Elementary Music/Music Technology Blog

Continuing with my posts on how the nine national standards from The National Association for Music Education (MENC) can be enhanced by technology in the elementary general music classroom, today I approach standard #5.

Content Standard #5: Reading and notating music.

Achievement Standard:
5b. Students use a system (that is, syllables, numbers, or letters) to read simple pitch notation in the treble clef in major keys.

This lesson comes from my book: Technology Integration in the Elementary Music Classroom.

Can you spell these words?
(A Note Naming Game using the Classics for Kids Website)

Objective:
The objective of this lesson is to have the students spell the musical words on the Treble Clef Staff, using only the notes found on the lines and spaces of this staff. Therefore, this game does not involve notes on the ledger lines.

Materials/Equipment:
The materials required for this lesson are:
- A large staff
- Notes to place on the staff
- A computer
- The website: http://www.classicsforkids.com
- A TV, SMARTboard, or LCD projector so that the students can see the website

Duration:
20-30 minutes

Prior Knowledge and Skills:
The students need to know the note names on a Treble Clef Staff.

Procedure:

1. Review the Note Names of a Treble Clef Staff:
a. Take out a large staff (this could be a felt staff, a staff drawn on an easel, a staff used as a carpet, etc.)
b. Review lines and spaces
c. Review the note names on the staff with the method that you taught the students to identify and comprehend the note names on a Treble Clef Staff.
2. Play the Game:
a. Before you begin, please go over good sportsmanship. If you decide to play a game that divides the class into two teams, then it is very important to go over what good sportsmanship means. In my school, I have an excellent PE program, so when I speak about sportsmanship to the students, they have already experienced it in their PE classes and know how to practice it.
b. Connect your computer to a TV, SMARTboard, or LCD projector.
c. Launch the Classics for Kids website: (http://www.classicsforkids.com)
d. Click on “Games”.
e. Click on the “Note Name Game” (see Fig. 1).
f. The game will appear with the notes dancing from side-to-side on the staff. They dance from side-to-side until you place the correct letters beneath them.
g. Divide the class into two teams. I usually name my two teams after composers, such as Team Bach and Team Beethoven.

h. The first few words that appear on the screen are only one to three-letter words. As the students progress, the words have more letters.
i. Assign Team Bach to go first.
j. The goal is to drag the correct letter name to the space below each note to spell a word.
k. For a three-letter word, such as AGE (see Fig. 1), have three members of the Bach team go to the computer (or SMARTboard) and drag the letter to the corresponding note. When the student puts the correct letter under the note, he/she earns Team Bach a point. Therefore, for the word AGE, if all three students place the correct letters under the notes, then Team Bach has earned three points. If a student does not place the letter under the correct note, the computer gives you a sound to let you know that the letter was incorrect and the team does not earn a point. I will usually give each student two tries to earn the point.
l. The game will give you ten words to spell. Many times, the team that earns the most points is the one who had the words with the most letters. Therefore, at the end I give each student (on both teams) a reward of a musical pencil or a lollypop. It is up to you how you decide to reward them, or if you choose to reward them at all.

Evaluation:
As the students each take a turn, you can sit in the back of the classroom and evaluate each student individually for naming notes and if you choose, you can evaluate each student for sportsmanship.

Follow-up:
This lesson can be followed-up with more note naming games like “Musical Hangman” – a game where the words used only have the seven letters on the musical alphabet – or creating compositions with the notes of a Treble Clef Staff.
From Burns, A. Technology Integration in the Elementary Music Classroom. Milwaukee, WI: Hal Leonard Corporation, 2008.

Congratulations to Joel of www.soyouwanttoteach.com and Joe of musictechnology.net, who just presented the first edition of the Music Education Blog Carnival! The Music Education Blog Carnival is a compilation of blog entries from a variety of blogs that speak to music education. They separated the blogs into the following categories: Practice, Practice, and more Practice, Teaching Tips, 21st Century Music Resources, and The Life of a Music Educator.

I highly recommend you checking the carnival out because you will find at least one blog entry that will appeal to you. I thank Joel and Joe for including my entry about Podcasting with the Youngest of Students.

If you blog and would like to submit an article/blog post, click here. Their next edition will be August 1st.

Continuing with my posts on how the nine national standards from The National Association for Music Education (MENC) can be enhanced by technology in the elementary general music classroom, today I approach standard #8. FYI: This is out of order because I have blogged about Standards 1-4.

Content Standard #8: Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts.

This lesson came to me yesterday as I was thinking about integration. For the next two days, I am at the National Educational Computing Conference (NECC) in San Antonio, Texas. I am presenting at the Avid Education Booth (includes Avid, Sibelius, M-Audio, Pinnacle, and Digidesign) on Sibelius’s Groovy Music Series of Groovy Shapes (ages 5-7), Groovy Jungle (ages 7-9), and Groovy City (ages 9-11). These programs teach music theory and composition skills using animations and pictures. They are wonderfully geared for elementary grades (PreK-Grade 6). As I present, I continuously show my students’ works created in Groovy Shapes, Jungle, and City.

Standard #8 came to me as I was presenting Groovy Jungle because this program is set in the rainforest. My 3rd graders study the rainforest in science and they are continuously writing about the facts of the rainforest. In Groovy Jungle Create Mode, there is a typing tool. The 3rd graders will type in facts about the rainforest. Then, they will use the rhythm trees, the melody butterflies, the arpeggio flies, the chord spiderwebs, the bass line bushes, and the bonus sounds that consist of a variety of animals found in the rainforests, to create a song that compliments their written facts. These completed songs can be posted on groovymusic.com where parents and students can go to view and listen to the song as it is seen and heard in the program itself.

If you have never seen the Groovy Series, I encourage you to read about it at Sibelius’s website and to check out some students’ works on Groovymusic.com.

If you are at the NECC Conference, please come to one of my sessions on Tuesday, July 1, at 11:00 am and 3:00 pm or on Wednesday, July 2, at 11:00 am and 1:30 pm, at booth 8222. Sibelius is giving out a free Groovy triple pack (Shapes, Jungle, and City) to one participant at each of the sessions.

Have you ever used and of the Groovy Music Series in your music classroom? Or, have you even enhanced a standard #8 lesson with technology?