Third Grade Music Class
The third grade students receive music instruction once a week for 50 minutes. During the third grade year, the students are busy expanding on their musical knowledge to create musical compositions to show what they have learned. Concepts being taught throughout the year are: Rhythm, Melody, Form, and Harmony.
What's Happening in Third Grade Music?
Listed below are the concepts covered and a brief description of our lessons in music class over the course of the school year. This section will be updated as we cover new topics!
September-November
Unit 1: Rhythm and Parts of a Song
To begin the year, the students listened to several pieces of music to review what they know about rhythm and steady beat. We also learned about the parts of a song and different signs and symbols used when reading a piece of music. We used classic hits such as "Rockin' Robin" and "Do Wah Diddy" to recognize the steady beat and do some movement and instrument playing to accompany our singing. We also listened to a funny rap song about a grocery store and focused on learning the difference betweeen a verse and refrain.
All of this information is being used to create our own rap songs in groups. The students will be writing their own original lyrics based on a topic of their choosing. After their lyrics are written, the students will use a program called GarageBand on the iPad to lay down background tracks and record audio. They then will have a finished recorded piece to share with families and friends.
Here is an audio recorded example of one of those pieces.
December
Unit 3: The Nutcracker Suite
This is a continuation of a unit we started in second grade. Throughout this unit, the students are exposed to more sections from "The Nutcracker Suite." We being by reviewing the "Overture" and "March" that we discussed last year. After that, we spend a couple weeks talking about various musical elements such as form, and rhythm with two other pieces, " Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy" and "Russian Dance." We then watched clips from the Nutcracker Ballet that correspond with the music studied in class.
January-February: Form
For this unit, the students are introduced to various types of form. Form is looking for pattens of ideas that are the same and different in music. We start out by identifying AB form with the traditional American Folk song, "Old Dan Tucker. We then worked on further identifying different forms with the songs "If I Only Had a Brain" (AABA), "Country Dance" (ABACA), and "The Syncopated Clock" (ABACA). We used discussion and movement activities to help reinforce the idea of listening for different melodies to identify the form in music. We also did an activity with the piece "March of the Comedians" where the students had to unscramble "puzzle" pieces based on what they heard in the song and then identify the form of the piece. We really had a great time doing that! To end our unit, the students composed their own instrumental ABACA form compositions with the classroom instruments.
Here is a video of a finished composition:
Unit 3: The Nutcracker Suite
This is a continuation of a unit we started in second grade. Throughout this unit, the students are exposed to more sections from "The Nutcracker Suite." We being by reviewing the "Overture" and "March" that we discussed last year. After that, we spend a couple weeks talking about various musical elements such as form, and rhythm with two other pieces, " Dance of the Sugarplum Fairy" and "Russian Dance." We then watched clips from the Nutcracker Ballet that correspond with the music studied in class.
January-February: Form
For this unit, the students are introduced to various types of form. Form is looking for pattens of ideas that are the same and different in music. We start out by identifying AB form with the traditional American Folk song, "Old Dan Tucker. We then worked on further identifying different forms with the songs "If I Only Had a Brain" (AABA), "Country Dance" (ABACA), and "The Syncopated Clock" (ABACA). We used discussion and movement activities to help reinforce the idea of listening for different melodies to identify the form in music. We also did an activity with the piece "March of the Comedians" where the students had to unscramble "puzzle" pieces based on what they heard in the song and then identify the form of the piece. We really had a great time doing that! To end our unit, the students composed their own instrumental ABACA form compositions with the classroom instruments.
Here is a video of a finished composition: