Music in the Classroom!

The Kingston Symphony brings classical music to local grade 4 students.

Classical music comes alive in grade 4 classrooms throughout Kingston. For 14 years, the Kingston Symphony Association, the School of Music at Queen’s University, the Limestone District School Board and the Algonquin and Lakeshore Catholic District School Board have joined together for the Symphony Education Partnership. This unique project introduces classical music to grade 4 students in the Limestone District School Board and the Algonquin and Lakeshore Catholic District School Board through music education and performance.

Through the Symphony Education Partnership program, over 2,000 students are introduced to classical music in a number of different ways. This year, the program focuses on the science of sound. Through various lessons and activities, students will study instrument types, explore how and discover why instruments make the sounds that they do, and create their own instruments and compositions which will be performed for their peers. In addition, the students will learn rhythmic movements and lyrics to perform with the Kingston Symphony at each of the concerts.

Each year, teachers representing the school boards, Queen's University music education professors, and Kingston Symphony staff plan the school concert repertoire and write curriculum for the program. Music education students from the Queen's School of Music work with their professors to implement the curriculum through appropriate lessons that the students present in visits to an assigned grade four class in the region. Representatives from the Kingston Symphony Association, Queen's University, and the school boards conduct professional development sessions to work with area teachers on ways they can prepare their students for the experience of the symphony concert. Finally, four Kingston Symphony concerts take place over two mornings and following the concerts, the student teachers pay final visits to their assigned class.

This program is instrumental in shaping the creative, artistic, and musical character of young Kingstonians. The Kingston Symphony will perform for over 2,000 grade 4 students and their teachers on February 12 and February 13 (9:40 a.m. and 11:00 a.m. both days) at McArthur Auditorium, Queen’s University West Campus, Union Street.