2015 Term 1 Week 3: Chinese New Year

 

This week is the start of the Chinese New Year festival. It is also known as the Spring Festival as it is the first day of their spring season.

Chinese New Year is special because it is everyone's birthday. If you are born between the first and last days of the Chinese New Year, you can add one year to your age. For example, if you are 9 now and your 10th birthday is in October, you can already say you are 10.

The Chinese New Year is 15 days long. Each day represents a celebration, and the final day is celebrated with a lantern festival - like the one in Albert Park, Auckland. 

Chinese New Year can be celebrated with a feast, fireworks, hongbao - red envelopes that contain money, new clothes (traditionally each person will buy new clothes for Chinese New Year), spring cleaning in the days leading up to it,  and visiting family.

Each year is represented by one of the 12 zodiac animals.   This year is year of the sheep/ ram/ goat.

2004 was the year of the monkey

2005 - rooster

2006 - dog

2007- pig

Here are some traditional Chinese instruments being played  with some modern backing instruments. Can you identify them using the chart below?

This video is from one of the main TV stations in China. It is the New Year’s celebration filled with many traditional songs, dances, instruments, clothing and so on.

Here is a Chinese New Year song. You might want to watch it several times to follow the words and characters.  By the end of it, you might be able to remember how to say "Congratulations".


Here's a poster of many different kinds of traditional musical instruments from China. 

Traditionally, Chinese instruments fitted into 8 main categories: silk,  bamboo, wood, stone, metal, clay, gourd and hide.

You can hear the pipa played here. The pipa is a pear-shaped stringed instrument which traditionally had strings of silk.

The erhu is a two-stringed instrument played with a bow.  Here is some more information about the erhu.   You can see and hear the erhu in this video, and learn a bit about its background.

You can hear the xiao played here.  The xiao  is a type of flute and is made of bamboo or wood. Look how he blows across the hole of the xiao - it's like blowing across the top of a bottle. (Try that for homework!)

The tanggu is a big drum. You can see it played here.  Here's more information about it.

Here's  a group of young people playing several different types of traditional Chinese percussion instruments.

Seniors:
This week we are learning about crotchets and crotchet rests. Crotchets are also known as quarter notes.
Use the video to practise reading and beating crotchets and crotchet rests.

Here's our listening game from last week. Let's try the harder levels this week.

This is quite a tricky listening game of matching the same sounds, but with a bit of practice, I'm sure you will be able to master it.

Juniors: We are learning about nursery rhymes this term.
Hickory Dickory Dock  first appeared in a book of nursery rhymes in 1744.  Hickory is a tree growing in America, and dock is a weed. There is no particular story behind this rhyme, its just a fun way to start to learn to tell the time using rhyming words. 

Hickory Dickory Dock. 

Hickory, dickory dock
The mouse ran up the clock
The clock struck one,
The mouse ran down,
Hickory, dickory, dock.

Actions for Hickory Dickory Dock

 Print by Margaret Tarrant- 1940s

Here's a  dance for Hickory Dickory Dock 

 Kermit has a bit of fun with Hickory Dickory Dock.

And this is a short cartoon about Hickory Dickory Dock with a different ending.