Miss Todd's Terrific Team

Music Around the World--A Christmas Edition--Session 1--Week 2--Africa

We had so much fun in our Music Around the World Class on Friday! We began our morning by reviewing our songs from last week. Ask your child to sing "Mele Kalikimaka" and "Roo, Roo the Kangaroo" for you! We are really working hard to learn the words for these two songs. After a quick review, we jumped into learning all about our new country of the day--Africa!

We were introduced to some special places from Africa and learned about animals and instruments that are unique to this country. Then, we were in for a fabulous treat--a visit from a real musician, Mr. Mark! Mr. Mark taught us about some of Africa's favorite instruments--drums! He played several different types of drums for us. We loved them all! Then, we enjoyed some traditional African music from the African Children's Choir. We were so inspired by these musical experiences that we decided to create our own African instruments--drums, shakers, and tamborines. Finally, we learned our own rousing rendition of "This Little Light of Mine" complete with African drums, shakers, and tamborines! Here is a show of our morning! Check it out and let us know what you think by leaving a comment below. We have also included some pictures from another great day! We hope that you enjoy them! Today was so much fun! We can't wait until next week! :)

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1OVzXUpZiCchFaYkWpaQPNIQTs7TGnp_n/view?usp=sharing

Fabulous Friendship Fruit Salad

This week we participated in an exciting snack activity called Friendship Fruit Salad. We added items to our fruit salad that would make our classroom sweet such as "peachy keen" peaches for students who share and treat their friends with respect, "orange you glad you work hard" oranges for students who always try their best, and "really good apple" pineapple chucks for friends with good hearts who value kindness. We also talked about how we did not want any rotten bananas in our fruit salad (classroom) who would ruin our joyful creation. It was delicious! :)

Fabulous Five Senses

This week we have been enjoying exploring our five senses. We learned an exciting song about our five senses and then created a feeling hand to explore textures. We also were amazed when observing a hot air popcorn popper, which we used to pop popcorn while discussing what our five senses were experiencing. We thought this was a really cool invention! Ask your child to sing our five senses song for you this weekend. It really is fun!

Popcorn Experiment

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1wNFJwbhR7iKiwi4QuZmsITbqDdKt50Ax/view?usp=sharing

Music Around the World--A Christmas Edition--Session 1--Week 1--Australia

Welcome to our Music Around the World STEAMSchool class--A Christmas Edition! I am so very excited that your child is joining me in this journey as we travel around the world exploring different countries and their unique music. I have two loves in life—music and children— so I could not be more thrilled to share this experience together with your child. We are going to learn to play instruments and sing songs from different countries. Then, we will share our music with you all at our Music Around the World Celebration Night at the end of our study. It is sure to be a night that you will not want to miss! Thank you again for allowing me the privilege to work with your child. I can not wait to share this experience together!

We began our musical tour around the world today by talking about the universal language of music and how it can touch all hearts and help all people. Then, we enjoyed singing "Mele Kalikimaka" together before flying around the world to Australia.

The land down under had a lot to offer us! We learned about everything from koala bears to kangaroos and explored the top ten places to visit in Australia on a kids travel website. We were also introduced to two of Australia's favorite instruments--bilmas and digeridoos. After listening to one of Australia's traditional songs featuring these instruments, we made our very own bilmas and digeridoos. Boy were they cool too! Finally, we began learning the Australian Christmas song that we are going to perform, Roo Roo the Kangaroo. It is a silly song that will make you giggle and laugh, while allowing you to soak up the unique sounds of the digeridoos and the bilmas. Here is a show of our first day together. Leave us a comment and let us know what you think about our first week in Music Around the World!

Comparing Numbers 0-5

In math this week, we played many different games that allowed us to compare the numbers one through five. We began our week by playing Spin and Build where we would spin a spinner and then build the number that we landed on. Then, we enjoyed Roll and Record where we would roll a dice and write the number that we got. Next, we would record that number in our graph and race to see which number made it to the top first. This game gave us the opportunity to practice counting and writing our numbers one to five. After that, we participated in a game called Face Off. In this game, we rolled a dice and found the number that we got on our mat. Then, we had to place that counter on the correct number in our line of numbers. Whoever was able to place all of their counters in the correct spot first was the winner. Finally, we learned about the different combinations of numbers that can add up to a larger number, while playing Toss the Chips. We discovered that 2+3=5 and 4+1=5. Please ask us about these games at home, while you enjoy looking at our pictures and videos from our fun week together!