It's I Love To Read Month at Buchanan School!

In celebration of I Love To Read Month, all music activities are centered around books!




Grade 4/5 classes learned about the Underground Railroad through Jeanette Winters' book "Follow the Drinking Gourd". They learned about how slaves used "code songs" in order to plan and carry out their escape, so that slave masters wouldn't catch on. The "drinking gourd" represented the big dipper, and would help fleeing slaves find safety in Canada via the Underground Railroad (a series of "safe houses").




Follow the Drinking Gourd
When the Sun comes back
And the first quail calls
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom
If you follow the Drinking Gourd.

The riverbank makes a very good road.
The dead trees will show you the way.
Left foot, peg foot, traveling on,
Follow the Drinking Gourd.

The river ends between two hills
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
There's another river on the other side
Follow the Drinking Gourd.

When the great big river meets the little river
Follow the Drinking Gourd.
For the old man is a-waiting for to carry you to freedom
If you follow the drinking gourd.

Grade 4/5 students are now working on a musical adaptation of Tikki Tikki Tembo, an old Chinese folk tale retold by Arlene Mosel. You can listen to the story on YouTube by clicking here.

Grade 1/2/3 classes have been working on Pete The Cat: I Love My White Shoes, by adding a variety of instruments.

Now grade 1/2/3 classes are working on another Pete The Cat book - Pete the Cat and His Four Groovy Buttons.

Kindergarten students have added instruments to the book Jump, Frog Jump by Robert Kalan, and then to the Robert Munsch book Mmmm Cookies. We hope to share our work soon!