Grade Two/Three

March 11 – April 16

The children were so successful at Primary Days of Music! What a wonderful time they had sharing so many songs with 4 other schools! We really came correct with our singing and appreciation of the music. And on a snowy day, the kids were excited to enjoy the snow, go on a school bus and participate in this special event. Well done grade twos and threes!

Now we can concentrate on our concert preparations!

Divisions 9 and 10 will be featured in the dance Mr. Roboto. Here is the choreography with which to practice at home:

The list of songs that we are singing for our concert for Divisions 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12 and 13 are as follows:

• Run Away To Mars
• Space Travel
• Sally Go ‘Round The Sun
• Rocketman
• Space Oddity
• ISS
• Fly Me To The Moon
• Zoom Zoom Zoom
• Aiken Drum
• Final Countdown
• Planet Earth
• Around the World (dance)

*most of these songs are edited down for time and content to match the concert story

Lyrics:

Videos:

January – March

Divisions 7-14 will be working on many songs for our school play this term. Our play will be on April 15 and 16, but the children will begin to learn the songs now as they have a lot to learn. The children will be our “choir” for this play!

The grade twos and threes will also be learning songs for Primary Days of Music. These songs will mostly be taught by their classroom teachers. We will also rehearse a few in music class, and will do the final rehearsal with the music teacher.

Our day to attend Primary Days of Music is on Tuesday, March 10th in the morning. We will be bussed to Edmonds Community School.

Here is a booklet of the lyrics for the songs we will learn in music class that pertain to our concert/play.

Here is the background music for “Rocketman” by Elton John.

Here is a practice track for Space Oddity. Please note that Division 7 and 8 have a different practice track than Division 9-13.

And here is a playlist of songs for Primary Days of Music. These include:

• Oh Canada – in English and in French
• Children’s Blessing Song
• Nila, Nila
• Oh, Watch the Stars
• To Stop The Train
• A Kangaroo Sat On An Oak
• Skye Boat Song
• En Roulant Ma Boule
• Head And Shoulders Baby
• Space Oddity
• ISS by Chris Hadfield

Here are some of the lyrics for our Primary Days of Music songs.

Here is the background music for “Head and Shoulders Baby”, which we learned in music class. Have your child teach you the clapping pattern at home!

And here is a round we are learning for Primary Days of Music – To Stop the Train

Here is “Oh Watch The Stars” to sing along with:

To Stop The Train lyrics:

To stop the train

in cases of emergency

just pull on the chain,

pull on the chain,

Penalty for improper use

5 pounds.

Here is a video of the song Nila Nila and then a video to help you pronounce the words for Nila Nila

And here is a video for Children’s Blessing Song.

Children’s Blessing Song_Sherryl Sewepagaham.MOV

And here are some videos, including the choreography, for Division 9 and 10’s piece in the concert. They will be dancing to Mr. Roboto by Styx.

 

December

If your child is a grade two student in Divisions 11-14, please see the grade one page for their current activities.

We are now using the percussion instruments we were exploring in November during a song called When Santa Got Stuck In the Chimney. We are using those instruments to play some the beat and some special effects in the song.

We are playing such unusual instruments like the rachet, the vibraslap, the thunder drum as well as more common percussion instruments like the Tamborine, the jingle bells, the triangle, the cabasa and the woodblock.

We are also learning O Hanukkah for our sing-along on December 18th. Here is a video to practice with below. The French immersion classes are also learning this song in French.

November

We will be reviewing the classroom percussion instruments in November. We will use Heather Nail’s song/activity We Can Play Percussion and the games 4 Corners and Music Ball to play and review classroom instruments.

We will apply what we have be learning about rhythms and patterns to play songs and patterns on these instruments this month.

September and October

Students in grades two and three have been playing games to build community and practice their beat-keeping in the music room so far this September.

We have begun reviewing reading, saying and performing simple rhythms and patterns.

The students will be using these rhythms to create rhythm patterns that they will perform for the teacher and their classmates.

We are also singing songs that get us brainstorming creative lyrics. One such song has been Down By The Bay in which we brainstorm silly sentence that include 2 rhyming words. An example is:

Have you ever seen a whale with a polka-dotted tail.

Hopefully you and your child have been brainstorming some of these silly sentences at home. They have come up with some good ones! Keep practicing this musical and language arts skill!