Movement, Rhythm, Reasoning

Music is an essential part of an Armitage education. Skills learned through disciplined music study help students become better learners overall by enhancing their reasoning and organizational aptitude.

Music instruction incorporates the study of various instruments (rhythm, Orff, and recorders). Music is highly integrated with our drama program, and where appropriate, with other subjects. Each grade has an opportunity to perform on stage for the school community.

Music education provides students with many opportunities for self-expression. It helps students to make sense of sound and to appreciate the aesthetic qualities in the sounds of natural and technological environments. Students also learn unique approaches to problem solving through the active and reflective processes of both listening to and making music.

Music class students engage in singing, moving, listening, performing, composing/improvising and reading music.

All classes will sing music in different languages and participate in an instrument making unit. Students will also experience live music as we participate in field studies at the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra.

Essential Concepts by Grade

K: steady beat, pitch matching, fast vs. slow, loud vs. soft, high vs. low, timbre, stepping/skipping songs

Grade 1: quarter note, eighth note, quarter rest, so-mi-la

Grade 2: do, re, low la, low so, 4/4, and 6/8 time, half note

Grade 3: dotted quarter note, syncopation, fa, ti, 3/4 time

Grade 4: sixteenth note, major and minor scales, chords, choral performance

Grade 5: dotted eighth note, major and minor scales, chords, choral performances

Grades 6,7,8: music theory, music history (Europe and America), music listening and appreciation, instrument making, instrumental performance, opera, music, and art.