Music

Music at Hazelridge School 

Hazelridge School has a dynamic music program. Music at Hazelridge encompasses all four components of the music curriculum – music language and performance skills, creative expression in music, understanding music in context and valuing musical experience. 

Music is an essential part of life. We need writing and math for students to be successful in the world, but also the arts, as the arts are the heart of each person. The arts help us to express our feelings – whether it’s to carry us through a difficult time, or to celebrate events such as birthdays, achievements, and weddings. 

In early years music we focus on singing, moving, and keeping the beat. We play instruments from around the world, as well as play Orff instruments such as a soprano xylophone. We also listen to music from around the world and hear the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra play. Each year students also perform at many assemblies and events in the community; senior homes, music concerts, and Remembrance Day Services, just to name a few.  

In the upper grades we focus on choral and learning to play a variety of Orff instruments, recorder, guitar and violin. We also listen to music from around the world, and the Winnipeg Symphony Orchestra. At this level we are also developing our composing skills. Numerous times during the year we also share our music with each other, our parents, and community. 

Music also benefits us in other ways – here is how Manitoba Arts Education puts it: 

Music is a vital part of every student's education and contributes to deep and enduring student engagement that leads to learning success. Music education develops unique, powerful, and multiple ways of perceiving, interpreting, knowing, representing, and communicating understandings about self and the world. Through music experiences, students have opportunities to think creatively, explore ideas and feelings, and develop emerging personal, cultural, and social identities. 

The social act of music making generates synergy and provides unique opportunities for students to be part of collaborative and diverse knowledge building. Learning music enables students to explore ambiguity, to think imaginatively, innovatively, and with flexibility and empathy, and to feel confident with uncertainty and risk. Music education promotes open-ended, critical, divergent, and dialogic thinking and encourages understanding and feeling mediated through body, mind, and senses. 

Music helps students to appreciate and connect with others past and present, as well as to understand and celebrate their own distinctiveness. Mind, body, and spirit interact through music to engage students profoundly as they seek meaning in the world around them. Through music, students are empowered with the creative energies and sense of agency that are needed to consider diverse views and transform thinking and possibilities. Music has the potential to promote responsibility and leadership and to prepare and inspire future citizens of the world to understand and address the most critical challenges of their times.