On day three of Songwriting IL we continued on our songs made with the refrains and started to add a melody behind them. Some people left the classroom to work in different rooms and hallways to record, and others stayed in the band room and worked with headphones on. After we did our melodies...
Continue readingSongwriting, Day Three: Instrumentals and Meeting a Songwriter!
Today we started the morning off with sharing our songs that we wrote yesterday, as well as giving critics and suggestions. Throughout the day, we worked on composing and matching instrumentals to our lyrics. For my music, I used Band Lab with the alternative pop genre as my inspiration. Later in the day, we...
Continue readingSongwriting, Day Two: Creating Rhythm and Rhyme
Creating the lyrics for my song enhanced my ability to completely understand how to make a “part” of a song and how much creativity and work goes into a small part. Overall, I felt as if today, we made a lot of progress toward creating our song. Today, we continued progressing through learning how...
Continue readingSongwriting, Day Two: Refrains and Verses
For our second day of IL we learned about refrains and how to use them in a song. With our new-found knowledge of refrains we began to create our own short “songs” using refrains within them. Everyone was working diligently on their songs, and we were told to think of a melody we wanted...
Continue readingSongwriting, Day One: Making Songs and Having Fun
Today we were working on writing songs. Some people used instruments and played, while others used samples on various song writing apps. People stayed in the band room, and others went to places around the school to work quietly. I enjoy playing music, so I enjoyed writing music and playing it. When we presented,...
Continue readingSongwriting, Day One: A First Note
This morning we began our Intensive Learning experience. Over the next week we are going to be both learning about songs and songwriting. We began the morning by setting out some key aspects of being musicians. After settling in for the day, our first activity was that we each had to write our own...
Continue readingDominican Republic: A Full Day of Cooking & Coffee
This morning we woke up bright and early to breakfast and a Spanish lesson. Our tour guide Brayan taught us the important words we would need to know throughout the day. Then we prepared for our “market challenge.” The challenge consisted of walking around the Jarabacoa produce market and speaking with people in Spanish...
Continue readingCave Dwellers Who Love Zip Lining!
Today we woke up and started our day off by having breakfast at 7:30. For breakfast we had a buffet that had an assortment of great pancakes, scrambled eggs, sausage, and yogurt. At 8:30 we left the hotel and headed out to our first destination of the day: zip lining. It was an hour...
Continue readingIt’s Not Rocket Science (oh, wait … yes it is!)
Sky is clear! Range clear! Launch in 5, 4, 3, 2, 1! Upper School math teacher Larry Ottman leads the young rocketeers. When it’s a student’s turn to launch, they set up the rocket on the launcher and take the controls. Then, the safety protocols. They crane their necks to scan the sky, one...
Continue readingAt long last, it’s June (Week)
This morning the Upper School launched “June Week,” the much-anticipated adaptation of Moorestown Friends’ beloved Intensive Learning program, which was cancelled two years in a row due to the lengthy COVID-19 pandemic. Although the program will be a short version of IL, it promises to be no less sweet as MFS teachers share their...
Continue readingAdiós, Cuba. Hasta la próxima vez!
March 31, 2017 On our last day in Cuba, we visited a beautiful farm in the small town of Alcalá, about an hour and a half away from Holguín. Getting to this farm was probably the most challenging part of the day as our tour bus could not drive through a patch of fertilizer...
Continue readingOur Wonderful Literary Journey
Our last day in England was one to remember: we returned to the village of Haworth, home of the Bronte sisters. We took a 5-mile hike out into the moors that the sisters would have done daily (in long dresses, no less!). Our guide, Martin, read us Emily Bronte’s poetry about the moors as...
Continue readingCommunity Empowerment Through Service Learning: Final Reflections
This Intensive Learning taught me a lot about the Camden community. Moving forward with my volunteer time going back to Camden is a good possibility. I really enjoyed volunteering at the soup kitchen and seeing all the grateful people and how happy someone can be, despite being in the position they are. I would...
Continue readingFinal Day of Yoga Retreat
Today we woke up early to practice an energizing vinyasa flow. As part of the last practice we were encouraged for one song to let go of everything and to be free as we danced around the room. Afterwards we headed to breakfast to enjoy our last meal together, homemade yogurt and grains and...
Continue readingYoga Retreat Day 5: Boat Pose … on a Boat
Today we started with an intense vinyasa class that had a lot of ab work in it. After breakfast, we made mala necklaces/bracelets with the full 108 beads (one = wholeness, zero = emptiness, eight = infinity, plus a lot of other reasons for the number 108) to use as a meditation tool. Then we...
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