Fête de la Musique

I wasn't sure how to share about last night. Maybe the best way would be to quote Barney Stinson from How I Met Your Mother. "Challenge-Accepted!"
Fête de la Musique was the biggest evening event The French School has ever had! Over 400 people came and each of the 11 classes performed their songs admirably. I had been dreaming/planning/stressing about it for four months and thanks be to God it was a success!
I tried to plan for some things to go awry and having no air conditioning in the gym was probably the biggest challenge. But everyone was gracious and we made it through. I cut a couple of the Orff-Schulwerk demonstrations to make the total performance time a little shorter due to the heat.
I couldn't have done it without the wonderful parent committee to help me plan, fold programs, make beautiful posters, organize food and setup! One family even donated a huge projector screen for the picture slideshow!
Another blessing was that several of my coworkers stepped up at the last minute to help hang decorations and transport the instruments. One of the assistants, Rémi, even accompanied the 2nd and 3rd grade classes on his guitar.
The highlight of the concert was the last song called Tender Care by Tim Weigand. I translated it into French and the children wrote letters of appreciation for their parents. 5 of the students read their letters aloud at the end of the song. One of the 1st grade boys wrote: Dear Mommy, I love it when you pick me up. I was not the only one with shining eyes!
Bringing our school closer together through music-this is one of the reasons why I do what I do!
 

Symphony in Your School

What a week! Monday was a big day for the 2nd grade classes. I need to give a short back story to explain first. The St. Louis Symphony has an education outreach program called Symphony in Your School. I applied to be a part of it last year but they were already full. This year we got in! The wonderful director Dacy gave the introductory visit right before Spring Break. It did not go well. She had to dismiss 14 students (the usual offenders) and it was very embarrassing for me. I was so frustrated I cried myself to sleep that night. But with the input of the 2nd grade classroom teachers and Mme Kate (the librarian) we came up with a good action plan. The students who had to leave last time had one strike. If they didn't get their acts together they couldn't come back for the other 3 presentations. We explained everything really clearly to the students and from the way they acted on Monday message received!
A violinist and a cellist came and they were amazing with the children. They even had a book called Mole makes music and played along with the story. I could say more put I think this picture tells the story better than any words I could write. This is one of the reasons why I do what I do.

"Mallet Madness" or Operation Glockenspiel Part II

Bonjour! I realize that it has been 4 months since my last post. My apologies! But in my defense, after la Fête d'hiver (Winter concert) not much happened. I was ousted from my classroom for 5 weeks while the school used it for computerized standardized testing. I now have a lot of respect for "cart music teachers" who travel to the classrooms and teach. It was not ideal. Since the majority of our classrooms only have partitions or thin walls, I couldn't use my instruments. Instead, I taught more music appreciation using Walt Disney's classic Fantasia and Fantasia 2000. I also finished up teaching the instrument families of brass and woodwinds.
Thankfully, I'm back in the music room and for the past 4 weeks I've been joyfully teaching the students (even the kindergarteners!) the basics of playing Orff-Schulwerk barred instruments. A retired music teacher from my AOSA chapter, Sue, came to help me teach the first week. She was wonderful and I learned so much from observing her teach. Though Sue taught in English, I was able to translate a couple of her songs as well as the procedures and methods. It was very inspiring to be with her as she taught for 31 years! As I struggle sometimes with frustrations and feeling I can't make it even one more year, I picked her brain about how she taught that long! Sue said that the Orff method is very energizing and that every year she threw out her lessons and started anew!
All this to say I  feel like I'm becoming a legit music teacher this semester. I've taken the 2nd and 3rd graders on a field trip to the St. Louis Symphony (funded by DonorsChoose.org :-) And I am teaching the students to play barred instruments! I can only pray that the clumsy, inattentive children won't trip and fall on the $700 bass xylophone. I have a feeling that our $250 loan fee for insurance and repairs will definitely be put to use!
So maybe more has happened in the last couple months than I realized. I must conclude with this anecdote from a procedure I learned from Sue: to get the children to stop playing (after the cut off) you have them put their mallets on their shoulders, in an X or on their heads! They loved it!
Almost every class burst out laughing the first time I demonstrated "Battonets sur la tête!"
"Madame Michelle you look like un papillon!" (butterfly)
100% of the students in a class engaged and having fun in music. This is one of the reasons why I do what I do.

La fête d'hiver and a Nikon D90 Giveaway

Last night was the first big performance of the year! La fête d'hiver: Winter Celebration! 11 classes, 12 songs and 400+ people were there! By the grace of God, it all went smoothly. It helped that we had two rehearsals the past week. I feel very relieved that it is over though! I'm already brainstorming for "La fête de la musique" in March. I think we'll go with a similar program but I'd really like each class to get to play instruments with their songs. It would be so great if the 2nd and 3rd graders could play the new Orff barred instruments too!
In other news, my DonorsChoose field trip to the symphony in February was funded on Monday! DonorsChoose is covering the cost of the bus and 40 of the tickets. I found out about this camera giveaway today that would be wonderful to take pictures of the field trip and other DonorsChoose projects in the future. Check it out! http://www.ohsoposhphotography.com/blog/?p=5458
This is truly the season of giving and I am inspired by this photographers' desire to give back.
One of the highlights of last night was seeing all of the families of the students together and celebrating their students learning. You could really feel the shared pride and love radiating from everyone there. Joyeux Noël! Merry Christmas!

Operation Glockenspiel

This morning I broke a personal rule to not go to school and work on the weekend. But it was for a very good reason: Operation Glockenspiel.This was no ordinary mission. So many different components had to fall into place but thanks to supportive administrators, understanding committee members, my good friend Jenny and my awesome husband the mission was accomplished!
In October, I applied for The French School to "host" a classroom set of 12 Orff barred instruments (mellophones, xylophones and glockenspiels)  We borrowed our friend's SUV to pick up the instruments from a storage facility and then transported them back to the school. I breathed such a sigh of relief when the instruments were safely in the classroom and we had returned our friend's car!
Now I have a classroom set of instruments! It is worth over $8000! I get to keep them until next November when the national conference will be held in St. Louis. I am really looking forward to teaching the students how to play songs with such cool instruments! A retired music teacher from the St. Louis AOSA chapter is going to come help me teach the first lessons after Christmas too!
I can't wait to see the looks on the students' faces when I tell them we have more than just tambourines and rhythm sticks to play now. I'll keep you posted on the final results of Operation Glockenspiel!

Piano Passion

Recently I started taking piano lessons. In my quest to become a better music teacher, I thought that piano would be pretty helpful. My main instrument (for about 16 years!) has been the flute. :-)
As much as I love the flute, piano is definitely a more versatile instrument. Eventually I'll be able to accompany my students in their performances instead of just being able to play scales for vocal warm ups.
This week in one of the 1st grade classes, I was blown away by one of my students. He is usually a pretty shy 6 year old but he asked me if he could play a couple songs he had learned in piano for the class. He proceeded to confidently play FROM MEMORY Ode to Joy and Jingle Bells! It was magical. By a stroke of luck, his class is singing the French version of Jingle Bells "Vive le Vent" for the Winter Concert! I asked him if he would want to play along with the class (who will be playing real jingle bells) I hope he will! I told his mom how great he was right after school. Needless to say, she was so proud! It was very inspiring for me to see a normally shy, quiet student express himself through music. This is one of the reasons why I do what I do.

Praxis Passed!

I am so happy to report that I passed the Music Content Praxis exam! Now I am a "highly qualified" French music teacher!
The teaching highlight of this last week was in a kindergarten class. I've been trying to improve transitions in my classes. It seems that after only 10 seconds of down time some students lose interest and focus!  So I experimented this week. While transitioning from teaching a new song (using the stereo) to learning half notes (on the board) I decided to sing a couple songs with the kids that we have learned the past few weeks. It worked really well! I know that I probably have heard of this method before but for some reason I hadn't tried it yet. I can't wait to see how it works with all of the grades. Bon week-end!