Teaching students to tune is an area of concern for many music teachers. Students, particularly young ones, often need frequent attention to help them tune correctly. While there may be times that student difficulties tuning are physical, such as an inability to turn a tuning peg on a string instrument, many times the difficulty is … Continue reading Effective Strategies for Teaching Students to Play In Tune
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Educating the Whole Person–Ethical and Social Considerations in Music Education
In this, the third and final installment in my series on educating the whole person and music, I will discuss the social and ethical pathways identified by Comer, and the intra- and inter-personal intelligences that Gardner found. There is perhaps no greater purpose to music than for one person to relate to another through the … Continue reading Educating the Whole Person–Ethical and Social Considerations in Music Education
Educating the Whole Person–Movements and Emotion with Music
This is the second in a three part series on educating the whole person and music education. Yesterday, I gave an overview of parts of the whole person, and in general how music engages several of those parts. Today I will discuss in detail the relationship between music and the physical and psychological pathways identified … Continue reading Educating the Whole Person–Movements and Emotion with Music
Educating the Whole Person
This post is the first in a three-part series on educating the whole child and music education. Today, I will discuss what the whole child means. In the other posts, I will cover how music education addresses ways of learning and knowing children have. Most philosophies of American education include a statement to the effect … Continue reading Educating the Whole Person
With Music, The Learning Is In The Doing
Today, one of my eighth grade classes was composing percussion ensemble pieces. They had begun their works last week, and were continuing composing today. As I circulated through the class, looking at student work and pointing out notational issues that needed to be corrected, I was reminded of how many students make the same errors, … Continue reading With Music, The Learning Is In The Doing
Music, Emotions, and Student Listeners
Every now and then I'm reminded that there are some hints I take for granted that are perplexing to some students. The learning activity for fifth grade classes was to listen to the first ten minutes of Maher's fifth symphony and make a list of each emotion they heard expressed moment to moment. The activity … Continue reading Music, Emotions, and Student Listeners
Music Teachers and the School Community
Music teachers can easily have many reasons for feeling disconnected from the rest of the school. They are referred to as specialists, teach a subject most other teachers have minimal training in, and work in a room that is probably isolated from most of the other classrooms. Also, music classes are typically taught when other … Continue reading Music Teachers and the School Community
The “Late Bloomer” in Music Classes
Our students bring a variety of inhibitions into a class, most of which will influence the their responses during learning activities. Some students, especially young children, will be very withdrawn and reticent to do anything alone with others watching, and the teacher may not know the reason. Yet music cannot be taught by group response … Continue reading The “Late Bloomer” in Music Classes
On Teaching Music Composition in General Music Classes
Although most music educators have solid training in vocal and instrumental techniques, expertise in teaching music composition is less common. There are, I suspect, fewer music teachers who are composers than instrumental or vocal specialists. Even so, music composition is an important part of musicianship, the development of which is at the heart of music curricula … Continue reading On Teaching Music Composition in General Music Classes
Teaching Music from the Student’s Perspective
In the midst of planning and teaching lessons that encompass a complete curriculum and provide training in comprehensive musicianship, music teachers, myself included, sometimes forget to approach our content from the student's perspective. As teachers, we are aware of different proficiency levels and different learning styles, but we are not as aware of what our … Continue reading Teaching Music from the Student’s Perspective
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