Mr. Eric Petrucci-Music Instructor
I am excited and honored to be the new music instructor at ICCA! I build my curriculum from a foundation of song learning in the Catholic liturgical tradition; singing is always first. This includes songs for school wide liturgies, special services, sacraments, feast days, and seasonally appropriate repertoire. Beyond that, I will expose the children to other aspects of music learning: theory, music history, musicianship, ear training, critical thinking, and in some cases individual instrument instruction. Whenever possible I aim to use an inductive approach to the material: students can use what they already know to intuit many aspects of learning. Some specific features include the weekly recitation of the Acceptance Song, Composer of the Week, tuning rods, Drop The Needle exercises, whiteboard grand staff work and rhythm, and percussion instruments. Of course, the kids will enjoy a frequent visit from my friend, Max the Musical Monkey. Fun is an important part of my class. These kids have a lot on their plate, so I want to make my 50 minutes with them an opportunity for them to relax and be creative. Individual class breakdowns below:
Kindergarten: seasonal songs and games, introduction to Grand Staff and note names, intro to solfege. Getting them moving and laughing and burning off all that extra energy! We are preparing songs from “The Wizard Of Oz” for our end-of-year show.
1st Grade: pitch recognition, lyric and melody memorization, percussion instrument identification, song learning, movement songs, improving reading skills, some basic tuning rod concepts. “The Sound Of Music” is what we will offer at the end of the year.
2nd Grade: exposure to concepts of rhythm, note letter names, Grand Staff ID, fun with silly movement songs, more in-depth tuning rod exercises (scales, triads), taking advantage of accelerated literacy. They are preparing “Mary Poppins” for the end of the year.
3rd Grade: fine-tuning note letter names, identifying line/space notes on both clefs, more complicated rhythm concepts. Potential for song learning and noticeable development of voices in this class is very high. End of year show: “The Lion King.”
4th Grade: rhythm subdivision (eighth/sixteenth notes), music history, tuning rod “choir” (each child has his/her own pitched rods and they play songs as a group, similar to a handbell choir). “Annie/Oliver.”
5th Grade: my “piano” class. In addition to more technical theory work, hopefully eventually we can devote most of our time together to learning to play piano with the 5-6 keyboards I have at my disposal. 5-finger patterns, scales, intervals, simple songs.
6th Grade: students will take more accountability for Tuning Rod choir, theory-heavy curriculum, intro to theatrical concepts (monologues, diction, perhaps preparing excerpts from a play or Broadway show)
7th Grade: learning to talk about music more accurately and critically, making connections between music and culture, history, socioeconomics, improving music reading ability via Tuning Rod exercises/songs.
8th Grade: Drop The Needle, concepts of genre/subgenre, musical themes, mood, lyric analysis, song structure, refining understanding of more complicated musical concepts, Tuning Rods.