KTBA Weekly Donation Archives - Page 12 of 17

KTBA Weekly Donation

Donation of the Week

KTBA Donates Classroom Set of Recorders mallory, wv – Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation donated a classroom set of recorders at Man Elementary School in Mallory, WV! As excitement builds for the start of a new elementary school year, students talk about the possibility of playing a new instrument in their music classes. However, in Mr. Bailey’s high poverty area of West Virginia, these activities are easier said than done with their limited budget for the music program. “By donating, you will be able to help us achieve basic musicianship through our Recorder Karate program. Our students will be learning to read the treble clef, rhythms, and melodies through this project. In addition, by playing they can easily recognize steps and skips in music. Also, the recorders are color-coded to identify which class any lost recorders came from.” Students enrolled in the music class will learn the foundations of music theory while learning to play individually and together in groups. Students also learn life skills such as accountability, practice routines, and how to recognize patterns. These skills have a snowball effect in the sense that they will come more regularly to class meeting times, and that excitement carries over into other subjects. Since recorders are inexpensive learning tools for these youngsters, they are easy to fund through our organization, even though it may prove more difficult for Title I schools and the like. Using your donations from this past week, we were able to supply Mr. Bailey with the funds for his recorder project, and they are excited to start learning some new tunes! Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, My heart literally skipped a beat when I read the email saying this project was funded. The people on Donors Choose just continue to amaze me with the amount of love and caring they have shown my students. I’m absolutely overjoyed that my third graders are going to be earning their Recorder Karate Belts this year. We will be starting Recorder Karate after our Winter Break. Because of you, our students will be taught musical discipline, rhythmic accuracy, reading on the Treble Clef, and so much more. I just can’t thank you enough for all the help my students are going to receive. With gratitude, Mr. Bailey Keeping the Blues Alive is committed to preserving music education in public curriculum as well as preserving Blues heritage! If you would like to help us fund next week’s project, click here to make a donation!

September 4, 2014

Donation of the Week

KTBA Ignites First – Year Band Program atlanta, ga – In any subject area, it is always important to learn fundamentals. One of the first things students learn in school is the alphabet. Without this solid foundation, students will begin to struggle to read and write. We all learn basic material so that we can build on it, and learn the exceptions (there are always exceptions…) and as a result of diligence and persistence, you begin to master the material. The ABC’s of music are so important to the development and success of each student as they begin their musical journey. Coretta Scott King Young Women’s Leadership Academy is a single – gender comprehensive four-year public high school enrolling approximately 300 students in grades ninth through twelfth. The school opened in the fall of 2007 and had its first graduating senior class in the spring of 2014. This is the first year for full time band program at the school. The students are very excited to become a part of history by helping to construct an exemplary all female band program in the region. The materials requested will help each of Mr. Burton’s students develop the correct musical reading fundamentals for instrumental band. If the students have developed the correct fundamentals the students will be able to become successful in the band program. The band method books will help each student prepare for college band scholarship audition by the end of the school year. Mr. Buton adds, “This project will help each student in the band program prepare for college band scholarships auditions in the spring. The band scholarships will help all of my students who may not be able to afford to attend a college or university.” Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation was able to fund Mr. Burton’s Music Fundamentals projects by fronting the cost of a complete orchestral set of method books for the inaugural concert season! Now, the students will have the materials they need ensure the future success of their band program, and learning a new artform which they have never experienced before. This is great news for Mr. Burton and his classroom because these unique schools don’t have strong budgets for new ventures. However, thanks to the donations, the school will not have to fund the curriculum – the one thing that will allow these young women to be well-rounded students in the work field. Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, On behalf of myself and the students, we want to thank you with all of our heart for your generous donation. Our young ladies are looking forward to the putting the donated material to use. This donation will help the young ladies prepare for their college band scholarship auditions and give them a fighting chance at becoming productive citizens. “The most powerful thing they can be is educated.”The students will be putting your donation right to work as they prepare for some very important performances that will shape their musicianship . We can not thank you enough for what you have done for us.With gratitude, Mr. Burton

August 29, 2014

Donation of the Week

KTBA Donates Music Software to High School Hayward, CA. – It’s another great week for the foundation as we plow through our donations and really feel a sense of urgency and accomplishment! This week, with our emotions running high, we reached out to Mt. Eden High School who were in need of new music software for their music technology program. The teacher’s motto: “To develop and nurture the universal language of music.” Well, we can’t say no to that! Mr. Cato explains, “I want to continue to develop my students musical understanding and bridge musical connections.” My students are high school aged musicians who put hard work, sweat and tears into our musical group. Our school has a great arts programs and is continuing to improve academically. We have a great staff and administration. I have watched our musical program grow year by year and we are really excited to continue our service to the students and community.” The only thing missing for the school year was a new set of tools and inspiration for the technology program. “We need Auralia and Musition software to help students to develop their musical ear and recognition of musical relationships. Our students will use these programs to gain a deeper understanding of the musical pieces, musical relationships and musical problem solving. They will begin to recognize and evaluate musical intervals, harmonies progressions, and rhythmic patterns. This will help to prepare them for reading their musical scores, future musical ventures and college music classes.” Music software is helpful in the classroom because it adds that little bit of interactive play that any human being lusts for when learning new material. You also have the technical consistency of teaching – which when combined with a professional moderator or music teacher, can push the students to excel in the material. As the school year begins, we are excited to help out this classroom and provide them with the tools they need to recognize musical patterns and relationships between the notes. Mr. Cato, and his students, are also grateful! Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, Your support with this project is like music to our ears! We are soooo excited to begin our school year and incorporated these software programs into our classes. Our students really have so much to be thankful for and we are so fortunate that you all decided to support us!I have many ideas as to how we can work this into our classes. Offering this option in our classes will have such a huge impact for our music students and their development overall. Once again thank you this is a great gift to start our year off with, I can’t wait to begin!With gratitude, Mr. Cato Thank you to everyone who has contributed to this foundation in one way or another! It is an honor to be a part of this musical revolution! To make a donation to next week’s story, click here!

August 22, 2014

Donation of the Week

Mitchell, SD – Well, it’s back-to-school season again! For all of those parents, teachers, and students out there doing all their school shopping and curriculum planning, Keeping the Blues Alive Foundation would like to wish you all a prosperous, adventurous, and productive academic year! So much is happening in our world theses days, but we know that by perseverance, hard work, and diligence, we can overcome any obstacles in our way. In fact, by using the donations accumulated over the past week, we were able to kick start our semester donations to underfunded music programs by starting out in Mitchell, South Dakota at L B Williams Elementary School! We donated new percussion instruments that otherwise would not have been possible given the limited funding available for the next school year. At their young age, music classes are not entirely for music theory purposes. It’s about exposing students to new stimuli, encouraging group play, and maybe they will pick up a new skill in the process! Students also learn about recognizing patterns, and hand-eye coordination. “Music should be a fun outlet for kids and allow them to be creative. In my classroom students are encouraged to be silly, to try new things, and to think outside the box. They always meet that expectation and help me come up with new and fun ways to teach music. “ According to Mrs. B, an important part of music education is using instruments to learn about rhythm, beat, form, dynamics and more. Yes, we can sing, but for some students singing can be intimidating to do alone. Yet, with an instrument, a student can echo a rhythm or show an example and feel confident. These instruments will help hundreds of children to grow a love of music. Basic classroom rhythm instruments are a staple of elementary music programs.” We heard her plea, and made sure that a classroom set of instruments made their way to South Dakota. Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, Thank you! Thank you so much for supporting our music class and donating to our program! I am so excited to be able to tell our students the news! These classroom instruments are such a basic necessity for our classroom to be able to do amazing things! They will help us to build a foundation of beat, rhythm, tempo and tone colors. With your generous donation you have helped give our students the building blocks they need to become great musicians! I am overjoyed and again thank you from the bottom of my heart!With gratitude, Mrs. B. As we prepare for back to school projects and the new website (coming soon), help us out by making a small donation! Donate Here!

August 15, 2014

Donation of the Week

KTBA in the Final Frontier: Donations in Alaska! napaskiak, ak – Thanks to your donations this week, KTBA has achieved yet another milestone since we started our weekly donations back in 2012! We have officially donated to a school in each of the 50 states, demonstrating our national impact on music education programs everywhere – from Hawaii to Alaska to South Florida and Maine! Maya Angelou once said, “Music was my refuge. I could crawl into the space between the notes and curl my back to loneliness.” 4th grade students at Z. John Williams Memorial School will explore the magical world of music through the recorder, finding their own crawl spaces to explore and enjoy. Students are mostly Yup’ik Eskimos living between two worlds: the traditional subsistence life of the rural Alaskan tundra and the modern American life of the Lower 48. Ms. C describes, “our village is only accessible by plane or boat, and has fewer than 400 souls. As a result of cultural disintegration, they are often the innocent victims of generational alcohol abuse, which compounds their otherwise up-hill path to learning a second language (English) and thriving in school. As a result, by the time they are in 3rd grade, they are so far behind in basic academics that they only have three real subjects a day: reading, writing, and math. Subjects like music, history, art, science, and physical education — the very things that make school enjoyable — are dropped from the curriculum. And we wonder why so many Native students drop out? In this milieu, I am able to offer a unique opportunity for students by providing 30 minutes, twice a week, of musical instruction.” By using the donations from this past week, KTBA was able to go in and fund Ms. C’s music project allowing them to purchase new learning materials and recorders for her music curriculum. This particular donation was about more than just recorders and music books. It quickly became about improving the quality of classroom instruction that changes the students’ perspective on their education. When you live in a rather recluse area of the country, there is a great chance that students are not exposed to different cultures and social nuances that we take for granted. “With these materials, my students will be able to make music! Of course, they will learn basic theory, rhythm, pitch, and the technical skills necessary to play recorder, but they will learn so much more. Music provides a safe opportunity to practice and develop many of the soft skills that are lacking in children of lower socioeconomic status. For example, my students will learn the benefit of hard work, practice, and perseverance; they will experience the swelling feeling of pride at a job well done. Hopefully with practice, these soft skills can transfer to other environments, creating generally happier and healthier students. The effects of the positive soft skills acquired through music are difficult to overstate in the lives of rural Native children growing up in a village ravaged by alcohol. The musical skills they gain will serve the students well, too. Many students are interested in composing music for traditional Yup’ik dance, and solid musicianship helps. Additionally, many students will eventually join the church choir, where reading sheet music is a definite boon.” None of this would be possible without small donations from music lovers like you! Thank you for your enduring support of Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation and we are excited for the semester ahead! Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, It is through generous philanthropic work like yours that my students will be able to experience the joys of making music. Thank you!From their first squeaky notes through their end-of-year performance, my students will thoroughly enjoy and use their new recorders, stands, and sheet music. As you well know, music can reach students that otherwise struggle in school, and many of my students fall into this category. Your gift allows them an opportunity to express themselves in ways that don’t hinge on knowing the English language, which is a challenge to learn in our Yup’ik first language community.Thank you again for your generosity. I know my students thank you, too!With gratitude, Ms. C. To make a donation to KTBA, click here!

August 8, 2014

Donation of the Week

Students Take Musical Journey Around the World Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping the Blues a Alive Foundation donated a slew of instruments in Chandler, Arizona! Most of the supplies included a Continents of the World photo book series, a world map, arts and crafts materials including pom poms, feathers, craft sticks, and glitter, in addition to a music around the world CD to make instruments from each of the seven continents of the world. Students will be taken on a journey to the seven continents of the world. While studying the culture of each continent students will create a model that resembles an instrument from each area. The goal of each model will be to produce a sound that is similar to the actual instrument. The school music teacher caters to 20 English language learners who are in the third grade. They are a self-contained class that has a lot of fun learning and playing together. School is a safe place for them to grow as new citizens of this country. They learn cultural etiquette and social paradigms. They learn about collaboration and compromise. Additionally, students are very much challenged by their living conditions at home. Some students are from migrant families. These children are required to help their family make money after school and don’t have time to do anything else. Some students live in trailers with as many as three other families living with them at the same time. Last, most of the students’ parents don’t speak English at home, so they have a hard time helping with homework and school projects. The first social studies unit of the year will be studying the seven continents of the world. They will analyze music, dance, food, clothing and customs of each area. Then the students will bring the lessons to life by creating a model of a musical instrument from each continent. Music provides a unique identity for each continent. Over thousands of years each continent evolved its own unique musical instruments. Students will study the structure of the instruments then create a modern day model. In Europe the students will create bagpipes. In North America students will create maracas. The Cajon will represent South America. Everyone will then create clap sticks from Africa. Next the students will make didgeridoos from Australia. The Dizi flute will represent Asia. Finally skin drums will represent Antarctica. Appreciation of other cultures leads to ultimately understanding our world and the people who populate it. Music is the gateway to connecting and communicating with the world. Students will be changed for the better by understanding that there are dozens of musical styles and instruments to play it. Beyond the music advantages, cultural differences are something to be celebrated. Once students understand this concept a better classroom climate will be created. Thanks to your donations, these students will get to enjoy those cultures and grow and become better citizens because of it. Click here to make a donation to our charity!

August 1, 2014

Donation of the Week

wichita, ks – Students at Bostic Elementary School in Wichita will have an exciting school year this fall! Their love for music class has been blooming more and more throughout the years, and Ms. Barker had done all she could to help them reach their potential. “They enjoy working in small groups on a variety of things; but hands down, the activity they love most is playing instruments! I want to get them actively involved in composing music by using glockenspiels” Ms. Barker explains. Bostic Magnet Elementary School is a Traditional Magnet, meaning that the students wear uniforms, and are expected to work for high standards in discipline and academic achievement. Yes, they are still a part of the local public school system, however they do not hold themselves to the same standards necessarily. The students enjoy coming to Music class, and work hard for reward days, when they get to show off their talent with solo singing, piano, and comedy skits they put together. In order to get the most of their experience while at the school for only a short time, Ms. Barker requested a set of glockenpiels to teach the students rudimental concepts of pitch differentiation, melody, and group songs and activities. “I will use the glockenspiels in centers with worksheets so that students can work independently or in pairs to compose music within set guidelines. Using instruments with letters on the bars (as opposed to say, a guitar) reinforces the musical scale. I want my students to be reminded of the letters as they write the notes on the music staff on their paper. I would ultimately like to put an Orff instrument in the hands of every student in my classroom. (My classes run about 24 each.) When everyone in the room can play at the same time, it makes a HUGE difference in the amount of interest students have in class!” Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation funded Ms. Barker’s project, and we still have room for more donations for next week! You can be a part of our journey to fund music education programs by making a small donation! Click here to make a donation to our charity!

July 25, 2014

Donation of the Week

The Composers de Campobello! campobello, sc – Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation was able to donate plenty of materials to the students at Campobello-Grambling Elementary School in Campobello, SC! Mrs. Pym, the school’s music instructor, said her students were “excited to create sound stories with picture books and handheld percussion instruments.” They were motivated, engaged learners in this rural SC public school and elementary students come to music class once a week to enjoy integrating music with other subjects they are learning. “I am fortunate to teach in an environment with students that love to learn!” Mrs. Pym added. With the picture books like The Girl Who Heard Colors and There Was a Tree and handheld percussion instruments, her students will be able to compose sound stories. Additionally, they will get to integrate percussion instruments into books, creating their own musical composition. Students will get to perform their sound stories to other students in younger grades. After receiving the funds for her project, Mrs. Pym left us with a little note expressing her gratitude: Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, Thank you thank you thank you for your interest our classroom! I am so excited to have handheld percussion instruments that my students can share! This will serve to provide enough instruments so we have an entire class set – no more waiting for your turn! My older students will enjoy composing accompaniments to use with our picture books. This will reinforce our skills of reading and writing music as we work to compose our own pieces. Thank you for giving us the tools we need to continue to be successful! With gratitude, Mrs. Pym We could not do these donations without your help! To make a donation to next week’s project, click here!

July 11, 2014

Donation of the Week

KTBA Donates Sing-Along Music and Books milwaukee, wi – Thanks to your donations this week, Keeping the Blues Alive was able to donate music activities, headphones and accompanying CDs for their music class. Dr Benjamin Carson Academy in Milwaukee is located in a high-poverty zone – often leaving students surrounded by grief and various hardships in their community. Mrs. Miller-Ahmed’s 18 young and budding singers attend the school but because of budget cuts, they had not had a music teacher in many years. “I am not the most beautiful singer but I do try to expose my children to songs and musical experiences. Every day they say “Do we have time for a song?” Mrs. Ahmed pleads. “My hope for these materials is that students will learn new songs that they can sing when they are happy or sad. They can teach them to their families during bus and car rides and eventually to their children. They can be used in whole group lessons to tie into our reading, math, social studies, science and health themes. In addition, students can listen to them on our CD player with headphones. The students will learn rhythm, muscle control, balance, and multiculturalism through these songs.” The project included CDs by Ella Jenkins and Greg & Steve. According to Mrs. Ahmed these students will enjoy singing and learning about the music concepts because with their learning curve being so high at a young age, they are bound to take the necessary steps to grow as a group and apply the lessons to other instruments as well. It was very clear that theses students, although they aren’t in a conventional music class, would benefit from the camaraderie of learning music with their peers! Thanks to your donations, they will have a new perspective on going to their school, and attendance rates will see a significant change! Dear Keeping The Blues Alive Foundation, Thank you so much for funding our classroom’s project, A School Without a Song. My school truly is a school without a song because of budget cuts. Not having a music teacher is a terrible experience for elementary school students. I try to enrich the students lives the best I can with music. Singing and musical activities always make the students in a much happier mood. They ask me, “When can we sing?” and “At the end of the day, can I pick a song to sing?” The students are desperate for age appropriate music. Your generosity will allow my class to listen to music with the headphones on their own during station activities, learn a wide range of new music from the CDs, and sing songs with props using the Sing And Move Bag. I would not be able to have these wonderful materials for my class without your organization! Thank you for bringing music back to my classroom. With gratitude, Mrs. Miller-Ahmed What a difference, these little donations can make. If you’d like to help us make a difference for music education, please click here to make a donation today!

July 4, 2014