Music With Ms.McDonald

Looking for the Grade 4 Thanksgiving songs? Click here!!!!! What a wild and wonderful month September was. Thank you to the welcoming students and staff at MQW for a great start to the year. Keep reading if you are interested in what we've been up to so far this year. I will apologize in advance - it's a long one :) What's going on in the music room? Kindergarten has been busy practicing their singing voices. We have been playing games like "icky sticky bubblegum" and exploring all the different instruments in the music room. We learned about the ugly stick and mummers and Newfoundland music. Now we are playing a game called "Closet Key" and will soon be practicing our four voices - singing, speaking, shouting, and whispering! Grade 1 has been having lots of fun in the music room! We also learned about the ugly stick, in preparation for our author visit. We spent some time this month learning about our music room routines, and trying out all ...

Our grade 4's are getting ready for the Thanksgiving Assembly! QUICK LINKS TO LISTEN TO Land of the Silver Birch/My Paddle Don't Be A Turkey I Count My Blessings Los Colores THERE IS A SECRET WORD HIDDEN IN ONE OF THE SONGS... If you practice you will find it. Don't tell it to anyone else! When you come to class I am going to check and see who practiced - because they will know the secret word! Have fun! Click here to see our song lyrics. Click here to check out our PRACTICE! page which has the lyrics and places to listen to each song!

All elementary (4, 5, 6) students need a music duo-tang. It can be any colour or design. They will need to bring this duo-tang to every music class and it will be an important part of their assessment for the year. I have extra duo-tangs if providing one is an issue. Thank you so much!

What a wonderful week it has been! There have been so many changes and new challenges for students and staff alike - and that's a wonderful thing. A change is as good a rest - but I am ready for an actual rest, too! Happy Friday! I feel so warmly welcomed at MQW. The staff have been supportive and friendly and are helping me find my way in a new place with new procedures and rules. And the students - I can't tell you how kind, open, polite, and fun they are! I am so excited to get to know each of them this year. I am a very lucky teacher! Thoughts on flexible seating so far...  Flexible seating has gotten off to a great start in my room. My biggest challenge is definitely space - class sizes have gone up this year and it makes a big difference in my room because of it's strange shape. We are making it work, however, and I just finished moving around some furniture to give everyone a little more breathing room. It's amazing how much space 30 grade six students...

I am so excited to begin a new chapter in my teaching career at Mary Queen of the World. Although it is hard to say goodbye to my students and co-workers at Beachy Cove, I already feel like part of the team at MQW. I am anxiously waiting to meet my students tomorrow. I'm excited to share my love of music with them and to get to know them and learn from them. I received my position about three weeks ago and I have been steadily working on my classroom since then. For the majority of the last two years I was teaching "a la carte" - moving from classroom to classroom to deliver my curriculum. I found this to be a rewarding and challenging experience but I am so delighted to have a classroom this year. Flexible seating is a very hot topic in education right now and I am hopping on the bandwagon with both feet. I have not seen many articles or blog posts specifically related to flexible seating in the music environment but I am eagerly following  Mrs.Miracle  thanks to...