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I was pretty excited when I got home from work one day to the kids telling me my package, Music Appreciation Book 2: for the Middle Grades, from Zeezok Publishing had arrived for the TOS Crew Review! There is something so wonderful about getting a box of brand new books in the mail.
Music Appreciation Book 2: for the Middle Grades
This series is actually part two. Music Appreciation Book 1 is written specifically for grades kindergarten through sixth.
Music Appreciation Book 2: for the Middle Grades is aimed at grades 5 – 8. Although it is highly recommended to use these two courses in sequence, we only used the Book 2 series without any issues.
My family loves music. We love to sing every single day. Many of my children taught themselves to play multiple musical instruments also. With such a love of music, it seemed logical to add Music Appreciation to our course of study this year.
The core of this study contains nine biographies, which covers seven composers.
These books are so easy to read because they are written in storybook form. They are far from boring. The books start right out with excitement and attention-grabbing storylines.
Our favorite part of Frederic Chopin, Early Years was literally at the beginning of this book. Little four-year-old Frederic’s father sat him down at the piano and he immediately started playing perfectly a piece he heard his mother play. Amazing!
Have you seen the new movie, The Greatest Showman? Our family fell in love with this show immediately! Homeschoolers just love musicals!
Jenny Lind is a key player in this action-packed documentary-type movie. Imagine our excitement to read that Frederic Chopin, a great fan of the legendary singer, Jenny Lind, was actually excited himself to have her unexpectedly attend one of his concerts
Robert Schumann and Mascot Ziff
Since we thoroughly enjoyed reading about the life of Frederic Chopin, it was exciting to continue reading about him in this book, Robert Schumann and Mascot Ziff.
It was super interesting to learn that Chopin loved to play music written by Robert Schumann. It was heart-warming to read about their mutual respect for each other.
Adventures of Richard Wagner
Robert was a mischievous child. This book includes some of those fun adventures, including Robert playing the drum loudly during a play, failing at school, and giving a young girl is prize possession – a bullfrog!
Stephen Foster and His Little Dog Tray
Who hasn’t sang out the words to Oh! Susanna as a child?!? You may know every word and verse to the song, but did you know that it was written by Stephen Foster? We are looking forward to reading about Stephen’s life in this biography.
The Young Brahms
Young Johannes (pronounced Yohan) Brahms was a lover of the music composed by both Mozart and Beethoven. As a young boy, he told his mother that he would love to play in a concert all night long.
The Story of Peter Tchaikovsky
It didn’t take much to grab my daughters’ attention with this story. Just the fact that young Peter was a lover of horses was enough for them!
Peter Tchaikovsky and the Nutcracker Ballet
This book started us off with a laugh as Peter retells a story of how he studied for years to become the lawyer his father so desired him to be. He tells how he was so enthralled with a melody in his head, one day, as he was on his way to deliver an important document that he literally ate the paper! This was his wake up call that a law career was not for him! He was hungry. As he so finely put it in this book, “Yes, hungry for music.” (Direct quote from page 8 in the book, Peter Tchaikovsky and the Nutcracker Ballet.)
Edward MacDowell and His Cabin in the Pines
It is amazing to read about these famous composers’ childhoods, including that of Edward MacDowell. Our family was amazed at how young these men were when they were reaching for pianos and composing their own works of art.
Student Activity Workbook
This program also contains an amazing Student Activity workbook. This workbook lays out exactly how to get the most out of this program. My favorite part of the Student Activity workbook is the QR codes.
The workbook includes five full pages of QR codes that allow you to listen to the musician’s music right on your phone or tablet.
Yes, you will need to download a FREE QR code reader onto your device in order to access this benefit, but is definitely worth it.
The Student Activity workbook includes a complete four to five-week outline, so you will know exactly what needs to be completed. There is no guesswork for the student or parent!
The student workbook’s pages are all perforated and 3-hole punched. This is, however, a consumable workbook, so you must not make photocopies. You will need a workbook for each individual child.
App. Alerts
App alerts are added throughout the Student Workbook. Theses alerts link to websites giving additional instruction and demonstrations of what is being taught in the workbook.
The Lesson Layout
Timelines, quizzes, comprehensive questions, character qualities of the composer, tidbits of interest facts, vocabulary words, mini geography lesson and a little history facts focused on the place composer lived, and even a little culture are all covered in these lessons.
Even though everyone in my family is musical, we don’t actually read music. I was super excited to have the Music Appreciation lessons include lessons on learning to read music.
Music Appreciation sells two separate books to supplement this program.
How did my family use these lessons?
If you know our family even a little, then you probably guessed that we used these books during our family read-aloud times.
The illustrations are done extremely well and truly added to the enjoyment of these books. They reminded me of Garth William’s illustrations in the Little House on the Prairie series, Charlotte’s Web, and Stuart Little.
Our family really enjoys reading about history, plus we are very musically inclined, so these books worked perfectly for our family read-alouds.
We also thoroughly enjoyed simply listening to the musicians’ composed works of art.
Our Lessons Included:
Gathered into the living room. Kids worked on drawing, and arts & crafts project, crocheted, or simply sat and listened to the book being read out loud.
Listened to the musician’s music simply by using the QR codes included in the workbook.
The actual workbook was only worked in by Sarah, my 6th grader since these are consumable workbooks that are only intended to be used by one student.
Supplement Material
Zeezok Publishing offers a couple of supplemental books to coincide with the Music Appreciation Book 2 lessons.
These are not absolutely necessary, but both would round out these lessons perfectly.
Music Appreciation Book 2 Lapbook
Music Appreciation Book 2 Coloring Book
Our family didn’t actually use these two supplemental workbooks, but they do look amazing.
Highly Recommended
I really enjoyed this Music Appreciation study. I loved the combination of real, hold in your hands, and actually turn the pages books and workbooks, alongside QR codes, YouTube videos, and e-books. The mixture helped to keep our family from getting burned out on lessons. They work very well for both music and history lessons. You can read what other homeschooling families have to say about these books by clicking here or clicking on the graphic below.
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