans - John Lennon. Even if you cannot make plans to visit The Beatles Story at Albert Dock, scholars still take part in learning all about the Beatles. Youngsters gain facts...
PBS
Math with Jake: Ratios and Fractions
And the beat goes on. The installment of the Math at the Core: Ratios series introduces time signatures in music. A musician shows the relationship between different types of musical beats. Working in pairs, classmates create beat...
PBS
Math with Jake: Frequencies and Pitch
Be an octave above the rest. A musician explains how to write music in different time signatures. An interesting resource continues to demonstrate ratios using the pitch of musical notes and hertz. Pupils use a pitch table and determine...
PBS
Math with Jake: Transposition Using Ratios
The star of the show is ratios. The informative resource explains how to transpose music using ratios. Individuals transpose the song "Twinkle, Twinkle" in the activity by applying their ratio skills. The activity challenges class...
Jazz Academy
Let Freedom Swing
Three lessons in the Let Freedom Swing concert tour resource guide packed with information, materials, and activities that provide the context for any study of American history.