One of my favourite ways of getting to know students (or anyone, really) is to ask them about their favourite song…but this year we started by discussing favourite sounds. (I’ve also changed our 3x a year “Sharing Music from Home” to “Sharing Sounds from Home” and student performances are creative and brilliant.)

Some answers on this bulletin board: the sound of fries sizzling, the sound of my Grandfather snoring, the sound of a boiling kettle, the sound of my dog’s footsteps, the sound of laughter, the sound of a basketball swooshing. I have 300 student answers and wish I could share them all!

Over 100 students went on walking excursions with me to explore Toronto’s Music Garden. I played us through the 6 dances in Bach’s Suite No. 1 which inspired the Garden’s architecture. My seven primary classes are taking Bach melodies and creating lyrics, body percussion dances, and instrumental accompaniment for our “Bach Remix” concert later in the year.

I was asked to submit videos for this CNMN project highlighting JLPS’s creative music learning and I am so thankful for the opportunity to celebrate my students! Please feel free to contact me if you ever want to come into our music room to play, listen, and learn. Katherine.Fraser@tdsb.on.ca

Sector Focus Resources: Creative Music in Education

I feel so lucky that we got to hear and learn from Joy. JLPS just got our OWN steel pans and hope to have Joy back soon – we  want to know and listen more!

When JLPS began the students and I wrote a school song. They created every chord, melody note, and lyric. This year some Gr. 6-8s (and one Gr. 3) composed a School Song Band and their parts. We now accompany the song every assembly and I am in awe of their musicianship. I love playing with them! Here’s a recording from our June/22 assembly – the first time all of the JLPS students/staff met in the gym together…EVER!

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A friend of a friend, Jim Creeggan offered to perform for our K-3s and he was incredible! Our young audience’s full participation, respectful behaviour, and genuine musical enjoyment impressed him so much that he then donated instruments to our program. Thank you Jim! What a win for Music Ed!

Students spread out in our music room, hall, and stage to create their own original ways of writing music. They chose their instrument, their ways of producing sounds, and their symbols to notate these sounds. Once they were done, students taught a peer how to read/play their piece. During reflections on our three-part composition unit many students commented that this third assignment allowed for the most personal creativity (but Soundtrap was also very popular!).

Home Depot donated (shout out to Home Depot!) 35 buckets to our program and now thanks to them, our Bucket Drumming Club is the most relaxed extra-curricular I’ve ever “led.” Once a week Carly Rae and I meet the students outside during lunch recess and anyone can drum and go as they please. We move locations, change rhythms, and let grooves happen.

There is a motion-censored light in the hallway leading to our music room. Last fall with my very first class ever in our new space I joked that to magically turn on the light, they had to yell, “Music Yay!” The caretakers at our school comment that they can still hear them yelling this every day.

I have a felt board at the end of the hall and students who need some personal space love to rearrange our “Music Yay” felt letters and other pieces. It’s almost as popular as our new favourite way to end ukulele classes – with our campfire singalongs. Shout out to my colleague Ms. Phillips who gave me the idea and my TC, Nancy Singla for crafting it.

I’m a classically trained violinist and yet I hesitated when drawing the staff on our Music room white board…until I titled it as Western European Classical Music Notation. We discussed that notes on the staff is ONE way and not THE way to compose music. Students chose notes, note durations, and then played their melody compositions on mallet instruments, ukuleles, and violins.