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Keyboard centers with Music You Can Read

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students play the letters provided in the format "Keyboard/Xylophone/Tone Bells" with the intention of using the "Music Only" format as skills progress. They study fingerings and chords when appropriate to skills.
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Retell A Story Through Dance

For Teachers 2nd - 4th
Students tell stories through dance. In this ballet lesson, students learn pantomime dance skills and examine "The Nutcracker" ballet performances as they examine ballet as storytelling.
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Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

For Teachers 3rd - 6th
Students study the life and music of the composer Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart. They practice listening for the downbeat of a musical selection. They participate in a physical exercise where they march around in a circle and clap to the...
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Home Sweet Home

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students complete activities with the books Color Me Dark, The Diary of Nellie Lee Love, and The Great Migration North.  In this literature/History lesson, student read the story and discuss the plot. They analyze photographs taken...
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Fit Kid

For Teachers K - 6th
Young scholars practice and perform the song "Fit Kid" while learning the basics of motion and music and dynamics in this elementary-level instructional activity for the General Music classroom. The instructional activity emphasizes...
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Triple Meter

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students chant "Mabel, Mabel, Set the Table" in beats grouped in 4's using a percussive pattern. They repeat using 3's. Students sing a song in 4's and in 3's. they move to recorded music to practice threes. Students create Orff...
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The Golden Spike

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students investigate modern transportation in the 19th century by examining artifacts.  In this U.S. history lesson, students read the story Joseph's Railroad Dreams, and discuss the Golden Spike used in the first transcontinental...
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Flowers Galore

For Teachers K - 6th
Students examine the work of Georgia O'Keefe and observe the shapes and lines that make up a flower. They create a flower drawing or painting.
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The Dancing Flute

For Teachers 2nd - 4th
Young scholars use a cardboard tubes as props as they create their own dance steps to express the emotions invoked in a portion of The Nutcracker by Tchaikovsky.
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Dance Research Essay

For Teachers 4th - 5th
Learners discover and appreciate the history, characteristics, and significance of a specific dance style. They to pick a dance style that they are interested in and would like to research.
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Readers Theatre using an Indonesian folktale

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students read a short play based on the Indonesian folktale Cicak and Kancil and complete related activities.
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Design a New Dollar Coin

For Teachers 4th - 7th
Students create a design for a new coin after researching people who have impacted history. Students must write a persuasive essay about why this person should be memorialized on the dollar coin and present their person to the class.
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The Pony Song

For Teachers 1st - 5th
Students sing "Three Little Pigs", the "Pony Song", and "The Animal Blues" in this elementary school music lesson. National and State Standards are addressed. Assessment rubric is included for grading and student evaluation.
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Sounds Like Science-Guitars

For Teachers 4th - 12th
Learners demonstrate the relationship between a sound and its frequency. In this sound and frequency activity, students use an old tennis racket and nylon fishing line to create a guitar. Learners observe the pitch and frequency.
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Transportation Through Time

For Teachers 3rd - 5th
Students write a short story illustrating the past and imaging the future in transportation. In this transportation lesson plan, students explore artifacts that have to do with transportation in the past in Chicago.
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Dancing Hands, Abstract Drawings

For Teachers K - 8th
Students discover African musical rhythms by performing Ancestral Spirit Dances.  In this musical lesson, students research Willis "Bing" Davis and the abstract work he created.  Students listen to Yoruba drum music and...
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Rhythm and Rhyme

For Teachers 2nd - 4th
Students compare the given rhyme to another rhyme that they already know (I Know An Old Lady Who Swallowed A Fly). Students listen and identify the similar rhyme pattern of the two rhymes and apply those concepts to a group creation of...
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Rhythm and Rhyme

For Teachers 2nd - 4th
Learners listen to and identify the similar rhyme pattern of two rhymes and apply those concepts to a group creation of a new rhyme. They discover that the given rhyme comes from India by learning a little background information on India.
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Native American Friendship Dance

For Teachers 3rd - 4th
Pupils demonstrate the proper steps in sequence to the Native American Friendship Dance.
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The Ingredients Needed for a Musical National Park

For Teachers 4th - 6th
Learners identify musical sites that are worthy of being included as units of the National Parks System. They anthologize American music from primitive times to today.
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The Composer's Blueprint

For Teachers 3rd - 8th
Students recognize AB and ABA form in music and distinguish between these two forms. They explore meaning of tempo and how to perform accents in written music.
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Staff Kids

For Teachers 3rd - 8th
Students participate in a group game to help them identify notes on both staves by using words.
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Using Graphic Organizers for Sensemaking

For Teachers 2nd - 12th
Students create concept maps in order to assess the information that they have gathered during research. They study the concept map to determine if the research is complete.
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An Introduction To The Instruments Of The Orchestra

For Teachers 1st - 6th
Students explore a variety of instruments to discover their sound. After watching an orchestra play, students discover the categories of instruments such as woodwinds, brass, strings, and percussion. In teams, they listen to music and...