Using Children's Literature to Prepare and Practice Music

Below are the handouts from my PMEA Annual Conference session.  Enjoy!

Witman Session Handout

Witman Bibliography

Music In Our Schools

March is known in the music world as "Music In Our Schools Month (MIOSM) ".  Started in 1975 by the Music Educator's National Conference (MENC), MIOSM has grown from a single day celebrating music in education, to an entire month.  MIOSM advocates for music education in all schools and there are many special events, such as a nationwide concert and advocacy days at state and federal government building, that help us celebrate that fact.

This year MIOSM's nationwide theme is "Music Inspires."  At Mill Road and Bainbridge Elementary school, we recreated the logo by having each student in the building put their name on a leaf to add to our tree.

Adults in the building were encouraged to join our celebration by putting their name on a blue bird.  Many of the teachers really got into decorating their birds!

I loved the students' reaction after the tree was completed!  Many of them were in awe of the tree and wanted to find their name.  Having their name on the tree represents something very important that all children yearn for:  a sense of belonging.  Everyone deserves to have musical experiences and it is my hope that my students feel just as much included in our music classroom as they do seeing their name on our tree.  Music certainly has inspired many things for me.  What has music inspired for you?

The Playground Connection

This past week 2nd grade learned a new game called "Hot potato, Pass it on".  I recently learned this from a website called Active Music Digital.  Instead of passing the "hot potato" as quickly as they can, the students learned that to play the game properly, they needed to bounce the ball to the metric beat (beginning of each measure in the song).  I love this game for many reasons:

1. ASSESSMENT:

I was able to assess if students do or do not feel the metric beat.  In first grade, we spend a lot of time understanding how to perform a steady beat, which does not come naturally to some students.  However, 2nd graders start to understand that steady beats are grouped and we can perform several different steady beats (micro beats: the subdivision of the beat; macro beats: the beat; and metric beats: the beginning of each measure or group of notes.)  I was surprised how many of my good steady beaters were having trouble finding the metric beat in our song, while for others it came as naturally as walking.  This formative assessment allowed me to gauge my student's progress and make changes to my upcoming lessons to accommodate the students who need more practice in this area.

2. SINGING:

The students enjoyed singing the song, even if we sang it 20 times in a row!  They loved it, everyone participated without reminders and everyone was singing with energy!

3. SOCIAL LESSONS:

While students got "out" during the game, it was not based on skill.  Getting out was simply based on chance.  Students learned that getting out may be undesirable, but it was part of the game.  This is a life lesson that children need to practice in order to understand how to control their feelings in similar situations in the future.

 

My favorite moment while teaching and playing this game was when one of my students said, "Hey!  We could play this on the playground!"  It is surprising how novel that concept is to the students.  Children learn first through play and yet there has become this disconnect between what we learn in the classroom and what we do outside of the classroom.  

Time outside the classroom, whether it be on the playground, at home, or in the comings and goings of our daily lives, should be time for students to practice what they are learning in school.  For my 2nd graders, taking the "Hot Potato" song to the playground is a great way to practice finding the meter of a song.  What they don't realize is that they can do this with any song that they know!

Parents can cultivate the idea of bringing school learning into daily life by modeling ways that children can take the concepts they are learning and applying it to a real situation.  If your child is learning addition skills, simply turn an everyday routine into an addition sentence (ex. You put one plate on the table and we have 3 more plates to set.  How many plates do we have altogether?).  Children become more comfortable with asking questions and excited about learning if the adults in their life model it for them.

Up Beat Learning

The Up Beat! preschool music program is in full swing!  So far we have had two energizing sessions with 20 children taking part in at least one of the sessions.  To prepare for my preschool lessons, I have been reading into Edwin Gordon's Music Learning Theory (read about it here).  In particular, I am using many ideas from Gordon's early childhood music curriculum: Music Play.

Aside from moving, chanting and singing in several different meters and modes, I have also incorporated at least one song-based picture book into the lesson. I try to model ways that the parents can do the same at home.

The first week we read The Ants Go Marching by illustrator Jeffrey Scherer.  Musically, this was a great book to work on steady beat and singing a song that is in minor and 6/8 meter.  Better still is the fact that we were able to pause to cumulatively count from 1 to 10 on each page.  The children not only practiced counting, but also made connections between the name of the number and what the number looks like in print, as well as one-to-one correspondence in the pictures.  After doing things like this at home with my son, he is now almost able to count to 10 on his own and is even recognizing numbers in print at only 20 months old!

The first book we read this week was Winter Wonderland by illustrator Jacqueline Rogers.  I had intended on using this song the week prior, but we had to cancel our session due to our own winter wonderland!  I loved pausing during the song to make connections to things like weather.  The children shared things they see during the winter time and we talked about what they like to do in the snow.

The second book we sang this week was If You're Happy and You Know It by illustrator Jane Cabrera.  I love this book because the kids already know the song and can interact with movements and sounds that are described in the lyrics.  It's a great way to help the kids recognize patterns (i.e. clapping 2 times after I sing "clap your hands").  At the end of the book is a picture of all of the animals from the previous pages.  We took some time to discuss the characters in the book by naming the types of animals.  Next week we will use this song and sing it with feelings.  The children will share different types of feelings and things that you do when you feel that way (i.e. happy = smile, sad = cry, sleepy = yawn, etc...).

For those of you interested in song-based pictures books, Jane Cabrera has a collection of really great ones!  The other two books I mentioned are from Scholastic's Sing and Read Storybooks.  Again, there are a lot of really great song-based picture books from Scholastic.  Some even come with sing-a-long CDs.

Up Beat!

For the past few months I have been working on putting together a preschool music program and now I am very excited to announce that my program "Up Beat!" will become a reality starting in February!

Up Beat! is a preschool music program for children of the Elizabethtown Area School District, ages 3-5 (not enrolled in kindergarten) and their parents.

The current session of Up Beat! will meet in the music room at Mill Road Elementary School on Tuesdays from 3:00-3:30 for the months of February through May 2016.

What is Up Beat!?

In music, an "up beat," or anacrusis, is the unaccented beat before an accented beat or "down beat."  The term "up beat" was chosen as the name for our preschool music program, because I feel that the key to successful students is starting their education before formal education starts in kindergarten, and building connections between home and school educational efforts.  It is also the goal of Up Beat! to create a joyful and up beat learning experience.  Children who have joyful learning experiences are more likely to engage in learning in the future.

"Ana-crucial" Elements of Up Beat!:

 Below is a list of "ana-crucial" elements that Up Beat! will focus on.  The word "ana-crucial" is a play on the words anacrusis and crucial, meaning that these elements are necessary for the development of young learners before they enter formal education.

1. Exposure: There is a lot of research that has been done on how we learn.  Most findings boil down to exposure!  You can't learn it if you aren't exposed to it.  The more you are exposed to something that you need to learn, the easier it will be for you to retain the information and apply it in new situations.  By exposing children to music concepts and other core concepts at a young age, they will be more equipped to make connections to their experiences and learn new concepts in the future.  Up Beat! strives to expose children at a young age to the arts and core subjects.

2. Engagement: In order for a child to become a life-long learner, engagement is key.  If a child is not engaged, he may not want to learn or may not make the deep connections necessary for him to be able to apply his learning in new situations.  However, it is also imperative for parents and guardians, the child's first teachers, to be engaged in the child's learning as well.  Up Beat! strives to build connections between home and school education by engaging the parents and child in the educational process.

3. Exploration: Children often first begin to learn by exploring the world around them through imaginative play and games.  Exploration often leads to opportunities for children to apply their learning in new situations.  Up Beat! provides a safe environment for children to explore their world through imaginative play, movement, songs and games.

Space for Up Beat! is limited and will be granted on a first come, first served basis.  

Please register today!

 To register please, contact me by email (nichole_witman@etownschools.org).

Melodic dictation in 1st grade

In 1st grade general music, one of the biggest priorities is to teach a solid foundation in rhythmic and melodic literacy.  However, as many elementary music educators may agree, rhythm often holds a higher priority than melody when teaching students how to read music.  There are many reasons why rhythm should hold a higher priority: it's the frame work from which we hang melodies from; music needs rhythm, but not all music needs a melody; and, frankly, it is more concrete and therefore easier to teach to young minds!

With that being said, I have a plethora of rhythmic games and strategies that I use with the students and I try to make sure we do some rhythmic sight reading and other rhythmic work in every music class.  I also try to have some melodic work as well, but I've noticed that I have less games and strategies for teaching melody.  I'm trying to push myself to include more melodic decoding and dictation activities into my lessons so students become just as comfortable with their melodic literacy as they are with their rhythmic literacy.

  When we first labeled melodic sounds, we started with the terms "high" and "low."  The students became comfortable with distinguishing between high and low sounds by comparing the two different sounds and labeling what they heard.  Later we renamed the sounds sol (high) and mi (low) and discussed how it was important to rename them, because in music we don't just have one high sound and one low sound.

One way that we decode and dictate melody is by using a staff and bingo chips as the tones.  1st grade is currently working with a two line staff (one line for sol and one line for mi).  Here are a few pictures of the 1st graders dictating some familiar melodies:

"Teddy Bear Teddy Bear" -- from the song Teddy Bear Teddy Bear Turn around

"Have the wish I wish tonight"--from the song Star Light Star Bright

 

We used "scaffolding" by first doing this activity as a class, then in pairs, before trying it individually.

One strategy for decoding the melody was to clap the phrase using high clapping for sol and a low clapping for mi.

The students took turns pointing to the dots as they sang the song to check their answer.

This week we will follow up this activity with a melody recognition and matching game on our interactive board.  Students will be assessed on their ability to hear sol and mi melodies with a formal assessment in 2 weeks by telling me if the melody they see matches the melody they hear.

Super Hero Holiday

On December 21st, the 3rd graders at Bainbridge Elementary helped to lead the school in our annual Carol Sing.  This year Bainbridge Elementary has a super hero theme, so for our Carol Sing, I wrote an original script to play on the super hero theme.  

"Super Hero Holiday" tells the story of Santa and Mrs. Claus before they became the traditional characters that we think of today.  In the beginning, Santa was 'Super Santa' and Mrs. Claus was 'Captain Claus', super heroes who's mission it was to save the world's toys from destruction!  Super Santa soon realizes that the two super heroes have been fixing the toys of naughty children who do not take care of them and, in fact, there were nice children who did not have any toys at all.  Super Santa and Captain Claus decide to change their mission and deliver toys to the nice children of the world instead.  After changing their focus, they realized that they will not be able to complete the mission alone.  With each obstacle, they add more super heroes to their team (the reindeer) until they are able to complete their mission of delivering toys to the nice children of the world.

25 students volunteered their time during several lunch recesses to practice dramatically reading the script.  Both 3rd grade classes learned 2 songs each, which were sung throughout the dramatic reading and the whole school participated in our sing-a-long intermission.  This year we had over 75 parents and community members in attendance.

Miss Richter's class opened the program with the song "North Pole Rock 'n' Roll" by Teresa Jennings.  

Miss Richter's class also learned an interlude on the orff instruments (xylophones) that I wrote for them.  After several sessions of practice, four students were selected to play the interlude every time a new super hero was introduced in the story.

Finally, Miss Richter's class performed "Teamwork" by John Riggio as Captain Claus is trying to convince Super Santa to add more team members to complete their mission.

 

After the whole school sing-a-long, Mrs. Stough's Class took the stage.  They performed  "Santa Claus is on His Way" by Teresa Jennings.  Several students were selected to play the BoomWhackers.

Mrs. Stough's Class closed the show with "A Super Celebration" by Teresa Jennings.

 A big 'Thank You' to Miss Antrim for being our Videographer!