Celebrate Music In Our Schools Month® Ideas For Early Childhood
And Elementary Music Classes Amy Burns
Far Hills Country Day School
aburns@fhcds.org
Education (NAfME) for the observance of Music In Our Schools Month® (MI- OSM®). This event first occurred as a statewide celebration in 1973. From there, it grew to become a day, then a week, and now a month-long celebration. The purpose of MIOSM is to raise aware- ness of the importance of music educa- tion and to remind everyone that schools are where all children should have access to music. In 1985, NAfME started “The World’s Largest Concert” as a highlight for MIOSM. This concert is a sing-along that has reached an estimated six mil- lion students, educators, and supporters of music. In 2012, the concert became known as the “Concert for Music in Our School’s Month.” This concert would probably have already taken place by the time this article is published. However, there are other ways to celebrate MIOSM. Here are a few ideas that I have used and some that I discovered by reading posts from numerous music educators through social media.
M Early Childhood At the beginning of each month, I
teach a “Parent and Me” music class at my school for the younger siblings who are not old enough to enter the PreK program yet and for those young children in the com- munity. This class is for children ages six months to three years. During the month of March, I am going to give the parents a CD of the songs (public domain) and lul- labies that we have been singing in class.
TEMPO
arch is the official month designated by the Nation- al Association for Music
The CD cover will have “Music In Our Schools Month” on the label. This will help the parents reinforce the songs by playing the CD (or uploading it to their streaming service) in the car or around the house. It reminds the parents how music can have so many positive effects on their children from soothing their crying, to lulling them to sleep, to them becoming tuneful, to so much more. In the same respect, one can text the
parents a MIOSM text that includes links to websites that have recordings of songs, links to information about MIOSM, links to music books, links to children’s song books, and links to wonderful recordings that the parents could purchase to play for their children from classical to contemporary. Since MIOSM is about music
advocacy, I always tell those in my music education workshops that if there is a way that music educators can get their music classrooms onto the parents’ smartphones, then the advocacy for music education will quickly follow.
Elementary Bulletin Boards: The first place to
begin is to update your current bulletin board (if you are on a cart, then a bulletin board within the school) with a MIOSM theme. This theme could include any of the following: Students’ and teachers’ fa- vorite songs, student compositions, stu- dents’ and teachers’ favorite composers, students’ drawings to music, students’ and teachers’ reflections on what music means to them, a survey from the teach- ers that shows their musical backgrounds
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from instrumental to dance to vocal, and so much more. The possibilities are end- less.
Getting Teachers Involved: Expand-
ing from the bulletin board idea, ask teachers to participate in MIOSM. Have them post a music note on their class- room door to show support for music in the schools. I adored an idea I read where a music educator asked the teachers to hang a poster in support of MIOSM and if they did this for the entire month, they would receive a small prize.
Sing-Alongs: If you could not par- ticipate in the Concert for Music in Our School’s Month, then there could be the option to hold a school assembly sing- along to raise awareness of MIOSM. This sing-along could
have a
variety of songs from patriotic,
to folk, to previous concert songs, to pop songs, to anything you think that your students would enjoy singing. In addi- tion, open up the sing-along to invite the local community into the school to enjoy it as well. You can turn the sing-along into a wonderful concert event where between the songs, you continuously talk about music in our schools. I do this at the be-
MARCH 2016
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