Down the Halls of Ol' Mimosa

Fourth and Fifth graders are all learning the school's Alma Mater. Here is some history on it:

About three years ago, maybe four, Mrs. Johnson asked me to write a school song. Can you believe that in all this time, there was never a school song? One of the things I have fun doing is taking a familiar tune and coming up with new words. I thought that we really needed a fun school song and a serious school song. The Alma Mater is our serious song. It is meant to be sung at things like the 5th grade celebration and the last walk through the school.

So, where did it come from?
Roswell High School's Alma Mater has the same melody as Cornell University. Mr. Spraggins and I thought that it would be good to use that melody since you'll hear it in high school. The melody is called "Far Above Cayuga's Waters."

How did you come up with the words?
I got a history of the school and started writing. I wrote the spirit song by myself, but Mr. S. helped with the Alma Mater. It took us about two weeks, but the song we came up with represents the learning, diversity, and community that we have at our school. Our school motto, "Where learning unites us," is in there as well.

The parts "we are learning, we are growing" are significant as well. We could have used the past tense in that line, but chose to use words to show that learning and growing will still happen in the years to come. "Growing" does not mean how tall you are going to get- it means how much your are going to learn.



I have heard some of you come up with new words to songs. If you are willing to share with me (not in front of your class), I will give you house points! 

Writing Fair!

The teachers in charge of the writing fair have offered a challenge:

Write about what you love most about music, art, or PE. Be creative.

If you show me your paper before turning it in, I will give you house points.

Performer of the Month: Will Smith

It's January, and that means a new performer of the month! This month's performer is Will Smith. You may only know that he's an actor, but when he first started out, he was a successful rapper.

-Will Smith was known as The Fresh Prince in the 1980's while he was rapping. He got the nickname "prince" because he was known for using his charm to get out of trouble. He also performed frequently with his friend, DJ Jazzy Jeff.

-Will Smith had a hit song called "Parents Just Don't Understand." It was a hit with teenagers at the time.

-One of his hobbies is playing chess.

-He speaks Spanish fluently.

Things to do

I know you're going to miss me over winter break. If you want some fun music activities to explore, here are my suggestions:

Dallas Symphony Orchestra

Young Person's Guide to the Orchestra

Listening Adventures

New York Philharmonic Kids

And don't forget that there is a bunch of free stuff on the Quaver website.

If you do one or more of these activities, let me know and I will give you house points.

Have a fabulous winter break! I will see you all in January.

Performer of the Month: Hilary Hahn

If you remember my post from the summer, I said that I had a few surprises up my sleeve. Well, here's one of them- fifth grade gets to tag along with the Elkins Pointe Middle School Orchestra group for the opportunity to go to the symphony at a really reduced ticket price. I've done this before when I taught orchestra, but I wanted to give all the fifth grade students the chance to go if you want to go.

I'll give you more information about it in class, but the major details are that this is not a field trip (you need to bring your own adult and pay for the tickets), and if you do go, you will get to see the Atlanta Symphony Orchestra with violin soloist Hilary Hahn performing that night.

Hilary was three when she started playing the violin, and went to the Curtis Institute at age 10. The Curtis Institute is a school for very talented musicians. She was eligible to graduate at 16, but she wanted to learn more things, so she did not graduate until she was 19.

By the time Hilary graduated from the Curtis Institute, she was already traveling and performing the violin around the world.

She is known for trying new works and introducing people to the music of new composers.

She plays in two alternative rock bands.

You really can find everything on the internet

Well, not really. But I did manage to find a copy of "What Does the Fox Say" arranged for recorder. It was a good thing, too, since I needed something fun for fifth grade to do the week before winter break!

So, good behavior the next two weeks in fifth grade will get you the opportunity to learn it on the recorder.

Now I need to look and see what other fun songs I can find!

Swahili

Fifth graders are working hard learning our songs for the Breakfast with Santa in a few weeks. One of the songs is "Heri Za Kwanzaa." It contains a lot of Swahili words. Since international night is coming up, this is the perfect time to talk a little about this language from Africa.

Swahili is the primary language in the countries of Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo. It can be written with Arabic or Roman (English) letters.

In our song, we sing about character traits:
Umoja- unity
Kujichagulia- self-determination
Ujima- work responsibility
Ujama- cooperative economics
Nia- purpose
Kuumba- creativy
Imani- faith

Other words in Swahili:
Jambo- hello
Asante- thank you
Hakuna Matata- no worries
Kwaheri- goodbye
Simba- lion

If you've ever watched "The Lion King," you probably already knew simba and hakuna matata. Now you can impress people by telling them what language those words are spoken in.