It’s Tea Time in the Lower School

Dressed in all their spring finery, Ranney School’s youngest students showed off their burgeoning musical talent this week during the much-loved Lower School Parents' Day Teas. Standing before an audience of proud, smiling parents in RSPA Panther Hall, the young students sang and danced their hearts out in three separate performances, demonstrating their growing poise and confidence on stage, and in the classroom.

The festivities began Wednesday morning with refreshments in the Panther Hall Gallery, followed by a special performance by students in the Early Childhood Education Program. Under the direction of Movement and Creative Expressions teacher Victoria Chriss, the Beginners and Pre-K students sang several well-known children’s tunes, including: “I‘ve Been Working on the Rail Road,” “The Little Red Caboose” and “I’d Like To Teach The World To Sing.” Kindergarteners put their music to motion, delighting the audience by dancing to “The Twist.” The program concluded with a heart-warming rendition of “We’ve Got the Whole World in Our Hands,” sung by students in all three grades.

Later in the day, the first and second graders took the spotlight as Lower School Music Director Lillianne Torrente led first graders in a selection of tunes from around the globe. “Los Pollitos,” “Kumbaya,” and “Freres Jacques” required the first grade students to sing in several languages, a feat they performed effortlessly. Second graders, meanwhile, demonstrated their proficiency on the recorder, entertaining audience members with lively renditions of “Bad Boy Boogie,” “Texas Tune” and “South American Rhythm.”

On Friday, it was the third through fifth graders’ turn to take the Roberts stage before an audience of parents and families. First, under the musical direction of Ms. Torrente, each third grade class played a song on the recorder. Then, fourth grade choral dramatics charmed the audience with “Stand by Me”, followed by “El Condor Pasa”, sung as a round. When the curtains parted for the next act, it was to listen to the fourth grade band play “Five Note Concerto”, led by the baton of Janet Bender. The fourth grade strings played “London Bridge” and “Lightly Row”, directed by Dorothy Sobieski, followed by fifth grade choral dramatics performing “Music Rocks” and a very amusing “Whisk It” (played to the tune of “Whip It” by Devo), and sung with sound effects provided by colanders and wire whisks. The fifth grade band played two Japanese songs, “Hotaru Koi” and “Sakura”, the Black Belt Band, directed by Kevin Cotter, presented a rousing “Raiders March”, and fifth grade strings rounded out the recital with four challenging but well performed pieces, “Eine Kleine Nachtmusik”, “Dragon Slayer”, “Sahara Crossing” and “Viva La Vida”. The finale, “Ode to Joy”, was performed by the entire Lower School Orchestra, leaving parents and families smiling.

Following each of the performances, parents visited the Lower School classrooms where, in a prelude to Mother’s Day, many moms were presented with one-of-a-kind hand-made gifts. Lower School Head Patricia Marshall told parents that their real gift, however, is their strong, happy and confident young children, a sentiment that the parents clearly shared.

For additional information on all Ranney School news, please contact the Communications Department at communications@ranneyschool.org.