Friday, December 12, 2008

Music Room: Help Wanted!

Hello Fort River parents and guardians, There are a lot of exciting activities going on in the music room. We are incorporating drama into our music classes, and the students are very excited. It would be great to have some parent (or grandparent) volunteers to help and support the following projects: Chorus - We need parent volunteers to help transport musical instruments and props from Fort River to the Middle School auditorium on the night of our winter concert, Thursday, January 8th. This would involve picking up the instruments during or after school that day, and then delivering them to the middle school that evening by 5:30 pm. Then those parents would need to return the music equipment back to the school on the following day. It would also be wonderful to have some parent volunteers who could carpool students who need a ride to and from the concert that night. Kabuki Play- I am integrating with Linda Yeh and her fourth grade on a play based on a Japanese folk tale. We have been studying the Kabuki theater tradition, and are doing this play using elements of Kabuki. Miss Yeh’s will present this play on Wednesday morning, January 21st. The students will be working in music class on the following dates from 10:45 to 11:25- Monday 12/15, Tuesday 12/16, Monday 1/5, Tuesday 1/6, Tuesday 1/20. It would be great if a parent could come and assist at rehearsals, helping to cue the children, and helping with makeup and costumes. Also, if there are Japanese parents at Fort River who would like to come and consult with our class about Japanese culture and Kabuki, that would be wonderful. Mummer’s Play-Kris Griswold’s third grade class is working on a mummer’s play as part of their Medieval history unit. They will be rehearsing this play in music class on Thursday afternoons from 12:30 to 1:20. They will perform this play at their Medieval Studies celebration on Friday, January 23rd. It would be wonderful to have another adult come to help us with our rehearsals and performance, and also to help with children getting into their costumes. Fifth Grade Irish Immigration Plays-Starting in January, all of the fifth grade classes will be working on a musical theater project in which they act out stories of people who left Ireland in the mid 1800’s to escape the potato famine. It would be great to have additional people work with small groups as they develop their scenes for performance. We will present our plays in March or April. If you are interested in helping in any of these events, please contact me via email at whitea@arps.org or in writing to my school mail box. Or you can call and leave a message. My school phone number is 362-1264. Thank you, Anne White Fort River Music Teacher