Music Reading
Craig Sale, Editor
The new teaching year always brings a time of reflection and action-time to evaluate student progress and then implement a plan for the coming year. This year I am re-tooling some of my early-level reading activities. I have collected several ideas from previous articles in this Reading column and hope to incorporate them into my lessons. I am eager to see how these changes will help my students become even better music-readers.
Including kinesthetic experience
In the Spring 2003 issue, Dr. Alice Hammel wrote, "We all learn through various modalities (visual, aural, and kinesthetic)A kinesthetic approach combined with visual and aural elements helps students learn."
This year I am including kinesthetic elements in the introduction of "lines and spaces" with my young beginners and students with learning differences. In the past I have presented line-notes and space-notes by having the student see what I draw on the whiteboard. The only modality used in this case was visual. With the addition of "hands-on" kinesthetic experiences, I hope to avoid the confusion and apparent lack of focus I sometimes observe in young students working with the basic notational concept of lines and spaces.
To implement this goal, I have cut five 3-foot segments of heavy rope which I lay out on a table (using any number of the ropes). Each rope represents a "line" and the area between the ropes is a "space." I have students place their hand on the rope to feel the line and then place a hand in the area between to feel the space. We do a brief activity where the students place their hands on lines or spaces as I direct. In past years I have used lines and spaces made out of tape on the floor, and students would stand on the lines or spaces. Although this whole-body experience has been effective, I believe my new activity in which the students manually feel lines and spaces will be even more meaningful.
Our three-dimensional experience of notation will continue with students placing large noteheads (cut out of construction paper) on or between the ropes, seeing how notes "sit" on a line or a space. Sometimes the students will place the notes as I direct them; other times I will place the noteheads and the student will tell me if it is a line-note or a space-note.
When we begin
exploring intervals, the students will play them on the keyboard
(aural), create them using our ropes and noteheads (kinethestic),
and read them in pieces and at the board (visual). By expanding
the number of learning modalities used, I will have increased
the students' sensorial experiences and I suspect that because
of this, their understanding will be more complete. . .
from Rebecca Lewis' article
Change sparks both creativity and enthusiasm
I confess! I love summer and it's hard to see it go. Family vacations, gardening, picnics-summer provides a restful margin in an often hectic teaching year. It also provides treasured time to study, practice and create new goals for September, the starting point of a new teaching year. Recently I've been making a real effort to use summers to reflect upon the successes and failures of the previous teaching year and commit to making at least one significant change to my studio, whether it be the addition of a piece of equipment, updating the curriculum, providing more performance opportunities or creating a new student incentive program. In this way, I regularly evaluate what my studio offers and look for ways to improve the curriculum.
Change is good not only for our students, but for us. Borrowing
a phrase from today's business world, it is good for us to "think
outside the box." All of us have comfort zones. Many of us
feel comfortable with our familiar, "tried and true"
teaching methods or styles. However, our comfort zones may fail
students, who become bored with predictability. Change sparks
creativity and enthusiasm. Change energizes teaching and learning.
For this reason, as much as I love summer, I look forward to September,
knowing that the changes I make will spark excitement among students
and their parents. . .
Rebecca Lewis, NCTM, holds a B. Mus. degree from Wittenberg University and a M. Mus. degree in Piano Performance and Pedagogy from Northwestern University. She is the Pennsylvania Music Teacher Association Chair for Arts Awareness and Advocacy and lectures and writes on the benefits of music study. She frequently judges local piano festivals and competitions and maintains an independent piano studio in Pittsburgh, PA.
For the other Samplers from this issue
