Lesson 6: Soundscapes for Where The Wild Things Are

Grade: 3

Musical Concept:  Timbre, dynamics, tempo

3rd Grade Concept: Reading: Literature

Time: 45 minutes

Element:  Soundscapes

3rd Grade Element: Creating

Materials:  Found sounds, various hand-held percussion instruments

Specific Utah Standard:  3.1.b: Improvise a soundtrack for a story and/or a poem.

Specific 3rd Grade Standard:   Reading: Lit Standard 7: Explain how specific aspects of a text's illustrations contribute to what is conveyed by the words in a story (e.g., create mood, emphasize aspects of a character or setting).

Objectives:

1. SWBAT demonstrate their understanding of how illustrations contribute to a story through classroom discussion.
2. SWBAT demonstrate their understanding of how music and sound can enhance a story through creating soundscapes.
3. SWBAT choose instruments, dynamics, tempi, and short/long note values that exemplify the timbres they are seeking to imitate.

Procedure:

1. Ms. Grgich:
1. Read WWTA to the class.
2. Talk about different settings in the text.  Include Max's room, growing forest, on the boat, the land of the Wild Things, the wild rumpus.
3. Talk about how the illustrations contribute to the story by creating the moods or emphasizing aspects of the setting.   Include discussion of colors, shapes, etc. and how they contribute to the story.   The following are some ideas (which you probably can come up with more or better ones than these that I've thought of):
1. What's the mood like when Max in his room after being sent to bed? Upset, lonely.  What's the mood like in his room after he discovers soup has been set out for him? Happy, loved by Max's mom.
2. How do the illustrations demonstrate Max's room changing into a forest?  What do the illustrations tell you about how Max felt when that was happening?
3. What are the wild things like? Do you know that from the text or illustrations or both?
4. What happened at the wild rumpus? How do you know?
4. Please write the kids ideas on the board, I will be referring back to them.
5. Conclude with talking about how, throughout the story, the illustrations contribute to the story, allowing the words to be visualized and making imagining the story easier.
2. Enter Gerilyn:
1. We can make aspects of the story come to life even more through use of sound!  Just like the illustrations make thing come to life using art.  Today, we are going to create soundscapes to go with WWTA.
2. Explain that we will be using instruments today.  When it is not your turn to play your instrument, you need to place your instrument in your lap or on the ground in front of you and put your hands on your knees.  If you are playing you instrument when it is not your turn, I will take it away.
3. Show pictures throughout the following steps:
4. As you talk about each aspect, have one or two students come up and choose a found/sound for that aspect of the setting.
5. For each setting, talk about how we will have the different instruments enter.
6. While talking about each setting, consider the dynamics and tempo of the soundscapes.
1. For example, maybe the trees could start growing slowly and them speed up and get louder as they get bigger.
7. Also discuss that when Ms. Grgich turns the page, its they need to place the instrument back on their lap and put their hands on their knees.
8. Practice each scene after choosing the found sounds, before moving on to the next setting.
9. Talk about the growing forest.
1. What do you see in the growing forest?  Trees, leaves, grass, stars, Max
2. What are tree made of? Wood!  What sort of sounds does wood make when it moves?  Think about when you walk up wood stairs or across a wood floor.  Its creaks and groans.
3. What sounds do leaves make? Rustling.  Can you make a rustling sound with your hands?
4. What about the stars? We know when we see stars they twinkle, what do you think they sound like?
5. In the next picture, when the forest is fully grown, we see Max facing the moon.  Max is in a wolf costume.  What might he be doing at the moon in his wolf costume?
6. It is night-time: what sort of animal sounds do you hear outside at night? Crickets, bugs.
10. The Boat:
1. Who here has been on a boat before?  What sounds do you hear when you're on a boat?  What about animals you might hear? Water sloshing, wind howling, sails flapping, seagulls chirping.
2. Wind gets louder and softer, seagulls are chirping from far away…
11. The wild things:  What sounds do the wild things make when Max arrives?  Roars, gnashed their teeth, clicking claws.
1. Loud? Sudden? Roars are long or short?
12. What happened at the wild rumpus?  Dance, songs, howling at the moon.
1. Have a few students pick instruments to exemplify howling at moon and have them do the howling for 8 beats as an introduction to Toembai.  Do Toembai as a two part round.  DON'T do the dance yet, just have them seated and singing.
13. What does Max's house and room sound like?
1. What about when he is wrecking havoc in his house?  Banging nails (Loud, fast?) Do you think he might fall if he stands on books?  What might that sound like? Thump, collapse, whoosh, wham.
2. What about when he gets sent to his room? He's sad, what might a sad instrument sound like?  What about a happy instrument when he gets back to his room after his adventures?
1. Could sing a couple tunes without words and ask them to choose 1, 2 or 3.
3. Synthesis!
1. Now that everyone has their instrument and knows what setting it goes with, let's read the whole story and do our soundscapes at the same time!
2. Remind students instrument rule - on lap or ground and hands on knees when it isn't their turn to play.
3. Instruct students when it is their turn, when their part comes up in the story.