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The five young violinists stood with their bows poised on the strings and their eyes trained on their teacher, Phyllis Freeman.
After listening to Freeman play a simple musical phrase of A, B, and C sharp on the piano, the third- and fourth-graders at Monocacy Valley Montessori Public Charter School in Frederick were struggling to play it by ear.
‘‘If you hear it in your head, you’ll find it in your fingers,” Freeman said on Tuesday.
The budding violinists sang the notes out loud and then picked the music out on the strings without the help of sheet music.
The charter school has offered a strings program since it opened in 2002. It is the only public school in Maryland to offer instrumental music program to first-, second- and third-grade students. Most students in mainstream public schools begin playing instruments in fourth grade.
Principal Bettejane Weiss said that students who study instrumental music organize data easier in their minds and over time, develop a proficiency in math.
‘‘Music itself is very soothing to the mind,” Weiss said.
Monocacy Valley’s students have given public performances at the Frederick Coffee Company, Dancing Bear toy shop and Barnes & Noble at the Francis Scott Key Mall.
Nine-year-old Rhiannon Talbert of Myersville said she enjoyed the experience of playing publicly.
‘‘People would watch us and then we got cake,” she said. ‘‘It was awesome.”
For 45 minutes twice each week, first- through eighth-grade students at the school learn violin or cello using the Suzuki method. This method teaches children to first decode the music, then use repetition and memorization.
‘‘For these kids, music is just speaking another language,” Freeman noted.
Students do not join the orchestra until they are in middle school and have had enough instruction. Violin and cello instruction are provided at no cost to students, Weiss said, and most students rent instruments. Teachers group nearly 70 students by skill level into 12 classes held at different times in the back of the First Baptist Church on Dill Avenue, where the school is located. Freeman and two violin teachers and a cello teacher use the space behind the rows of cushioned oak pews, framed by large stained-glass windows to instruct students.
A principal violinist with the Maryland Symphony Orchestra, Freeman said all of the strings teachers at the charter school regularly perform in professional orchestras. The teachers are not Frederick County Public Schools employees, but are a part of the Maryland Talent Education Center; a private music school that serves students ages 5 to 18 in the mid-Maryland area. The center contracts with the charter school to provide music instruction, Freeman said.
McKinney Voss, an eighth-grade student at the charter school, said she has played the violin since the school opened.
The 12-year-old Frederick resident said she picked up the instrument because she heard that playing a string instrument would help her reading and math skills. Five years later, it seems to have worked in improving her spatial skills, McKinney said.
‘‘I’ve noticed that since I’ve played the violin, math is not as challenging. It seems easier to get good grades,” she said.