Lyrical Kindness

Art and music have been connected for a very long time. They parallel each other by eliciting emotion, evoking memories, and providing inspiration. Each medium can influence, inspire, and complement the other.

The Elements of Art and Music
Artists and musicians create compositions by combining and arranging various elements. Music and art share similar principles such as pattern, rhythm, balance, contrast, movement, unity, variety, and emphasis. The elements of art include line, color, shape, form, space, texture, and value. The elements of music are rhythm, dynamics, melody, harmony, tone, texture, and form.

The Benefits of Both
Artists often create masterpieces while listening to music. Likewise, musicians are frequently inspired by visual works.

Both art and music allow us to share ideas, skills, emotions, and experiences in a way that cultivates lasting connections. Self-expression, communication, and collaboration through the arts are just a few important skills that support healthy, meaningful relationships.

In the art room, students can combine art and music to explore and express their emotions, understand and appreciate the perspectives of others, learn how to work together, and solve problems collaboratively. Whatʼs more, art and music increase motor skills and develop decision-making and inventiveness. They promote social awareness and emotional well-being and improve academic performance.

Kindness through Art
I often have music playing in the art room while students are creating, which led me to connect the two in a visual project.

Every year, I pick a theme to promote kindness through art. This year, the theme is It’s Ofishal: Kindness Runs Deep, which incorporates the symbol of the fish to represent kindness.

For this lesson, I combined a few poems about kindness and then shuffled some words to come up with a new poem called “A Simple Act of Kindness” to use as lyrics. I discussed with our music teacher which song would fit best with the lyrics, and she chose the tune of “The More We Get Together” by Irving King.

Decoding Symbolism
We talked about sheet music and what the symbols mean. The students who take music lessons immediately made a connection and were eager to share their experiences.
All students became excited when I explained the project and told them we were going to cover the hallway bulletin board with giant sheet music, but instead of normal musical notes, we would create notes that looked like fish.

Making the Connection
Each student started with a 4½ x 6" (11 x 15 cm) black construction paper oval. They added the features of a fish such as fins, eyes, tail, gills, and scales. The fish were decorated with patterns, shapes, lines, and details.

Following the sheet music for “The More We Get Together,” students added black ¼" (0.5 cm) strips to make quarter notes. Some curves for the eighth notes coincided with the correct notes on the sheet music.

I covered our 4 x 24' (1 x 7 m) hallway bulletin board with mural paper and long pieces of black strips to make the staff (the five horizonal lines on a music sheet with spaces that represent pitches). I printed out the words on the computer and placed them beneath the staff, then added students’ fish note creations in the correct places along the musical staff.

It was so exciting to see the finished project. When you look at this wonderful artistic creation by our second graders, you can actually envision the music and hear the lyrics playing in your mind.