The Arts

Music

Students in kindergarten through 8th grade enjoy a weekly music class at St. Catherine of Siena. In compliance with California State Standards, the program teaches rhythm through singing, body movement and playing instruments. All students perform in the Christmas Program and various assemblies throughout the school year. Students in third through the fifth grade learn to read music by playing the recorder. Meanwhile, students in middle school are given the opportunity to play instruments such as the ukulele and bongo drums while being exposed to many types of music and instruments around the world. Many students use their musical talents by playing their instrument or singing at school or family masses.

Art in Action

Art In Action is a comprehensive visual-arts curriculum that we offer to students in grades K-8.

Through this program students are exposed to the art of the Masters and art from cultures around the world. They learn how to analyze art, and are provided the opportunity to create their own unique masterpieces. This program is offered through parent volunteers who come to the school and support teachers by presenting age appropriate lessons.

The multifaceted lessons develop students’ critical-thinking skills, creativity, visual literacy, as well as self-esteem. Every lesson includes an open-ended discussion designed to help students carefully observe a work of art and analyze it, supporting their own ideas with evidence and listening to the ideas of others.

All lessons are aligned with National Visual Arts Standards and are easily aligned with Common Core and other subject areas of the curriculum.

Our school hallways and stairwells are often decorated with the beautiful artwork of St. Catherine of Siena Students!

Theater Arts

Students in the 7th and 8th grades receive the opportunity to study the co-curricular area of theater arts and public speaking. An introduction to theater basics include warm-up techniques to combat stage fright, pantomime, improvisation, movement, blocking and stage direction, character analysis and development; as well as, theater history covering the cultures of primitive dance, ancient cultures, European theater, Shakespeare, American and modern theater, and musical theater.

Students create and/or perform a multitude of different types of artistic displays through creative or performance art. Students perform primitive culture interpretive dance routines, build and decorate Japanese and Chinese theater masks, perform a Shakespearean soliloquy, present a musical pitch for an original production, write papers on Marcel Marceau, the Globe theater, and on the Tri-School productions at Serra high school, play theater games, present improv scenes with props, all culminating with seventh graders performing a scene from a Broadway play and eighth graders performing a scene from a Broadway musical.

Every year, eighth grade students have the opportunity to perform in supporting and acting roles with the opera singers from the San Francisco Opera. The final performance is attended by the entire school. La Cenerentola or Cinderella was performed in 2017, and we are looking forward to performing The Elixir of Love in 2018.