The 4th and 5th graders have been working hard preparing for their Spring Concert. The theme this is year is Around the World in Six Songs. In rehearsal we would talk briefly about the history of each song and the country it came from as we learned them. After fielding what felt like thousands of additional questions about each song and their origin, I decided to create a webquest for the students to explore and learn more about each of the songs and the countries they came from. The result was this website:
You can visit it here.
Today, my first groups of 4th and 5th graders began exploring the site and completing a short worksheet for each country. The students discovered facts about each country, native instruments and how they work, explained traditions surrounding music in each country, and compared performances using Venn diagrams. Here are some photos of them at work.
I just loved the comments I heard during this activity! “Wow this is so cool”,”How do they sing that fast?”, “That instrument is amazing!”, “I didn’t know that!”. For me, it was such fun discussing all the cool things they discovered as well. I am really looking forward to sharing this activity with the rest of the 4th and 5th grade.