Turkey Time in the Music Room

Hello and Happy Fall!

This is Tanya from Teaching Music: Tanya's Kodály Aspiring Blog.
I really love this "late-Autumn" time of year. 
However, I was at the grocery store the day after Halloween, and guess what, it’s Christmas! I went to Starbucks: yes it’s Christmas there, too. I made a trip to Target, you guessed it, more Christmas! “But wait !" I want to shout, “I want more fall! What about Thanksgiving? Winter doesn't even start until December 21st!" (sigh.)

Yes, I know there’s not much commerce in Thanksgiving beyond buying a turkey and trimmings, but let’s give a little love to this grateful holiday.

Today I'm sharing a couple of turkey themed songs and games that I include in my lessons the week before Thanksgiving. 

Thanksgiving Day 

This is a fun, simple song I sing with 1st graders. (If I taught kindergarteners I would share it with them, too.) After performing this short little song for the students, I pull out my autoharps and have the students down strum on the steady beat. One student can strum with a pick while the other changes chords between FM and CM.

I recently acquired six cardboard dulcimers from another school, (yay!,) and we will be using them in 1st grade with this song. I can't wait!

Turkey Turkey Gobbler

This is a wonderful song to prep re or practice the do pentatonic scale. Additionally, there's a bonus vocal exploration opportunity for students. 
(I love to sneak that in whenever possible 😉!)

I introduce this song by having the students listening to real turkey sounds, especially the "gobble." This website has some excellent short sound bites of turkeys gobbling, purring, and giving "alarm clucks."

The students and I have discovered that the best way to imitate a turkey gobble is by rapidly flipping the tongue back and forth across the top lip while making a sustained high pitch. (Hurray for the head voice!)

Turkey Ensemble Time:
Before the game we practice our gobbles by watching and responding to the conductor, first with the teacher as conductor and then a student conductor. This a fun way for the class to practice watching for cues, cut-offs, and dynamics.

Game Time:
My 3rd graders love playing this "Marco Polo" style game where the "farmer" is blindfolded and must call "Turkey!" while the turkey responds with a gobble. The action begins after everyone sings the song.

Literacy Time:
This song is a fine re practice song, especially with the half note re emphasis in the second measure. My students body sign solfa in 1st and 2nd grade and begin hand signs at the beginning of 3rd grade. This is a fun and simple song for them to utilize their hand signs while singing.

Other re practice ideas:

• Highlight the re s on the SMARTboard on on individual worksheets.
• Sing in solfege and inner-hear re.
• Play the melody on barred instruments.
• Use the last measure of Turkey Turkey Gobbler to transition to another excellent re song, Frosty Weather, by changing the rhythm:

And voilà! NOW we're in the winter songs!

I hope you and your students have a lovely Thanksgiving.

Luck o' the Irish to you! I'm going to share a few St. Patty's Day songs and activities for your music class that are kid-tested.

One of my student's favorite songs this time of year is "I Am a Jolly Leprechaun," with a hide and seek game. I learned it many, MANY years ago at a workshop and have since forgotten from whom it was learned. 

One child is the "Leprechaun" (for fun they may wear something, like a plastic shamrock necklace, to indicate they are the “Leprechaun"). The class hides eyes and sings while the "Leprechaun" hides plastic gold coins or shamrocks in the room (4-5 at a time). Once all items are hidden, the class opens their eyes. There is mass chaos if the whole class tried to find the items at once, so I call out first letters of first names, colors of clothing, birthday months, etc., so a smaller group of children are the finders. Those students get only twice through the song to seek and by the end must return to their seats, If there are stragglers, count down from 10 to 0 to give time to get there. Students who found an object come to the front of the room with the "Leprechaun." The Leprechaun then shows us where un-found items are (for time's sake). You can vary what those students who found an item have to do. The Leprechaun may ask, "What do you wish for?" and the students respond with a singing voice so pitch matching may be assessed. Or they might read a rhythm card which uses St. Patrick's objects (see examples below). The Leprechaun then chooses a new leader from the group of students who found an object to be the new Leprechaun, and a new round begins. You could play this game like Lucy Locket singing loudly or quietly to lead finders to an object, but then only one child gets to seek. With 4 or 5 finders each round, you can cycle through a whole class in a short amount of time.

I learned this song as a simple ball catching game, and in my own classes, I switched to using beanbags to toss to avoid all of the stray bouncing balls. I always wondered the origin and just assumed it was a playground chant. Boys and Girls come out to Play - a Collection of Irish Singing Games by Maurice Leyden, it may derive from Irish games in which children bounce a ball, or more than one ball, against a wall and perform motions while the ball is in flight. In the case of Plansies Clapsies, I learned it as a game in which a ball/beanbag is just tossed in the air and the actions are done while the object is in the air. Below are the instruction to the game.

Plainsies- simply toss and catch
Clapsies- toss, clap catch
Twirl around- toss, turn in a complete circle, catch (I simplified- roll hands around one another)
Backsies- toss and catch behind your back (I simplified- toss, touch back, catch)
Right hand- toss and catch with R hand  
Left hand- toss and catch with L hand
Toss it high- toss high, catch
Toss it low- toss low, catch
Touch your knee- toss, bring knee up and touch it, catch
Touch your toe- toss, bring toe up and touch it, catch
Touch your foot- toss, bring foot up and touch it, catch
Through you go- lift a leg and toss ball under, catch with opposite hand

Here are a few other terms original to the ball against the wall game that could be adjusted to use in a classroom as a toss and catch game:

Plainy: The ball is thrown against the wall and caught on the rebound.                                           

Clappy: As for Plainy, but clap hands when the ball is in flight.
Rolley: Roll arms over one another.
To Backey: Clap hands behind back.
Hippy: Place hands on hips.
Tippy: Touch the ground.
Jelly Bag: Hands are held together,fingers spread wide apart to form a "bag" when catching the ball.
Basket: Weave fingers together, knuckles facing backwards to you to catch.                                  Burl Around: Turn completely around.
Downey/Dropsie: Allow the ball to bounce once off the ground before being caught.
Right/Left Leg: Throw the ball under a raised right or left leg to hit the wall first.                                 Archy: Separate legs to form an arch, and the ball is thrown from behind, under the arch       
Walla: Cross one leg in front of the other when the ball is in flight.
Stampy: Stamp both feet on the ground when the ball is in flight.
Pipey/Pipsie: Throw the ball straight up and catch it.

I haven't tried it yet, but thought it would be a fun idea to have groups of students come up with their own chants using the various words for the motions to perform for the class. In any case, this is a good song for older beginners who need practice with simple rhythms and melodies.

Below is a sample of a color by note worksheet for St. Patrick's Day. These kinds of worksheets are great for subs.

In order for you to download an actual PDF, I think I have to link it. I'm sending you to my Teacher's Pay Teachers page which at the moment I don't really use. My apologies. I'm defending my dissertation in about a month, so haven't had time to actually get it up and running. Maybe in the future. Here is a link to the PDF:

Pot-of-Gold-Color-by-Note

Happy St. Patrick's Day! Enjoy. 

Kindergarten music lesson ideas

Hi everyone! This is Aileen from Mrs.Miracle’s Music Room. As I dive into writing lesson plans for this week, I thought I’d write a blog post with a Kindergarten lesson that worked really well for my students and I this past month.

A little background about my Kindergarteners: I see them once a week for thirty-five minutes, and have six classes. At this point in the year, I’m about to present steady beat, have taught loud/quiet and fast/slow, and have done lots of vocal exploration.

With this lesson, students were brought into the room follow-the-leader style with me chugging like a train, and then we chanted “Engine Engine.” I had them wind into a circle as we said the chant two or three times, and then we sat down.

Then, we sang “Here we are together,” which is to the tune of “The more we get together.” The lyrics I use are:

Oh, here we are together, together, together,

Oh, here we are together in music today.

With Mrs. Miracle, and Macy, and Jenna, and Scott, and Michael, etc…

(sing all of the kids’ names around the circle)

Oh, here we are together in music today.

On the “day” part of “today,” I have students hit the ground. If there is an even number of students in the class, you’d sing your name again  at the end to even it out.

After that, we move onto greetings, in which I sing to students “Hello, Kindergarten,” and they sing back, “Hello Mrs. Miracle” on sol-mi. I ask them questions like “How was your weekend?” or “What’s your favorite color?” and then answer back as a group (with lots of answers being sung at the same time) and then I call on individual students. I use a toy microphone which students love to sing into, and then write down on a rubric of 1-4 how students sing so I can track their pitch-matching.

Middle School Choral Madness (aka Herding squirrels and teaching them to sing on pitch)

Hi everyone, this is Amanda Isaac. 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.

As for voicing here’s how it works in my classroom. I teach them a short song or fragment and we sing it in multiple keys. I then bring the students up to the piano in small groups, eight to ten at a time, always of the same gender, and we sing thorough them again. I call this a Voice Check (like a doctor’s check-up). No one ever sings by themselves (which reduces anxiety) and I move around the circle "casually" listening to the individuals sing. I then ask them to identify which key felt best for them. The students know that I always take their opinion into account when deciding their voice part and that they don’t always get what they want. Their voice part is determined by how many singers there are in the ensemble, their ability to match pitch, overall tone quality, range, and level of experience. Students sing the part that fits their voice the best.

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.

Sequencing Start-Up

Hi everyone, this is Laura Beese, and I’m excited to be blogging for the first time here at Kodály Corner! I just started teaching at a new school this year, so sequencing for a new group of students has been consuming my thoughts. Hopefully some of my reflections will be helpful to you whether you’re in your first year of teaching or your fifteenth!

Building Community

Just as Jamie talked about in the previous post, kids will be open to whatever you bring to them if they love you and they love coming to music. I look for activities that are going to get kids moving, playing name games, mixing, and singing together. It’s important to me that kids have a blast in music and leave with big grins on their faces looking forward to the next class. (This is true of every lesson, but FUN is especially a focus of the first few weeks.) Though expectations are an important part of a first day lesson, I only spend five minutes on explicit teaching of the “rules,” and the rest of the lesson is spent actively practicing the expectations through the kinds of games, dances, and songs we’ll be doing the rest of the year. Below are some of the students’ favorite activities from this year’s fist few lessons:

• K/1st: Page’s Train (fast/slow; names)
• 2nd: Jump Josie (circle play party with cumulative partner choosing)
• 2nd, 3rd: Julie Ann Johnson (closing song with guitar where students get to decide where Julie will travel, how she'll get there, and what she'll do. They loooove this one!)
• 3rd, 4th: Sasha mixer (Energetic and easy-to-teach mixer)
• 4th, 5th: Funga Alafia (I used as a chorus for a name game. Students would create 4-beat ostinato patterns for the class to copy during singing, then four individuals at a time would say "My name is _______" and the class would echo. Great synco-pa prep , and ripe with extensions for drumming and instruments! Amy Abbott has nice slides and notation for teaching Funga Alafia in her back to school set!)
• 3rd, 4th: King Kong Kitchie (Closing song with call/response and verse/refrain that 3rd and 4th grade love. Also a great tika-tika prep.)

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!

#1: Rotating Centers

Several years ago, I began experimenting with centers in my classroom. I had seen them done well in my daughter's Kindergarten classroom, and thought I would try it in my room. It has been a wonderful journey, and a great way to not only foster a more student-centered classroom, but to provide time to work with and assess students one-on-one while the other students are engaged in exciting activities! With rotating centers, I typically have four centers around the room that are focused on practicing the same concept in different ways. For example, for ta and ti-ti, I might have one center at the SMART board, where students are throwing a squishy ball at the board and then reading patterns, another center in which students play rhythm patterns on non-pitched percussion, a third center with worksheets for ta and ti-ti, and the last center with me, in which each student individually reads five patterns. Every five or so minutes, I have students rotate to the next center until they've been to all of the centers. It does have a much more student-centered feel to it, because instead of you teaching the students, students are often teaching each other! Whether they are explaining to each other how to play High D on the recorder, or reminding each other that la is a step above sol,  it's a really awesome thing to step away and let students process the information and teach each other! If you're looking for more information about centers, here are several blog posts with more details about using centers!

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.  

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!

#2: Melodies/ Poison

I like to have students echo me on solfa, in an activity I simply call "melodies." If practicing do, you could sing sol-mi-do with hand signs, and students echo, then do-mi-sol, and students echo, etc. This is a great review activity, in that all they have to do is echo you!
To make it a bit more difficult, you could only sing the first solfa and show the hand signs for the remainder, and they have to sing back all. Or, you could play it on recorder and students have to sing back!
A game that students LOVE is called "Poison." You can write a melodic pattern on the board. You sing a pattern, they echo, UNLESS it's the Poison pattern! If they sing, you could either have that student sit down, or do a teacher against class challenge--if even one student sings, you get a point, but if no one sings, they get a point. They love the competition!
With this game, you could simply write the patterns on the board. If you want them already made, I have some Poison games in my store; here is the one for sol-mi.

#3: Flipped classroom

Since I sent home recorders with my 4th graders before break, I made videos so they could review at home in front of their computers. This idea is often called "flipped classroom," in which students teach themselves at home. Even if you're going back to school tomorrow, you could notify your classes of videos they can watch to help them review, so when they come back to music class the first time they haven't forgotten everything! Here is the video to review "B":

Click here to see other recorder videos on my YouTube channel. I made them general enough that any music teacher could use them. If you want to make your own videos, you can record right from your computer (I used QuickTime) then post to YouTube!

#4: Vocal exploration

Since many students have not used their singing voices over their break, it's always good to do some vocal exploration to help them warm their voices back up. Here are a few blog posts all about vocal exploration! Even with upper elementary students, you can do vocal exploration, simply by having them echo you, on sirens, on nonsense syllables, etc., to help them get back into their head voices.

#5: Just sing!

As important as it is to teach musical concepts through songs, it is just as important to sing for the sake of singing. One of my favorites I've done this year with 3rd grade is "Boots of Shining Leather." It is a beautiful song, works well in a round, AND has a great dance which can also be performed in a round! Yes, it is a great song for 4/4, for half note, and for low ti, but it is also just a great song to sing, especially to get students singing again after break!
Here is the notation:

And here are my 3rd graders performing it in a round:

I hope you all have a wonderful first day back, and that your students remember just as much as you think they should. :) Enjoy, and Happy New Year!

Music Teaching in Times of Crisis

Hi all - Christopher here.

As we know, last week there was a terrible tragedy in Paris, in which people from ISIS set off a series of coordinated attacks on civilians, resulting in the deaths of over 100 people.  This is horrible.  This is something that is hard to fathom. This is something that should never happen again.

But tragedy strikes, and when it does, it affects all of us.  I believe that for music educators, such experiences provide opportunities for us to offer support towards the healing process, by consciously engaging in musical experiences in our classes that can directly or indirectly allow children to process the issues that may have emerged for them.

In people’s lives, music serves a variety of important functions.  One of them is that it allows us to express emotions that may be difficult to express.  In music education (particularly at the elementary level), we are wary of opening too many cans of worms when it comes to emotional topics.  But I believe that we can do our children and our school communities a great service by providing them with ways to address difficult life situations.  Different teaching contexts will call for different responses, and knowing your population is important.  However, that should not be taken as an excuse to avoid difficult situations – we can all grow from them.

Picture Books for Upper Elementary

Hi everyone! This is Aileen from Mrs. Miracle's Music Room. I've blogged quite a bit about picture books for the music room (see those posts here), but today I thought I'd focus on picture books that can be used with upper elementary, since they can be harder to come by!

Here are some of my favorites...I'm planning on posting about some more soon! Click on each picture to view it on Amazon or Alibis.

"If you find a Rock"

by Lember and Christian

I found this picture book a few years ago, and immediately thought that it would work really well with "Obwisana," which you can find here. It is such a beautiful book, with poetic language and higher level prose.

"Before John as a Jazz Giant"

 by Weatherford and Qualls

I'm a big jazz fan, so was super excited to find this book! What a great way to incorporate jazz into your lessons and teach a little history! I plan on using this soon, and am thinking of playing John Coltrane as I read the book.

"The Drums of Noto Hanto" 

by James and Tsukushi

Based on a true story in ancient Japan, this book is a wonderful way to introduce taiko drumming to your students. I've read this book to my 4th graders (and even created a program based off the book and had them act it out) and they were actively engaged and excited! You could read it before a taiko or bucket drumming unit, or before a taiko drumming listening lesson.

"Marching to the Civil War: Drummer Boy" 

by Turner and Hess

I really love this book as a way to delve into the song "Fire in the mountain," which you can see below:

To play the game, one student stands in the middle, playing the drum to the beat. Half of the students stand, and half of the students sit. As the drummer plays, the standing students walk around the circle. Whenever the drummer stops (halfway through the song, at the end of the song, halfway through the second time...whenever!) all the standing students have to find someone to stand behind. The drummer also has to find someone, so one person is left without someone to stand behind (much like musical chairs.) Then, that person becomes the drummer, and the sitting students stand, the standing students sit, and the game continues.

The song is actually about the Revolutionary War, but the book is a great connection about what drummer boys had to do. I will warn you...it is a sad book with very real sentiments, as the drummer boy laments about the sounds of war, and about his friends who have died. I have had to be careful to not get choked up as a I read it to students. That being said, I think it is a great book for students to read, as it gives them perspective about how much life has changed over the years, and gives them some historical context behind a song they love.

Looking for more picture book ideas? Here is one of my Pinterest boards, focused on picture books:

What are your favorite picture books for upper elementary? Feel free to comment below!

Change up your sequence

Hi all, Christopher here.

One of the raps on Kodály-inspired teaching is that it can be rigid.  People think that there is some prescribed method that dictates exactly what you have to teach and when you have to teach it. 

Not true.

The reality is that while Kodály-inspired teaching is methodological and sequential, it doesn’t come in a one-size-fits-all package.  Every teacher has to take the overall principles and apply them to their own setting. 

For me, what that means is that each year, I re-visit my teaching sequence in the fall, when I am doing my long-term planning (see this link for a description of one way to do yearly planning).  Lately, my basic sequence of teaching rhythmic elements has been something like the following:

Etc.

Music du Jour

Hello everyone! This is Tanya LeJeune from Teaching Music: Tanya's Kodály Aspiring Blog.

I feel like I'm always striving for balance of activities in my music room. In a perfect world, during every lesson my students would work on melodic and rhythmic concepts, practice ensemble work with and without instruments, dance, create in self-directed groups, listen to excellent music, and engage in higher level thinking through thoughtful questioning. Often, I'll look at my long-range plans and think, "I'm not on-track with the 3rd graders, and they haven't learned a folk dance for quite a while!" or "I need to make sure I get that 5th grade listening lesson in before Halloween!"

One of my goals this year is to include more listening in my lessons. My students are simply not exposed to a variety of music outside of the music room, unless it's pop or hip hop. It's wonderful that they listen to music at all as I believe that any music listening eventually leads to more listening of other genres. It's my responsibility to broaden students' music listening and expose them to genres they might not encounter outside of the music room. (Have you ever played a orchestral piece for young students and had several remark, "Is this from The Nutcracker?" That's a sign that they have not heard much classical music!)

SLO's in the Kodaly-inspired classroom

Hi everyone! It's Aileen from Mrs. Miracle's Music Room. This week, I submitted my SLO's, or Student Learning Objectives, to my principal. If you are in Ohio or another state that requires SLO's, you know what I'm talking about and perhaps just submitted yours, but if you are in another state, you may have no idea what this means! In this blog post, I'll write about how I use SLO's to inform instruction, as well as how I use pre-tests and post-tests to improve each student's learning. Whether or not you have to submit a SLO, I hope you find this information helpful!

First, a bit about SLO's. I wrote this blog post about creating a SLO, but just in case you haven't heard this terminology before, I'll briefly explain. In Ohio, teachers now have to turn in at least one SLO, which is a plan that tracks students' growth. The results of a teacher's SLO count for 50% of the teacher's evaluation. Admittedly I was a bit nervous when I first heard I would have to do this, but I believe the process has made me a better teacher and more mindful of how well students understand specific concepts in my classroom.

Improvisation Part 2: Melody

Happy new school year! This is Jamie Parker. It’s been awhile since I last blogged, and I realized I never finished my series on improvisation. In my last blog post, I talked about rhythm improvisation. Today, I’ll go over some thoughts on melodic improvisation.

(Thanks to Sonya DeHart, Kelly Benefield, and Melonheadz for the graphics)

Melodic improvisation can be tricky! In my own classroom, I’ve experienced several situations in which my students did not feel completely comfortable with what I was asking of them, and the improvisation activity was a complete disaster. Ever had that happen to you?

Don't Sweat the Small Stuff Mindset...

Hello everyone! This is Karla from CMajorLearning.  I don't know about you but this past summer just flew by and here I am having just finished my 3rd week of teaching in the 2015-16 school year!

As with any start to the school year, it comes with mixed feelings!  I LOVE my job and what I get the privilege to do everyday but I also LOVE being home with my family during the summer as I'm sure many of you do too!

With this school year, I told myself that I'm not going to 'sweat the small stuff' and that I'm going to not let myself get overwhelmed with all the expectations placed upon myself, both from my district and my own personal expectations.  Thus far, I have been doing very well - some of my teaching 'stuff' (class lists, charts, diagrams, schedules etc) were not ready as early as I would have liked them to be but it was not a deal breaker!  My lessons plans have been written in a timely fashion and they are looking good if I do say so myself!  I'm enjoying the time in class with my students as well as working with some amazing colleagues!