Tarzan Songs

Second graders at YES enjoyed writing their own songs in music the past couple of weeks. In our first activity, students had the opportunity to write a five note song using the pitches do, re and mi. They taught their classmates their songs by singing them first, and then everyone had a chance to echo it back to them.

During the next music class, they learned a poem about Tarzan, taken from "Game Plan 2" by Jeff Kriske and Randy Delelles. They first notated the beat for the poem, finding the places where they needed quarter notes and rests. Then, as a class, they set the words to do, re and mi, by moving quarter notes and quarter rests onto the staff. Each class created their own unique song, with no two classes turning out the same.

On the final music class in this unit, the students learned how to play their Tarzan songs on xylophones and metallophones.