Does your public elementary school have a music and art program? Can you describe?

[madskye]

Just curious how many public schools are still funding music and art curriculum. DD starts kindy in the fall, and I found out last night that we have a regional music teacher for the district--she basically comes in for a severl week unit twice per year.

[Linda on the move]

We still have regular art and music in elementary school -- a full time teacher for each in a school were there are about 80 kids per grade. All the 4th graders learn to play the recorder, and in 5th grade the kids have the option to add chorus or band or both. Art is a couple of times a week for all grades.

It's a title one school and this is one of the things the school does with the extra money. We have better art and music programs than the more monied schools around us.

[Drummer's Wife]

Yes, my kids' public school has music and art - each once a week. They learn about various artists, paint and play instruments, draw and sing songs, etc. I would be bummed if they lost funding for these, but they are in a Montessori class that includes art and music, so at least they still have some exposure.

[One_Girl]

Our school district has music class twice a week for kids in K-6 for all students. All kids learn the recorder in fourth grade. We have band, orchestra, and choir starting in 5th grade and extending throughout the high school years. There is a $50 fee that allows kids to rent an insturment from the school if their family can't afford to rent or buy one from a music shop and families are allowed to do payment plans for it. We also have honors band and orchestra that children can participate in at night if they qualify as well as several different avenues for choir participation.

[northwoods1995]

Small public school with art teacher and music teacher.

My son is in K and they have music 3x per week and art 2x week.

[momtoTnT]

We have art and music as well - my DS has music 2x week and art 1x week. The other 2 days he has computer class and library (PE is 3x week). Our music teacher travels between all of the elementary schools in our high school attendance area - I'd assume the same is for the art teacher as well.

[Alyantavid]

We don't have art, but we do have music. The way our schedule works is that they end up with music 2-3 times a week.

The teachers have been awful honestly. All the kids do (at least through 2nd grade) is learn songs every class and then a few times a year they have a program where they sing the songs they've learned. I'm not thrilled at all with our music program and it just keeps getting worse.

[sunnmama]

Title one school, about 60 students per grade--fulltime art and music teacher. Kids get 45 min of each every week (also get 45 min of computers, PE, and media center aka library).

We went to the spring musical program last week. 4th and 5th graders played recorders. All grades performed songs with choreographed movements. Very cute! And very well planned

[34me]

My oldes 2 also went to a Title I school but I think it's about average for the district. Full time music and art teacher and they had access 3x a week. My youngest goes to an Expedentiary learning School and they have volunteers come in 1x per week from the university for each grade and do a set curriculum. Art is incorporated in a lot of other areas though and there are some community volunteers that come in and mentor a rock band for all interested. We got grants for instruments.

[LynnS6]

Our kids have music 1-2x a week. They learn recorder in 3rd-4th grade, and I don't know what in 5th grade. Band/instruments don't start until 6th grade (middle school).

Art is 1x a month or so, by parent volunteers. Not great. Next year we're hoping to add an art teacher with Title I funds. That would be great. Then they'd get art in the rotation with PE, music, library.

[jen in co]

At our school (small neighborhood public K-6 with about 60 kids per grade), we still have a full time Art and a full time Music teacher. The kids rotate Art, Music and PE (their specials) in equal rotation -- 2 days in one, then 2 days in the next. Once or twice per year, they do full 1 week rotations through so the teachers can do bigger projects. Our art teacher is great and does some pretty creative stuff. Our music teacher does a variety of things at different ages (including bells, xlyophone thingys (can't remember what they're called), recorders, etc.) and she also does an annual show for each grade level. We also have band starting in 4th or 5th grade (not sure which)...

[Kristine233]

They have music programs and can start orchestra in 5th grade and band in 6th grade. Not sure what grade they can start choir. The art program was nyx'd about 5 years ago, the teachers do it now. (I'm still bummed about that one!)

[Tapioca]

my daughter is in k. 30 kids in her grade.

music 2 x a week
dance or drama 1 x a week
art 1 x a week.

I'll be interested to see how it plays it in the higher grades, as k is only half day.

specialized music/art/drama teachers.

I LOVE our public K though our district is facing cuts this year (thanks libs)

[LauraLoo]

Medium sized public school. In elementary, music is 2x/week and art is 1x/every other week. The teachers are specialized and are very good. I just wish the frequency was more often.

[mommy2maya]

Yes, extensive music programs- twice weekly for my first and third graders. First grade has a regular music class and the second is music and movement, much like gymboree class- lots of dancing, movement and fun. It is definitely a favorite! We have three music teachers- including one who is a strings instrument teacher, who does travel between schools in our district for lessons. My third grader is playing viola this year, lessons are provided free from the school- we had the option of buying our own viola (or any string) or renting from a school program. I think we paid $125 for the year rental. After we rent for three years (I think), she gets a full size instrument, basically for the rental fee- no further payment. She is also learning recorder this year.

Art is weekly, and is not construction paper and paste. They do tons of different mediums and it is really enjoyable. There are two full time art teachers.

Oh all of 4th and 5th have chorus as their second music class, and you can start wind instruments in 4th grade. Orchestra starts with third grade, band with 4th grade. You can also join select chorus in fourth grade, which my dd is trying out for. Oh, and 4th and 5th can do musical.

[mommy2maya]

oh we also have in addition to daily specials (gym, art, music twice weekly, and library) they have math lab twice a week and computer lab weekly.

[peaceful_mama]

DS's school, like the other elementaries in the district, will have art I think for kindy it is two shorter classes per week, the older grades have one 70 min class a week.

music is 2---35 minute classes per week in all ages.

[ollyoxenfree]

My dc have attended a few different schools, so they've had a variety of experiences. Generally, in the early primary years, the art, music and dance were taught by their classroom teachers. The depth of the curriculum and the wealth of the experience varied accordingly. Some teachers were enthusiastic and did lots of interesting things. In some schools, there were specialist instructors on staff and they would offer their expertise.

There was a fairly universal recognition that art and music were valid parts of the curriculum. They had regular classes every week and the term reports included reviews of their work, participation etc.

In middle school, they attended a fantastic public school with wonderful music program. The students have music class every day. There are 3 specialist instructors on staff - one for band, one for orchestra and one for vocal music. In addition to attending daily music class, there are lots of music extracurriculars - stage band, orchestra, chamber strings ensembles, choir, jazz choir, boys' baritone choir.... There are also classes in drama, visual arts, "design and tech" (known as "industrial arts" or "shop class" when I was a kid!)...

Our district offers about a half-dozen specialized arts high schools with admission by audition only (ds attends one and dd will start in the fall) and 3 or 4 arts-focused elementary schools. We're pretty lucky to have these programs available. There are a couple of high schools now offering specialized programs focusing on cyber arts and I've been hearing great things about them.

[Tigerchild]

Our elementary school has two full time teachers, each class gets 2 music classes a week. They're generalist classes (singing, playing percussion/mallet percussion, some dance) and each grade puts on performance once per year. They do start teaching recorder, but I think not until 3rd or 4th grade (all kids can sign up for elementary band/strings starting in 4th grade, but it's a before school program, not during school hours).

Art is taught exclusively by parent volunteers, though there is an okay district art docent training program. The funding for supplies is generated by each school's PTA (with highly variant $$s, when I was the art docent coordinator for the school one year I had a budget of $500--sounds great, right? Well, there are almost 900 students in the school.) but of course most parents who volunteer fund a lot out of pocket as well. It's not consistant and it's not guaranteed that you have arts instruction in any given class (depends on if you have a teacher that wants an art docent, if you have a parent who's going to volunteer, or if you have a teacher that incorporates art into their curriculum as well. Many do, but certainly not everyone).

[JayGee]

DD is in Kindergarten and DS is in 2nd grade. They both have music 2x a week and art 2x a week. The music teacher is phenomenal! She has launched DS's growing interest in string instruments (started violin this year, with her urging) and writes these fantastic musical shows that each grade gets to perform during the course of the year. I seriously can't say enough good things about the music program at their school. The art teacher is okay. Not superb, but they do work on interesting projects. She's just not as dynamic as the music teacher. Now our school just RIFed all the elementary librarians for the entire district so parent volunteers will be staffing all elementary libraries next year .