Find a recording and listen to the recording of the music.

• Learn about the composer.
• Learn about the musical historical period and about any story that the music tells.

Discuss the instruments of the symphony orchestra and show pictures of them. Listen to examples of each of the symphony instruments:

• Winds – clarinet, flute, oboe, bassoon
• Brass – trumpet, trombone, French horn
• Strings – violin, viola, cello, bass
• Percussion – timpani, snare drum, cymbals, mallets

Discuss appropriate concert behavior:

• Sit quietly; the performers can hear you and will think you don’t like them if you are noisy.
• Don’t get up and move around during the performance.
• Applaud politely at the appropriate times.

Discuss the music and ask what was liked and disliked.

Ask why selected portions or parts were or were not liked.

Compare the different selections performed at the concert.

1. How were they different?
2. How are they alike?

Discuss:

1. Did any music tell a story or sound like a story?
2. How did the music stir emotions?
3. What kinds of activities could you write music to, and how would the music suggest that activity?
4. Draw a picture of what the music made you see.
5. Write a story about what the music made you see.
6. Discuss the time period and culture the composer was writing about.
7. How did you feel during the music — happy, sad, excited, lonely etc.?
8. What was it about the music that made you feel that way?

Suggestions for helping your students become good listeners in a large audience situation:

1. The chaperons should be seated with the students, preferably on the aisles to help control students and keep them in their seats.
2. There are differences between sports activities and cultural events; talking and cheering are permitted during the game at sports activities, while listening and applauding at appropriate times are mannerly for cultural events.
3. We encourage the audience to react spontaneously to the performance. Audience responses are valid as long as they refer to the events on stage. Undue noise or distractions not only spoil the performance for others in the audience, but also disturb the performers.
4. Audience involvement — sing-along, clap-along, move-along — is appropriate only when suggested by the performers.
5. DURING THE PERFORMANCE, STUDENTS ARE TO REMAIN IN THEIR SEATS. Students are to use the rest rooms at their schools before leaving or the facilities in the foyer of the auditorium before the concert begins. THEY ARE NOT TO BE GOING UP AND DOWN THE AISLES DURING THE CONCERT.