Montague Township School District
Music Curriculum Guide
Grade 4
2025-2026
Jody Taylor
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Description
The Grade 4 General Music curriculum develops students' understanding and skills across five interconnected artistic processes: creating, performing, responding, and connecting. Students compose and improvise rhythmic and melodic patterns using expanded notation and solfege, perform songs with proper technique and expression, analyze music using appropriate terminology and criteria, and make meaningful connections between music and their personal experiences. Throughout the year, instruction emphasizes diverse composers, musicians, and performers, including those with disabilities who create music adaptively. Students engage with a wide variety of musical genres and social contexts, including spirituals and protest songs, to deepen their appreciation of music's role in society and culture.
Big Ideas
- Creative ideas, concepts, and feelings that influence musicians' work emerge from a variety of sources and are shaped by expertise, context, and expressive intent.
- Musicians develop technical skill and artistic expression through rehearsal, evaluation, refinement, and application of appropriate criteria.
- Musical works and performances are understood and evaluated within their social, cultural, and historical contexts.
- Response to music is informed by analyzing musical structure, elements, and the creator's or performer's expressive choices.
- Musicians connect their personal interests, experiences, ideas, and knowledge to creating, performing, and responding to music.
Essential Questions
- How do musicians generate creative ideas and make creative decisions?
- How do musicians improve the quality of their creative work and performances?
- How do context and the manner in which musical work is presented influence audience response?
- How do individuals choose music to experience, and how does understanding music's structure and context inform a response?
- How do musicians make meaningful connections to creating, performing, and responding?
Music - Connecting
Music - Creating
Music - Performing
Music - Responding
Students apply mathematical thinking when composing rhythmic patterns, understanding note values, and analyzing musical structure and form.
Students investigate sound waves and acoustics when studying music, exploring how vibrations create sound and how energy transfers through musical performance.
Students develop posture, breathing control, and fine motor skills during singing and instrumental performance while learning about proper body mechanics and vocal health.
Students explore cultural contexts, historical periods, and diverse perspectives of composers and musicians from various backgrounds and traditions when studying and performing music.
Students analyze lyrics, discuss musical intent and meaning, write explanations for musical choices, and engage in discussions about composers and musical works.
Students perform songs and study musical traditions from various cultures and languages, expanding their understanding of diverse global musical practices.
Students are assessed throughout the year using a variety of formative, summative, and alternative assessment methods. Formative assessments include group work, projects, class discussions, question and answer sessions, and teacher observation of skill development. Students demonstrate learning through performance tasks such as composing rhythmic and melodic pieces, performing in concerts with appropriate technique and expression, analyzing musical excerpts, and completing projects like STOMP creations with found sounds and concert programming activities. Skill testing occurs regularly to measure understanding of musical elements, notation, and performance technique. Assessments align with the New Jersey Student Learning Standards and are designed to measure progress in creating, performing, responding, and connecting across all units.
| Unit | Formative | Summative | Benchmark | Alternative |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01Creating | ✓ | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| 02Performing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 03Responding | ✓ | ✓ | — | ✓ |
| 04Connecting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Coverage | 4/4 | 4/4 | 2/2 | 4/4 |
| Unit | IEP | 504 | MLL | At-Risk | Gifted |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 01Creating | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 02Performing | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 03Responding | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| 04Connecting | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ | ✓ |
| Coverage | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 | 4/4 |