Spring Workshop Recap
“A little seed for me to sow/A little soil to make it grow.” Musical experiences in early childhood are truly the “seed” that grows into a lifelong love of music making. Young children need to sing, move, dance, play and be creative! NCAKE’s spring workshop, titled “Little Feet, Big Beats: Music for Early Childhood” featured two presenters who are expert early childhood music teachers; they shared an inspiring day packed full of songs, games, and movement activities for our very youngest students.
Kate Offer is a graduate of the Kodaly master’s program at Holy Names, and currently a full time preschool music teacher at Pacific Primary in San Francisco. Kevin Gerzevitz has his Orff Schulwerk certification from Mills College, and also teaches full time at Pacific Primary. The workshop was hosted in Kevin’s beautiful classroom at Pacific Primary; it was so helpful to be able to picture real children in the space where workshop attendees spent the morning singing, moving, playing, and hopping/skipping/dancing around the room!
One of my favorite things was how many different and varied activities were presented; Kate and Kevin presented fingerplays, guessing games, improvisation, folk dances, and many opportunities to adapt materials to encourage creativity in young children. One of my favorites was the fingerplay “A little seed,” [from the Amidons’ ‘I’m Growing Up’ collection], which I used with my kindergarten classes the following week--it’s been a big hit!
NCAKE was able to host many different educators at this workshop; some were full time music teachers, while others were preschool teachers or parents. We hope that all educators will continue to share a love of music and creativity with their students--to go forth and plant those seeds, and watch them grow!
-Rita Alway