Middle School Choral Madness

(aka Herding squirrels and teaching them to sing on pitch)

Middle School is a tough and fantastic age group to work with. They challenge you daily and demand your best; the most successful teachers serve that expectation and energy right back to them. Middle schoolers want to be both kids and grown up. I know I try to feed both halves of that personality split. Let them be goofy when appropriate and insist on professionalism when it’s time to work and perform. I also do as much as I can to lead them to certain things subconsciously for two reasons: 1. It’s good pedagogy and 2. Their subconscious usually doesn’t argue with me.

During warm ups everyone vocalizes the fullest range of the voice (both girls and boys). We do at least one overall ascending exercise, one descending exercise, and either a range extender or a tongue twister. I teach them why we do certain vocalizes and what their instrument is as scientifically as possible; that knowledge gives them responsibility and accountability for their participation and performance in class and on stage. For instance my favorite warm up is what I call a lip bubble (aka motorboat sound). Ascending and descending the perfect fifth, either with a legato or glissando articulation, gives the students a limited range to manage or focus on. This exercise is wonderful for supporting and maintaining airflow as well as relaxation of many muscles. Occasionally adding the outstretched tongue, which can release some minor tongue tension, injects some purposeful silliness at the beginning of the rehearsal. I usually begin in E flat or E and ascend by half steps to D’. If the piano is used at this point, I try to only have the open fifth or adding the playing the do, re, and sol as a chord to get their ear active in tuning.

Music a la Cart: Limited Resource Edition

       Hello everyone! My name is Bethany Bassler and I’m a PK-8^th music teacher in North Carolina. I am in my second year at my school and at the beginning of August I got a call from my administrator saying that my room, which was being transferred to a trailer, would not be ready at the beginning of the school year. Eek!  The result would be music on a cart to start the year, with an undefined open date to a trailer room.

Let the Great Organization Begin!

All items in my classroom had to be organized into three categories: what I wanted on the cart, what I eventually wanted in my classroom, and what was going into long-term storage. My window of cart-teaching was anywhere from 3-5 weeks, but even that was questionable, so my selection of materials had to be varied and cover all grade levels for that time frame of teaching. I didn’t know this at the time, but I also had very limited access to any other materials that were eventually going into the trailer, so switching out materials was near impossible.

The majority of my students are on a modified sequence, so I also had to consider what materials I used most frequently and had the most versatile uses across grade levels.

What I Took...

Here’s my top 5 items from my cart that I couldn’t have lived without:

1.       Rhythm sticks
               I use rhythm sticks in almost every class! My students fell in love with Acka Backa last year, so that was a must-have when I was choosing materials. I also use them as hammers for Cobbler, Cobbler and stirring spoons for Bate, Bate. Establishing the beat with kindergarten at the beginning of the year, I knew I would need them for Bee Bee Bumblebee. With my older students, I did a lot of stick passing games, like Deedle Deedle Dumpling and Bomberra.

Integrating New Students into the Music Classroom

Hi everyone! This is Jamie Parker. Like many of you, I’m getting ready to head back to school soon. This year, I am facing a new challenge: due to population changes, my school is re-districting. About 1/3 of my students will be new to my school. In preparation for this change, I have started to brainstorm how to integrate these new students into my music classroom. Today, I’ll share my thoughts with you.

These ideas will work for first-year teachers, teachers new to a position, or experienced teachers who are getting new students.

(Thanks to Graphics from the Pond for the number graphics.)

• Some of the students you will see this year will come with “a story” from their old school/teacher. Try to give each child a fresh start. Everyone deserves a second chance, especially children. Your students have had an entire summer to grow, and they will be entering a new environment. Greet every child positively and seek the good in each student to avoid a self-fulfilling prophecy.

Fostering a student-centered environment in the music room

Hi everyone! This is Aileen from Mrs. Miracle's Music Room. Today, I'm blogging about something that has been on my mind quite a bit lately as I've been planning lessons: how to foster a student-centered environment in the music room.

There are so many things that I love about the Kodály-inspired classroom...but at times, it can feel somewhat teacher-centered if taught in a traditional way. Sometimes, students DO need a whole-class approach. They need to sing together as a community, they need to prepare and practice rhythms and solfa together, they need the teacher to share musical knowledge. However, at some point, in order for students to transfer their knowledge, the teacher does need to step away and become more of a facilitator. So how do we do that in a Kodály-inspired classroom? Here are my favorite strategies!

Using Socrative in the Music Classroom

Hi everyone! This is Jamie Parker. A week before school began this past year, I arrived in my classroom to find five iPads sitting on my desk. I was thrilled! BUT I had no idea how I was going to use them with my students. I wanted the iPads to be used in a meaningful way. I began digging for different tools where my students could prepare and practice different elements, could create something new, and could be assessed on known material.

One app I found for assessment is Socrative. This app allows teachers to create their own questions and tracks all answers from individual students. I began exploring how I could use this app with my students:

I. Getting Started

• My first step in getting started with Socrative was to create a teacher account (completely free!) on the website: www.socrative.com.
• Then, I downloaded the student app on each of my devices (also free).
•  Once I was set up, I tried to think of ways I could create quizzes. I wanted my quizzes to directly reflect what the students were learning. I realized that I could not input musical notation into my question, but I could insert a picture (more on that below).

Student Teachers.....

"It was the best of times, it was the worst of times...."  Hi - this is Karla from CMajorLearning.  That statement is how I feel on the first day of having a student teacher!  I'm sure many can relate to this as I LOVE having a student teacher, "best of times", but not knowing what they are going to be like can be the "worst of times".  So, what are some things that I can do to set us both up for success?  Here are a few ideas that have worked for me!

Be Organized - There is so much information that needs to be shared between the cooperating teacher and student teacher!  I have found the way that works best for me is to put everything together in a student teacher handbook.  Check out my version, available on TeachersPayTeachers by clicking here.  This resource is a place to write everything down and use as a reference through out the experience.  I put mine together and get to the student teacher about a month before the experience begins.  Then, on the first day, we can hit the ground running!

Be Communicative - Open and honest communication is key - on the part of the cooperating teacher and the student teacher. Both parties need to express their thoughts and feeling clearly, professionally and respectfully.  Giving and receiving criticism should be done constructively and praise, no matter how big or small, should be done on a regular basis - just as we do with our students!

Musical Review after a Long Break

Hi everyone! It's Aileen from Mrs. Miracle's Music Room. Since many of us are headed back tomorrow after a long two-week break, I thought I'd write about reviewing after a long break. Granted, two weeks isn't super long, but since I only see my students once a week, it will be three weeks by the time they see me again! Here are a few quick and easy ways you can review with your students after a long break, so you can jump back into your lessons.

#1: Reading rhythm patterns

Sometimes, simply reading through some rhythm patterns can go a long way to getting students reacquainted with rhythms they should know well. Since it's the New Year, I just uploaded these rhythm flashcards to my store for free! Just print them out, cut them out, then read each with your students. You might try 4 beats apart, then 2 beats apart, then the third time through, no beats apart, which is a bit trickier and requires musical memory!
Since "Star Wars" is all the rage right now, another fun way to review rhythm reading with your students is to use "Rhythm Wars" by Amy Abbott (which can be purchased in a bundle or separately). The rhythms come on the screen just like the opening credits to the movie...so fun! (For more "Star Wars" activities for the music room, see this blog post.)
You could also simply have students read the rhythm to a known song. You may even ask them before reading what each rhythm is called. Then, dive into reading!