Upcoming Events
Junior Ensembles Concert
February 25th, 2017
Canterbury HS Cafeteria
2PM
Senior Ensembles Concert
March 4th, 2017
11:00AM
Bells Corners United Church, 3955 Old Richmond Rd, Nepean, ON
Family and Friends Concert
March 26th, 2017
time and location to be confirmed
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SuzukiMusic is funded by
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City of Ottawa Arts Funding |
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Please support our Sponsors! Click the ads below. Let them know you saw it here! Advertisements
Thank you to all of our Sponsors!
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150 Performances Challenge
Dear families,
Congratulations to everyone who has submitted a performance for this year's challenge! We have 50 performances recorded, and 100 to go by the end of the year. We can do it! Remember to send in a picture to the school and we will add you to the big 150 collage presented at Viva Suzuki. Some performance ideas include: playing for a neighbour, relatives, classmates, at a retirement home, or even stuffed animals (for the young beginners).
Let's reach this goal together and celebrate our Musical Mosaic in Canada anniversary year by sharing our music with our community.
Michelle Iznardo
Artistic Director
A tiny sampling of performances so far:
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Outreach Moments
Outreach events give our school a special connection with the greater Ottawa Community. We thank our dedicated Outreach Coordinator, Chela Escudero, for her hard work in organizing these special events. This holiday season saw outreach events at Stubbe Chocolates for the beloved annual Chocolate Nutcracker series as well as special performances in Senior Residences in the community. These outreach events give the public a chance to see what our school is all about and gives our children the opportunity to share the joy of music with others. And in the case of the Stubbe Nutcracker Series, they get a free hot chocolate and treats in the deal as well!
Violin Faculty, Judy, and senior students from her studio performed at Stubbe Chocolate Shop on Dec 18. Hot chocolate and sweets followed an hour of Christmas Carols played to shoppers
One of the performers at the concert for seniors at Central Park Place this past November.
Cello Faculty, Brandon, some of his students and their siblings performed at the Duke of Devonshire Retirement Residence this past December. They performed a selection of Suzuki repertoire and Christmas Carols to an appreciative audience who enjoyed clapping and singing along.
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Summer Camp 2017
Dates: July 17th to July 21st
Mark your calendars!
Our dates are set and registration is starting soon!
We'll be running both the Summer Headstart Program for 3 - 4 year olds as well as our drop-off day camp for 5 - 13 years olds who have completed at least one year of Violin, Viola, Cello, Flute or Guitar study by the Suzuki method.
We are looking to another fun camp of making friends, music and memories.
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Family and Friends Concert
Sunday March 26th, 2017
The Family & Friends concert is scheduled this year for
Sunday, March 26th.
This annual event is an opportunity for family and friends to form a group, pick out some music, rehearse, and perform! Any genre of music is welcome as well as any combination of instruments or voice. In the past we've had fiddle music, movie music, Beatles, folk, popular, classical... The possibilities are endless for this event. If you need assistance selecting music, you can ask your teacher for help. The minimum number of performers is 2.
Stay tuned for details about location and sign up details/deadline.
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Sponsors needed!
Viva Suzuki 2017 Fundraising starts now
We need your help to make our annual end-of-year concert,
Viva Suzuki, a success! This concert raises funds to support our school, our faculty-training fund, as well as providing much-needed support for our sister-school, Vision-Nouvelle, in Haiti. This year, we need your help and we are planning early! You can contribute as a sponsor in several ways:
- Advertising: Do you or someone you know own your own business? Want to promote your company or services? If not, do you want to help us contact potential sponsors? We sell ads here in our SuzNews (you're reading it now!) which goes out to 450+ subscribers, as well as in our Viva Suzuki concert program.
- Donate prizes or free services for a student fundraising incentive draw on April 30th. Students who meet our fundraising challenge will be entered into a draw for prizes - your contribution could be part of the prizes for this incentive draw.
Do any of these options speak to you? If so, please contact Susan at
[email protected]
Thanks for taking time to consider how you can help a great cause!!!
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Our Second Annual Black and White Sale
As part of our Viva Suzuki fundraising strategy we will be
hosting a Black and White sale during Group Class Saturdays in April.
Do you have black and white concert clothes that your children have outgrow
n? Bring them to our front desk on group class Saturdays in January and February. We will organize the white tops, bla
ck bottoms and black shoes and offer the donated items for sale at reasonable prices the following Saturdays.
100% of proceeds go to Viva Suzuki.
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Introducing our New Vulnerable Sector Policy
From the Ottawa Arts Grant Application:
"Organizations are morally and legally required under the Duty of Care concept to do everything reasonable to care for and protect their staff and participants. As such, not-for profit organizations and collectives are required to have a Vulnerable Sector Policy in place that identifies the risks related to vulnerable persons and outlines procedures to ensure program quality and protection of vulnerable participants (this may include volunteer/staff screening procedures, police record checks, operational procedures, etc.)."
In 2016 it became mandatory for all non-profits to have a Vulnerable Sector Policy in place. As a school we have always taken the safety of our children seriously, but this new mandate gave us an opportunity to formalize what we do in this regard.
From our draft policy section 6
Vulnerable Sector Screening:
All new and current employees and contractors are required to submit a Police Record Check at the beginning of their tenure with the school, or from the effective date of this policy.
All parents and other volunteers are strongly encouraged to obtain a Police Records Check to allow for flexibility in volunteer assignment and to provide a general level of screening for all members, rather than singling out individuals. Parents who do not provide a Police Records Check will be restricted in the volunteering positions available to them to ensure compliance with this Policy.
The NCSSM may obtain a copy of a Police Records Check instead of the original document. If over six (6) months have passed since the day the Police Records Check was completed, the volunteer must also provide an Offence Declaration that addresses the period since that day.
No person under the age of 18 is required to obtain a Police Records Check.
The bottom line for us as a school is that all Chaperones for concerts and special events such as our Orchestra School Tour are required to have a police record check in place.
Because this is a commonplace requirement for schools, sports clubs, scouts, guides and any other organization working with children we are hopeful that this will not be a big issue as many of you may already have police record checks done for other organizations. Copies of these existing checks are perfectly fine for our school. If there have been more than six months elapsed since you had your police check done we will have an offence declaration for you to sign.
This is a fairly urgent matter as we begin to get ready for Viva and our school tour in May and all chaperones involved will be required to give us a police record check. If you do not have one from another organization yet we will have police record check applications at the Front Desk - these allow you to get your check done for free as the check is for a volunteer position.
Thank you for your understanding and patience as we begin implementing this policy; put in place to better protect our children and bring our school up to the industry standard for non-profits.
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Parent Education Corner
Thank You, Suzuki Parents
Everything You Do is Much Appreciated
published in the Suzuki Association of the Americas Blog
There's something Suzuki parents need to hear more than anything else-that is, how much teachers appreciate everything parents do.
Suzuki student and father at Pennsylvania Suzuki Institute
In putting forward these thoughts, my goal is to voice some of the ideas that come into play when all of us-children, parents, and teachers-respectfully and joyfully join each other in making music.
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It all starts with Dr. Suzuki's emphasis on
"noble hearts and minds." Developing character comes by fostering, expanding, and fulfilling each child's true self. Through the challenges and rewards of musical study and performance, children experience what it means to care for themselves, for music, for others, and for life.
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Music ignites something extraordinary in every person. No matter how much time we spend at the instrument, no matter how difficult or easy the piece, no matter whether we finish learning a piece, we go back for more-because
music reminds us of who we are.
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Listening and practicing are two cornerstones of learning to play a musical instrument. Music reading is the third. For all ages and levels of students,
listening to the repertoire recording has the greatest potential for initiating and sustaining independent student progress. So, parents-please be zealous in playing the repertoire recording.
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Children appreciate their parents' interest, input, and influence in age-appropriate and level-appropriate ways. That means parents adjust from
active involvement with three- and four-year-olds,
to guiding and stepping away from school-age students,
to being supportive and interested in what independent adolescent musicians are going through. Letting go is a difficult yet necessary aspect of parenting.
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Some days are better suited to growth, while other days are more about rest. Just like in everyday life, there's a cyclical relationship of learning, forgetting, plateauing, refining, and taking things easy.
Periods of growth necessitate periods of rest. Allowing students the time to rest their body, mind, and soul means they'll soon be ready for growth.
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Children have things to say-literally and musically. They need teachers and parents to
take the time to listen, to ask questions that invite students' input rather than regurgitation of what adults think, and openly encourage children to express what they genuinely feel and think about music and their practice, especially in terms of what's working and what's not.
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There are journeys and destinations involved in learning to play a musical instrument. Both are important.
Enjoy the journey with spontaneous celebrations and short-term goals. Getting to the destination may mean long-term goals require unexpected rerouting along the way. Stick with it and celebrate both before and when students get there.
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Children have their own
musical identity-their favorite pieces, the must-have selections on their playlist. There are stories connected to children's musical identity. Parents and teachers also have their own musical identity, their own stories. Music tells us a lot about each other. It brings us together and helps us to connect with each other through a universal language.
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Research has revealed most parents stop reminding their child to practice at the time when their child most needs to be reminded. Many adults wish their parents would have made them continue practicing. Unfortunately, hindsight is usually 20/20. One thing that can help is to routinely revisit the
affirming reasons for having music in your family.
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Parents see their children every day, while teachers see their students once a week. Yet, parents and teachers
depend on each other's input-not just in discussions about problem areas. They rely on each other share what's working, to ask questions, to be reasonable and respectful of each other's values, life experiences, and expectations.
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There are many elements in performing a piece-notes, fingerings, rhythms, interpretation, technique-but students may not necessarily learn the elements of performance in an orderly, step-wise manner.
Be sensitive to squashing students' musical interest in attempting to streamline their performance development. Parents and teachers, please remember how much you valued doing things your own way as a child.
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Children learn amazing things from their peers as well as younger and older children. Teachers and parents can
help children move past superficial comparisons and fully understand other students' achievements, especially when they make friends and get to know the inside story of someone else's successes-and their setbacks, too.
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Repetitions in practice can go two ways: either closer to or further from the goal in mind. That's why it's often fun and productive to
experiment with the goal and its opposite. This way, students know where they're headed and why one particular direction may be more advantageous than another.
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Children enjoy taking ownership of their own musical studies and performance. Parents may encourage this in their child with descriptive rather than judgmental self-evaluations. That means children get comfortable with
describing what they're doing (fluffy or deep tone) in place of judging how well they play (good or bad).
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Thank you, Suzuki parents. You do an amazing job. We teachers cannot even begin to express how deeply we value who you are-your vision, your commitment, your love for your child and music.
Everything you do is much appreciated.
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