Jam Session With Music Producer Mark Oblinger, Book Publisher Kat Coughlan & The Second Graders In Van Meter, Iowa

Last week there was a very special jam session going on in the second grade classrooms of Tracy Ferguson and Staci Braun's at Van Meter.  

They were jamming with Grammy nominated producer Mark Oblinger and Kat Coughlan, product development for Cantata Learning to celebrate the music they created for the Winter Around The World global project we have all been working very hard on over the last month. 

The week before we Skyped with Lisa Bell, songwriter, and Emily Bell, illustrator, for Winter...The Coldest Season Of All. 

You can read about this special day here. 

Since the second graders have been composing, singing and recording their own winter songs with their music teacher Marcia Fries, we knew Skyping with Mark would be the perfect way to bring this PBL project all together.  

You can read all about their amazing winter music here. 

We kicked off the visit by singing Winter...The Coldest Season of All with Mark and Kat.  It was so much fun for everyone to sing together. 

Mark talked to the second graders about making sounds with different instruments.  It was fun for them to guess what the sounds he was making. 

Kat shared what she was responsible for in her job and told them what it takes to bring a Cantata Learning book together with music.

It was then time for the second graders to share the winter songs they created.  

Mark even played along as they jammed out in their classroom.

After the jam session, the little ones asked Mark and Kat lots of wonderful questions about music, writing, production, and all kinds of things they wanted to know about our two special guests.

                                             

We ended the day with one more jam session with Mark and Kat.  They played instruments....

and so did we!  It was great fun and something that the children at Van Meter will not forget as they sing and share their winter songs throughout the season too.