Musical cheer and projects

SD83 district music staff have broken into teams and are busy creating learning experiences for students at home and at the Hub schools (where children of essential workers are being cared for) during this unique time.

One team is working on musical activities which can be done at home for the elementary weekly template, another on the activities for the middle grades template, and a third is working on a school wide music challenge. Another team is working on music support for Hub schools while secondary school music teachers are in direct contact with their students.

District Vice-Principal of Music Michelle Honcoop Reed comments one of the exciting projects which has already come out of these collaborations is the SD83 Music Hub School Roadshow!

“Each Friday we will have a travelling musical act that will go to all SD83 Hub schools to perform, from a safe distance in the parking lot, to all students at the school. Our hope is to bring joy to these students who may be feeling some extra stress during these times.  It allows the students to get outside and experience live music.  It also gives our music staff a beautiful project to focus on during these times when the majority of home contact is being made through classroom teachers.  It gives us a safe venue to continue doing what we do best – spreading joy for and through Music!”

The music staff will feature a variety of experiences including combos, music lessons, and family bands.

The trial concert was at Hillcrest on Thursday.  Music teacher Brook Roberts and his two kids, 12-year-old Jonas and 10-year-old Maya, have a family band called ‘Yer Maw’.  They arrived at the Hillcrest parking lot with their gear loaded in the back of their truck, ready to rock for whatever crowd was present. 

They performed a fun set of seven songs and added a lot of humour by re-writing lyrics to fit our current times and playing an upbeat mix of popular children’s songs and pop hits.  The highlight was probably the rewrite of ‘My Sharona’ to ‘Fight Corona’. 

In addition to the staff and students in the building, the show attracted an added audience of people on their balconies in nearby homes and also drew a few more kids from the neighbourhood who heard the music and  walked over to listen from a safe distance as well.  “We look forward to sharing more from the SD83 Music Hub School Roadshow!”

The teams working on the elementary and middle weekly home learning  are creating music optional activities for students and will focus on providing engaging and age appropriate materials for primary, intermediate and middle school.  This content will be shared via classroom teachers so not to overwhelm homes with too many contacts.

The team working on the School Wide Music Challenge is putting together a way to bring school communities together by sharing in and posting (if they choose) their music challenge activities on a school site/page.

In addition, music teachers are now beginning to pop into virtual classrooms to say hi to students or sing them a song.