Elementary Music Observation

Music Observation 1

On Thursday, September 10, I went to Valley View Elementary to observe Mrs. Allison Whitmire’s Kindergarten music class. I arrived there little bit earlier so I got to observe the first grade class. They were studying about the American flag and singing the Star Spangled banner. After the first graders left, Mrs. Whitmire gave me a sheet of her lesson plan. On the lesson plan, it had the lesson topics for September 8-14, 2015 which were String Family, Percussion Family, Piano, Forte, Piano, and Conductor. The objectives for these lesson topics were to review Forte/Piano and Loud/Quiet, to explore the piano, and to practice proper etiquette as a performer observer. Mrs. Whitmire captivated and kept studentsʼ attention by singing the

After the teacher had settled them down, she reminded them that last week they watched a video of how to make a piano. Afterwards, the teacher put on a YouTube video of animals playing in an orchestra, then she told them that the piano was part of the string and percussion family because it has strings inside that are hit by hammers when keys are played and the hammers hit the strings your fingers press down on the keys. This was something new to me because I didn’t know what family it was in. After Mrs. Whitmire told them facts about the piano, each students got the chance to play on the piano. Each students had 50 seconds to play and when the time was up, the voice on the speaker would say “Fortissimo!” While I was watching the students play, the teacher commented that the way the children were playing matched their personality. For example, one child who was quiet and shy, she would play a relaxing and calm music. There were other students who were loud and rambunctious, they would hit the piano keys hard and play it loud. I didn’t notice this until the teacher said something. For those students who were hitting the keys so hard, the teacher reminded them to play respectfully and not to play