Articles about Dalcroze pedagogy organized by age.
Early Childhood:
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Reinforcing the Classwork at Home
The Dalcroze classes are now in full swing (ok, pun intended), and the kids have heard and experienced music with a variety of tempos, rhythms, and dynamics. They have been encouraged to express those changes in movement. Children naturally learn in many different ways. Some like to watch in class and ‘do’ at home. Some
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For Parents: Classes for 4-5 year-olds
Parent: “What did you do in class today?”Child: “I was a cat.”Parent: “Oh.” It is difficult for young children to express exactly what they are ‘learning’ in a Dalcroze classroom. What happens in the room after we take off our socks and shoes and close the door? Of course, in the mind of the child
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Exploring Meter
A primary focus areas in the beginning of the year is the subject of meter (with subtle differences this is also known as ‘measure’ and ‘time signature’). Meter can be defined as the grouping of beats into 2’s, 3’s and 4’s. (They can be larger, too!) Usually the first beat of the group is felt
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Register And Scale
Translating musical phenomena into verbal language can be tricky. Most adults are familiar with the use of the words high and low as applied to musical pitch. Specifically, these words refer to the frequency of the musical tone: higher tones have a more frequent wavelength than lower tones. When physicalizing these concepts, we take advantage
Early elementary:
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Letter to 1st and 2nd Grade Families
note: here’s an end-of-the-year summary for the families of my 1st and 2nd grade Dalcroze classes. I refer to a list of skills and experiences. It’s a bit long for a post, but if you are intersested, I’m happy to send you a copy. Dear 1st and 2nd grade families, The 1st and 2nd grade
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Skills and experiences for 1st-2nd Grade Dalcroze: Movement (Part 1 of 4)
The focus for this list is movement. In each Dalcroze class, I give a short warm-up at the beginning. The focus is usually on some kind of movement technique, and I often use the warm-up to provide an introduction to the musical subject of the day (for example beat and division, syncopation, simple triple meter,
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1st-2nd Grade Dalcroze Skills and Experiences: Rhythm (Part 2 of 4)
Second in a series of posts describing what a typical class might cover during the year. Now we get to the heart of the matter. This is a formidable list, and not all that different from a list I might make for adult classes. Does this mean the children will master each of these things?
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1st – 2nd Grade Skills, Experiences and Objectives Associated with Pitch (Part 3)
Here are more curricular lists for 1st-2nd grade. This time the focus is on pitch. Rhythm skills for kids this age are a lot more predictable for me than pitch skills. Some kids have an easy, natural relationship with their singing voice, while others seem to struggle with the kind of self-consciousness that plagues older
Late elementary:
Adult
note: during the pandemic, when we were looking for ways to keep ourselves moving, I made some posts for adults to practice their eurhythmics skills. For more about teaching Dalcroze to adults, view ‘by subject‘.