Conference Workshop: Teaching Music in the Elementary Grades

Teaching Music in the Elementary Grades

Day 1: 

I enjoyed attending the Niagara conferences and felt I have learned a lot from the educators' experiences and the workshops I have attended. On the first day of the conference, I attended the workshop on Teaching Music in the Elementary Grades. This workshop has offered ideas on how educators with no music background can incorporate music into their classroom. Connections to the music curriculum were made and taught to us. Yvonne Chan taught this workshop and has over 7 years of experience teaching music in the elementary school setting before becoming a principal and still continues to support teachers in her schools with teaching music. I have learned some ways on how to incorporate music into my teaching by creating rhythms and utilizing instruments. We were able to look at the grade 3 curriculum and create our own rhythms and sounds using the various instruments Yvonne has provided us to practice. This workshop was meaningful to me because it broke down the misconception that teaching music requires formal training or a specialist background. As a classroom teacher, I sometimes feel unsure about how to effectively incorporate subjects like music, especially when I don't have extensive experience in that area. Moving forward, I plan to use the strategies I learned by incorporating rhythm activities into my lessons, particularly through body percussion, clapping games, and simple instrument use.

EDU491- VictoriaD @NU