It is expected that students will create, listen to, and perform music, demonstrating understanding of expressive and physical properties of rhythm. Use flash cards or an overhead projector to practise reading patterns, with students performing the displayed rhythm patterns. Students create their own rhythm patterns and take turns clapping rhythmic dictation for the rest of the class. Listen to music from a variety of cultural and historical contexts, and analyse to discover standard or typical metres in each context.
Students identify examples of various metres in their repertoire.
Listen to examples of dance music from a range of contexts and identify the metre used in each. Practise invented dance steps to selected metres to assist in internalizing the beat. Teacher or a student conducts various music selections while students focus on rhythm and sing, hum, or mime the details of their individual parts. Have students listen to and notate the rhythm of a short recorded work or music fragment played by the teacher. Each week, present students with increasingly complex rhythms.