Loving Music and Nature With Musikgarten Cycles

Where does the time go? Despite a year of continued distance learning, five wonderful young musicians completed the Cycle of Seasons curriculum! Students grew in their creativity- suggesting their own ideas for our stories, dances, and instrument playing! Musikgarten purposefully structures this level to capitalize on that creativity and imagination, and addresses other developmental windows such as language and steady beat! All of this serves to aid in building the children’s confidence and to help them experience the joy in working with others. A variety of music styles, modes, and rhythms served to keep each week’s lesson fresh, engaging, and concept-building. We discovered characters in our stories and movement activities, and the students made suggestions for new ways of experiencing each one. Nature plays a large role in “Cycles”  as we enjoyed focused listening with a variety of animal, nature, and weather sounds. We played games with objects found in nature- see the picture of my “Prickly Tickly” basket. What an engaging way to feel the contrast of light, staccato, smooth, legato, short, long. The Cycle of Seasons capitalizes on the children’s love of nature – and that was one thing we could count on during this unusual time – getting outside with your family, and exploring all the sights and sounds of the seasons! These students are ready for the next level of Musikgarten: Music Makers at Home, where they will discover, by ear, that the patterns they have been singing can be found in music!