"The Plan" - Part II

This week's post is a continuation of last week.  This week I'll address two musical elements and the way I break them down by grade level.

Beat

 Let's start with "the beat."  In the broad sense, I want my students to understand:

1. The beat is steady, only speeding up or slowing down for expressive reasons.
2. The beat helps musicians perform together.
3. The beat is more often something that is felt rather than heard.

Because an awareness of steady beat is essential to all other elements of music (related to performance), it is the reason music teachers care so much about it.  We've all seen it - some children walk into our classroom with a natural ability to detect the beat of any song.  Others are more prone to responding to the rhythm, and others have no clue.  I am convinced this is instilled from birth (or before).  Children who are sung to and rocked by their parents or care-givers are more apt to walk into our classes with the beat all ready to go.  For the others, we must play catch-up!

Because the beat is so basic, there really isn't a "breakdown" of what to teach at each level.  However, here are a few suggestions...

Pre-K - lots of opportunities to move to the beat - dances, parachute play, clapping and moving body parts to the beat, playing the beat on rhythm instruments.  For tempo, being able to identify the beat as "fast" or "slow" is good enough at the ripe old age of four.

Kindergarten - even more of the above.  In this grade I do like to introduce the term "tempo" and practice identifying some basic tempo markings such as allegro, presto, andante, and largo.

First through Fifth Grades - more movement and playing of the beat and identifying tempo.  In fifth grade I do try to make a stronger emphasis on the fact that the beat is felt rather than heard in many pieces of music.  I address tempo-related concepts as they arise in the literature we happen to be using (accelerando, ritardando, etc.).

Rhythm

The next logical progression from beat is rhythm.  What they need to know at a core level:

1. Rhythm is the division of sounds and silences over the beat as variations of long and short.  
2. We read rhythms by reading the "stick part" or stems of the notes.

Pre-K - being able to tell the difference between beat and rhythm.  Classify simple words into groups according to syllables (blue and horse are one-syllable words, yellow and puppy are two syllable words).  Identify short repeated rhythmic patterns as "same" or "different."

Kindergarten - still more practice identifying beat as opposed to rhythm and vice versa. I avoid actual notation reading at this level, but we address rhythms in terms of long and short as in B-I-N-G-O - long, long, short-short, long.  I also use picture notation at this grade level - big pictures for long sounds, small pictures for short sounds, and we do actually read the quarter rest for a beat of silence.  There are many good materials (old and new), and I have a book called Kinderjams! that is ingeniously listed on the J.W. Pepper website as a "recorder book" (see my bio on this blog about being pigeon-holed as a "recorder guy").  If you're interested, I still stand by the collection and its awesomeness.  I still use it, and my kids love the recordings.  Check it out here.

First Grade - begin to read simple four-beat and three-beat rhythm patterns using quarter notes, quarter rests, and paired eighth notes.  We read these using rhythm syllables but, experience has shown me that we need to drill, drill, and drill some more about the difference between what the note is called and how we say the notes in a pattern.  I do not like asking, "What kind of note is this?" and getting an enthusiastic answer back, "TA!"  No, it is not a "ta" - it is a quarter note.  I also have learned that it is important to introduce rhythmic notation with the note heads on the notes.  This way I can show students notes with stems up and with stems down and they learn there is no difference.  Using the tradition "stick notation" from Kodaly does avoid this, but they will be seeing music printed with note heads, so why not start it off that way?

Second Grade - continue to read the first grade patterns, introduce eighth notes both with flags and with stems.  Again, it is important to call things by their correct names so students don't have to do double the work.  Calling things by cute names may seem like fun to an adult, but really...why teach young children it's a "this" when it's actually a "that?"  It just doesn't make sense to me.  This is also the year that we begin to read longer note values - half note, dotted half note, and whole note.  I introduce the corresponding rest with each and we also discover the tie.  Additionally we learn the dotted quarter-eighth note pattern.  I don't get into the whole mathematics of the dot - it's not appropriate at this level (they really don't understand fractions at this age - some may, but I'm telling you, a true understanding of the concept just isn't developmentally there yet for the most part).  What I do is put up a pattern with a pair of eighth notes in it.  I separate the pair on the next line using individual flagged eighths, then write it again tying a quarter note to one of the eighths, and then saying, "We have a much shorter way of writing this..." Amazing.  We also discuss the fermata in second grade.

Third Grade - we continue to review all of the note values from previous years.  This is the exciting time when I introduce the concept of syncopation.  This is a tough one to get across, so we visit the topic more than once during the school year.  Third grade is also a good year to introduce triplet eighth rhythms.  I don't really introduce much more new rhythmic material to their repertoire at this age because they really need to get a lot of practice in reading and performing rhythm patterns in all the various combinations using whole, half, quart, and eighth notes and rests as well as with ties and syncopation - that's a lot for the eight-year-old mind to get a handle on.

Fourth Grade - again, all of the previous and then I add the study of sixteenth notes in all combinations - two sixteenths and an eighth, an eighth and two sixteenths, four sixteens, dotted eighth followed by a sixteenth, and a sixteenth followed by a dotted eighth.  We continue to read rhythms using only syllables at this age level.  This is also the age when logical thinking can be addressed when related to music.  I introduce the idea here that "we add something to the note, it gets shorter, we take something away, it gets longer."  I demonstrate this with a hole note, add a stem, add some coloring, add a flag, and add another flag.  You'll know you've hit it when they ask, "Can you have more than two flags?" and then you say, "Sure!  What do you think the next type of note will be called?"  If you get "Thirty-second!" on the first try, you're doing a whole lot better than I ever have.  If I have a class that's really catching on, I'll go into the math side of it - dividing fractions!  Oh my!

Fifth Grade - My students have the opportunity to study a band or orchestral instrument when they are in middle school.  Before I send them off to the big and thrilling world of sixth grade, I make sure they know how to count rhythms using the "one-and" method since band directors as a group will never lower themselves to the elementary level of syllable reading (even though it makes a heck of a lot more sense!).  We review all previous years' rhythms throughout the year and toward the spring I do a big "one-and" lesson and they get it.  Why?  Because at this point they are ready.  They've had lots of experience with notation in the previous years (at least while they were with me) and now whether you call two-eighths "ti-ti" or "hotdog" or "one-and" it's kind of a moot point.  They know when they see that pattern what it should sound like.  I also take time to review the whole "add something to the note and it gets shorter" discussion from fourth grade.

Well, there you have my take on the elements of beat and rhythm.  Tune in next week when we'll go into the mysterious realm of meter and melody.

Until then...

"The Plan" - Part I

WARNING:  this week's post (and the weeks to follow) are not inundated with pictures, so if you're a visual type, you've been warned!

Due to a couple of personal emails and past concerns by music teachers, I decided that this week's blog post should be about curriculum.  It seems with all the preparation and ear training combined with performances and exams, colleges and universities traditionally leave out one of the most important aspects of teaching music in their music education programs - what do I teach and when do I teach it?  Imagine how wonderful it would be to exit college with a full year of music teaching under your arm for grades K-8...but alas, we're left to figure it out on our own or follow the outline in a textbook series.  If anyone had a different experience than this, please leave a comment - I would love to give props to your Music Ed. program!

I've taught through four textbook series at this point in my career.  And I have to say with all candor, until recently, not one of them has been worth their price when it comes to curriculum.  I say "until recently" because the current text I am blessed with in my classroom comes the closest to getting it right.  And I mean that...it comes "close" but it certainly isn't set up the way I could teach from page one to page two and so on and cover the curriculum.  I've always used my texts as anthologies rather than curriculum guides.  We could easily be on page 4 one week and page 397 the next.

I was fortunate enough to be one of the curriculum writers for my school district this year.  Many teachers around the country criticize their state standards as being too vague.  I will tell you this is done with intention to give you guidelines on what should be taught without dictating to you how and when you will teach it.  If teaching ever came to this, I think I would run!  I have the expertise and, after all these years, I have amassed the techniques and materials to impart my expertise (and continue to add to my "bag of tricks!").  I don't need a step-by-step dictated curriculum to accomplish this.  However, I know early on in one's career something like this could be very much appreciated.  When we wrote our district curriculum, I wanted a hand in it because previous guides seemed to lack "musical substance" and focused more on the materials (patriotic music, music for fall, etc.) than it did on the elements of music.

So, I was thinking this post over for the past few days.  I was going to "lay it all out" in this one post, but realized it would end up being more like a novel than a blog post, so I'm breaking it down into chunks, hence the "part one" title.  Not only will this make for easier reading, but it will also ease up on the time it takes for me to write it.  I know you all think I sit and write my blog all day every day, but...um...no.  LOL

Let's start with the lesson.  What should a good general music lesson look like?  I have always held this in mind and it has never failed me:  every lesson should include some music reading, some singing, some listening, some movement, and some playing of instruments.  If you can stick those five activities into your lesson - all focused on the same topic, you are almost guaranteed success in music teaching.  Sometimes, through discussions with other music specialists, I think they think their class is "song class" or "singing/playing/moving" class without actually being music class.  They prepare a series of activities to do with their students that are, indeed, engaging and fun...but if you were to pull one of their students aside and ask them "What did you learn today?"  they will most likely tell you the name of the song(s) or dance.  They will have no idea of a concept that was to be taught for the day.  While not necessarily "damaging" to a child's learning (they may be able to "figure it out on their own" later on), music instruction should be focused on just one thing - learning music.  The songs, games, dances, and instruments are not the end goal themselves - they are the means to the end:  a deeper understanding of music.  If you prepare each lesson with the goal being a deeper understanding of a particular musical element, your students will learn music.  With this in mind, the materials (songs, games, dances, instrument parts) are irrelevant.  You can use anything that you wish as long as it provides a solid example of the topic.  If you're preparing a performance - that's fine.  Use the song material to teach the concepts outlined in your curriculum.  Don't let "the performance" be the only goal (although, on one level, it definitely is a goal - performance is important!).

This takes me to a side tangent that needs to be addressed.  There seems to be two camps when it comes to music education philosophy - those who believe music exists in the school curriculum because it is an art that is worthy of study in and of itself; and those who believe music exists in the school curriculum because it enhances learning in the other core academic subjects.  In case you haven't guessed by now, I am of the former rather than the latter.  Our students get enough "academic subject teaching" in their day - if they needed more, why not just put more math and reading into their day, why music?  If we as music educators perpetuate the idea that we exist for the sake of the other academics, we are surely shooting ourselves in the foot and putting ourselves in peril of being eliminated altogether.  Does the study of music actually enhance and solidify learning in other academic areas?  Absolutely!  There are a multitude of studies on the subject out there (do a quick Google search).  Is it the reason we study it?  No.  Enhancing and solidifying learning that occurs in other academic areas is a "happy accident" as a result of music study - not the sole reason we have music in the school curriculum.

There, I'm off my soap box.  Now...back to the curriculum.  In the coming weeks, I will be outlining what has been successful for me in teaching music.  I will outline grade level by grade level what I include for each of the musical elements.  I will not, however, be telling you when I teach it.  That, dear reader, is up to you.  Personally, I don't think it matters, as long as all of the material gets covered.  Some teachers like covering the same topic with every grade at the same time - that's fine.  For me, I get bored easily and like to mix it up.  So while I'm teaching meter to one grade level, I may be teaching form in the next.

I like to think music instruction is divided into two areas:  musical elements and music-related topics.  The musical elements are:  beat, rhythm, meter, melody, harmony, form, and tone color.  A subcategory can be included here that we'll call "expressive elements" - tempo and dynamics.  I include these as subcategories because you can't discuss a tempo without having a beat and you can't perform dynamics without combining it with one or several of the other elements.  Music-related topics are:  style, composers, music history, and music as related to culture (other cultures, patriotic music, etc.).  When teaching musical elements, the music-related goals can be addressed within those lessons.  For example, when addressing the element of meter, you can include some listening examples from Strauss imparting the knowledge that Johann Strauss was known as "The Waltz King" and was a 19th century romantic composer from Austria. 

Stay tuned for more details.  Until next week....

The Room

Some have asked about the setup of my classroom.  I decided to take some time to go over the layout and features of  "my domain."

Aside from the main layout, there are areas of the room that are worth discussing I suppose.  We'll start with "command central" - it's important that I have space that is mine.  This is an area that is strictly off limits to students:

The chair is mine from home - I redid my home office and took the "old" chair to my classroom.  Comfort when sitting is a must (since I'm on my feet most of the day).

Another part of this area is where I keep all my "stuff" for conducting my classes - this area is also off limits to students.  It's just on the opposite side of my work area.  Not pictured is a book shelf (it would be behind me when I was snapping this picture) where I keep my software, DVD sets, teacher manuals, piano accompaniments, Music K-8 issues, etc.

I have my hand sign posters above the board, along with the traditional "Curwen-Kodàly Hand Sign" card set:

Want your very own hand sign set?  They are available here.

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I'm a big fan of making magnetic cards to save me writing and re-writing things that I write over and over during the week.  Here you can see how I use them.  My word wall is completely magnetic (and color-coded by topic) and, when posting objectives for the day's lessons, I frequently just grab a word off the word wall and use the "action words" I have set up under my objective area:

And for those very rare moments that I get to sit while teaching (before the "teach on your feet" crowd gets all crazy, the moments are RARE, but when you've been doing this since the mid-80's, your feet and legs need brief breaks now and then):

Found this great "tractor seat" find on Wal-Mart's website.  The blue matches my risers!

 I found these magnetic maps (US and World) in one of those "around-the-house" kind of catalogs.  If I could remember which one, I would tell you.  They are really great for pointing out geography when discussing a folk song or a piece of world music, especially since geography (from any part of the world) seems to be a lacking subject these days.  The maps are puzzles, so when talking about Kentucky as being the area where Blue Grass music started, I can pull the state right off the wall:

When you have 24+ guitars, storage can be an issue.  I convinced my principal this would be worthwhile purchase:  24 guitar hooks.  So far, totally worth it!  I assist the students in getting them down...

You can see some of my other Orff and Joia Tube instruments below the guitars.  Here is a table in the back of my room where I keep various instruments, glockenspiels, Boomwhackers®, etc.  I wrote an article for the national Orff newsletter Reverberations a few years ago about the Boomwhacker® holder.  I made it from the box in which the two-octave set is shipped:

I keep two buckets (one wash, one rinse) on the top of my filing cabinet for my loaner recorders when students forget or for those who chose not to purchase their own.  The angle of the photograph kind of hides the rinse bucket, but it's behind the wash bucket which has a teaspoon of germicide in the water:

In front of the filing cabinet is my IWB (currently the Mimio board).  As you can see, I have an abundance of lined boards in my room and this Wenger portable music board was moved into this school when it was built - transferred from the older building.  I had the carpentry staff mount the IWB onto it (because I am expected to share my board) and it works great as an IWB, a projection screen, and when not in use, another display surface.  My classroom rules and the school "values code" are posted on it with magnetic strips stuck to the back of the posters:

Next to the IWB is my electronic keyboard storage mentioned in an earlier post.  This was built for me by a coworker completely out of leftover scrap plywood and an extra can of polyurethane he had - total cost:  $0  I gave him the specks on the shelf size I wanted for the particular model of keyboard I have, he did the building.

Here is a "distance shot" so you can see how the whole space fits together:

The open area behind the risers is for circle movement and games.  You can see in the distance I use the back of my piano as "bulletin board" space as well - I bought some large corrugated plastic sheets from an art supply website and mounted them to the back of my piano using heavy duty Velcro strips.  Currently the two posters there are the "rewards" and "consequences" posters that go with my pink "rules" poster on the IWB.

I hope you got some ideas from this one.  Until next week...

Reward: Easier Days in the Classroom

This idea is a spin on the Whole Brain Teaching "scoreboard" idea.  Every school year, I start with the explanation of the rules, the reasons for them, and the consequences.  Throughout the majority of my career, I have stuck to keeping rules to a minimum (just five in my class).

When I saw Ron Clark speak a few years back, I realized that maybe limiting rules to just five wasn't enough (if you're not familiar with him and his book The Essential 55 you can find the Ron Clark Academy here or Google his name).  Yes, we shouldn't have a litany of rules to remember, but we are elementary teachers; and, as you are probably aware, students are coming to us with less and less structure and even basic rules like "Keep hands, feet, and objects to yourself" have to be broken down into exactly what that rule means.

With this background, I decided that I would not only review my classroom rules, but I would also go over a list of expectations I have for students to follow when in music class.  It turned out to be eleven, but that could easily change next week or next month.  Now before going on, I have to tell you, I have never, EVER been the "let's give a reward" kind of teacher.  I have always been a firm believer in intrinsic rewards for doing the right thing.  You do it because it feels good and you're supposed to do it and you will reap the benefits by doing so.  Unfortunately, our society has definitely become more focused on "what do I get if I do?" rather than "I do it because that's what I'm supposed to."  So, when in Rome...

I set up a point system and made it extremely easy to attain "the reward" these first few weeks of school.  I figured I could up the ante as the year goes on in case my children become complete angels in the process (oh yeah...when that happens, I'll let you all know!).  Since I have eleven expectations, I awarded each of my classes eleven possible points per class.  If they earned a total of 40 points during the first five weeks of school,  I would provide them with a "free day."  They seemed to like this idea.  I will say that I had a couple of classes that honestly did not deserve this reward, but in order to know what they'd be missing out on, I felt it was important that they get to experience it at least once, so I was very lenient during the first five weeks as far as awarding points.

My curriculum is intense and there is little time for "free days" (especially with all the interruptions in my class schedule that occur throughout the year).  But, I have learned:  give up the time in one chunk, or give up more time on a daily basis re-directing inappropriate or unruly behavior.  I will say, so far, it's been working.  The focus has been better (for the most part) and the retention of information seems to have increased.  The atmosphere in my class has always been "fun" but this year it seems even more so and much more relaxed.

"What is a free day?"  You may be asking.  I have stuff in my room...lots and lots of stuff.  And I pride myself on keeping it in good condition.  Therefore, a "free day" in the music room cannot mean "bedlam is allowed today."  Absolutely not!  In my school, electronic devices (iPods, iPads, cell phones, etc.) are forbidden.  I cleared it with my principal and told my 3rd, 4th, and 5th grade classes, "You may bring your electronics to school ONLY for music class and YOU are responsible for them..."  I teach in a high-poverty area, so I didn't know what I would see coming in...but, surprisingly, it worked out well!  I also put the stipulation of "what you do with the device must be related to MUSIC."  I made this pretty broad - to include simply listening to music.  After all, when do kids get the TIME these days to just sit and listen?

For students who didn't bring their own devices, I had a host of things set up for them to do.  They could use my electronic keyboards (with headphones) and I gave certain classes specific tasks to accomplish with them.  I had "Music ACE" set up on my desktop computer, I had Quavermusic.com set up on my laptop, and I had a Belkin Rockstar hooked up to my iPad so students could play with music apps like Garage Band, Instruments, Recorder Master, and Piano Dust Buster.  The Rockstar allows 5 sets of headphones to be connected to one device, thus creating a "listening center" in the classroom.

I was slightly concerned embarking on this during the past week.  I envisioned unfocused children moving from place to place, getting into trouble with each other, broken equipment, very little learning happening...and the nightmares went on.  I am happy to report, there was not a single incident.  My students stayed focused and after each class we had a discussion about how enjoyable it was.  I reiterated "THIS is what you are working toward when you earn points during music class..."  They agreed it was something they'd like to do again.

Here are few "candid moments" from the week:

Five students working on "Piano Dust Buster" using the Belkin Rockstar headphone splitter (white object on the floor).

Two girls blast note values in Quaver's Arcade on quavermusic.com (accounts are free with an email address!)

A third grade boy shares his own iPad with two fellow students.

Until next week...