This past year our school started a 5th grade instrument class where all 5th graders were required to learn an instrument for a year. Since I initiated this new program, and I am a woodwind tripler (clarinet, saxophone, and flute), the students could choose to learn one of those three instruments. Those three instruments were also a nice progression from recorder, which they had been studying in our general music classes since third grade. Here are some of my reflections from how the 1st year went:
- Scheduling: The 5th grade general music teacher is also a “quasi” administrator, so she needed more time in her schedule for administration duties. Due to this, the 5th grade general music classes, which meet 3X a cycle, were going to be reduced to 2X. I did not want to see that happen, so I proposed the idea for a 5th grade instrument class-where I would teach the class on the students’ 3rd music class per cycle. This made me rethink my own schedule and I was able to work it out so that all of my other general music classes (PreK-grade 3) still met with the same amount of time. Therefore, it was not hard to convince administration to have the 5th grade instrument class because it did not add anymore time to the schedule.
- Curriculum: As all teachers do, I had an idea, created lesson plans, and then scrapped them all once I had 17 clarinets, flutes, and/or saxophones in front of me-all at various levels, some with embouchure and finger issues, and some with instrument problems. Each 5th grade class would have a mixture of instruments from 8 saxophones (oh, my ears!), 5 clarinets, and 4 flutes, to 7 clarinets, 5 flutes, and 6 saxophones. It was difficult to teach the entire group. Therefore, I taught each day as it came and used Pearson’s Standard of Excellence, along with my own materials, to help the students to achieve success.
- Instruments: The school did provide the instruments for the students with an agreement signed by the parents about what would occur if the instrument needed to be repaired or if the instrument ended up missing. The funding for this came from the school. The students would have the instruments for a year and then give them back in June. I would then clean them out thoroughly and have them ready for the 09-10 5th graders.
- Who got to play what: At the end of the school year, I have the incoming 5th graders audition each instrument. They write down their 1st, 2nd, and 3rd choices. Over the summer, I calculate the choices and compare them to the amount of saxes, clarinets, and flutes that we have, and assign the instruments. For the first three classes, I will have students who want to switch their instruments because they cannot immediately produce a sound as quickly as the student next to them. However, last year, I encouraged and assisted these students and they continued on the original instrument that they chose.
- Results: Students responses by the time I left on maternity leave were: “I like this class. Do we have to stop and go to math?” “I love my instrument! Do I have to give it back?” “I did not think that I could play this instrument when I first tried it in September.” “I liked having Smart Music test me on my song.” (I used Make Music’s Smart Music for assessments throughout the year).
- Reflection: I am excited to teach this class again for the 09-10 school year. I know that since I will have a new crop of students, my lessons will probably be quite different to fit their various needs. In addition, since I am planning on staying throughout the entire school year (no maternity leave in my near future:), I will be able to see how the program begins, progresses, and finishes. With that, I will be able to assess the program more accurately and begin to create a curriculum that would be an outline for the class for years to come. All in all, I really adored what I saw this year and am thrilled that my school supports this class so that all students will get to experience learning a band instrument at some point in their elementary schooling.
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June 29th, 2009 at 9:57 am
It sounds like you took a situation where kids were going to be losing time in music and gave them much, much more than they would have had in the first place! Kudos.
I am interested in your use of SmartMusic for assessment. I’ve used it before with limited success with my string players, but it was a few years ago. How did that work for you? What were the advantages? disadvantages? obstacles?
June 29th, 2009 at 1:39 pm
Hi Greg,
Thank you!
Smart Music worked well, but I had to lower the tuning on it. Since it tunes at A 440 and my students did not quite have that tuning on their instruments yet (due to their weak embouchures), I lowered the tuning to 438 and that helped a lot. Then the students were scoring much better on their exercises.
The advantages that I found were that we were using Standard of Excellence, and it was easy to pull up all of the exercises on screen. The students would come up to the computer, play along with Smart Music, and then see how many correct notes they played (green notes were correct; red notes were incorrect). This encouraged them to practice more because they were all about making their score higher.
The flute players needed microphones because the computer microphone would not cut it. They could not produce enough sound for their playing to be assessed.
The obstacles were that the students and I would have to work out the details during class. For example, once I experienced the tuning issue, I was able to correct it. However, students had to play and be assessed low for me to see that it could be fixed. So, trying to fix the obstacles as they occur was difficult because I had to convince the students that it was not them, it was me working with the software,
Overall, once you work the software for your class, then it works very well.
I hope that helps!
Amy
July 1st, 2009 at 12:30 am
Amy, you are to be commended for going the extra mile and not giving up that third music class.
I’m wondering what effect you feel this will have on the instrumentation of your band program for the long term. Will you eventually have a woodwind-heavy band with small numbers of brass players?
Of course, students playing any instrument is better than not having the students in band at all!
July 1st, 2009 at 6:13 pm
Hi Kathy,
Thank you! You ask a great question. We have an after school program where students can study instruments privately. When I first proposed the 5th grade program, I did my research and found out that there was a significant lacking of woodwinds in the after school program. Therefore, the 5th grade class will balance that for the next year or two. After that, there could be a possibility that the band will becoming woodwind heavy. I wish that I could teach brass, strings, and percussion as well as woodwinds, but when I thought of a class of 17 students all learning a variety of instruments, I thought that it would be best that the instruments be the three that I could teach well.
I hope that helps!
Amy