Lesson Plan: Sounds Like the Olympics!

This week’s lesson is about the Olympics, and works with John Williams’ famous Olympic Fanfare, written for the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. This summer would have been the 2020 Summer Olympics, and we can still celebrate by learning about them! Williams’ has stated that his goal in writing the Olympic Fanfare was to represent “the spirit of cooperation, of heroic achievement, all the striving and preparation that go before the events and all the applause that comes after them.”

This activity is a great way for children to learn to tie their established ideas of a concept (in this case, the Olympics) to sounds and musical ideas through focused listening. Use the geography extension as a research project for older students.

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