Do Work.

Whew! This week flew by, I don't know about other teachers, but I think 5 day weeks go much quicker than weeks where we have days off. I was just chatting with my Dad about all the activities I'm involved in, and I think those things help to make time pass quickly. Sometimes too quickly if you're unprepared!

Yesterday I said I wanted to post some work done by my students, because I'm always proud when they produce original quality work. My 8th grade chorus class just finished creating posters or PowerPoints on a musical artist of their choice. Now, keep in mind we are an inner-city, mostly Hispanic community. I was surprised when two of my students wanted to do a poster on Hunter Hayes! Hunter Hayes is a young country artist who is nominated for Best New Artist at this year's Grammy Awards, and whose song "Wanted" is rocketing up the charts. Though these two young ladies like "Wanted", part of me thinks they chose him because they think he's cute. Good poster though.

Below the Hunter Hayes poster you'll see another Grammy nominee Miguel, who is nominated several times this year for his song "Adorn", including Best R&B song and Song of the Year. I was impressed to see students choose such relevant and diverse artists.

Speaking of the Grammys, my other 8th grade class (general music) voted on several categories and then created graphs displaying the distribution of our votes. Hows that for integrating math?! Check 'em out.

 
 Every once and again, when my students make some work that impresses me in some way, I'll share it with you. That way we all can breathe a sigh of relief knowing even these inner-city, underprivileged kids can do great things.
-Miss

New Year's Resolve

Wow, it has been too long! If anyone is reading this I apologize for the extremely long lapse in entries. Let's get on with the show.

Our school year is almost halfway over, and we have less than 100 school days left. Our school this year has done a complete 180 from last year's atmosphere. We have a new principal, who used to be a teacher at our school, and she has done wonders. Staff feels more supported, and in return is more supportive and involved, creating a better environment within our walls.

On the music front, our school is putting on Grease as our musical this year, and I'm proud to say many of the main characters are being played by my chorus students! Show choir will be undertaking some acapella work this spring, and I'm trying to organize a field trip to see a high school production of In The Heights, my personal favorite musical. I'm also proud to say I have a solid group of students learning piano this year, both during class and after school, and we have just started a guitar group, thanks to the donation of four acoustic guitars (check out www.donorschoose.org if you'd like to be a donor for schools in need)!

My students have been churning out some impressive work too, I'll post some pics and info tomorrow, but lets just say I'm loving the diversity of my students' musical preferences. I also have two young ladies preparing to audition this spring for our local performing arts high school, so we have been choosing their repertoire for those auditions (I like artsong and broadway combos).

On a personal note, I'm making the mid-January resolution to post more often, possibly every day. I think thats what really makes a blog successful. I'll find out. My other resolution was to get back to running and so far I've been meeting my goal, so let's find some resolve and write some posts!

Thanks, Glad to be back from my hiatus
Miss