Teaching Notes, 20100823

It's week 2, and I wanted to keep trying out new things for the students. This time, I had prepared a whole bunch, but I found it hard to get through it all, as students had more trouble with the activities than I expected. Furthermore, it appears that I might have a bit of a logistical problem with my classes; my first class starts at 10:20A, but that's when recess gets out, and students cannot beam over to class in a split second. As a result, it felt like I had only about 20 minutes for my first class, which turned out to be a bit of an equalizer as my second class again seemed to have a little more trouble keeping focus (although it was much improved since the previous class).

Everybody Oughta Know	Lead class into the room with the song, add nonrepeating 3rd line, zipper
Students remembered this song pretty well, and by the time I went in, they were singing enough to know what they were supposed to be singing. I then added the nonrepeating 3rd line, which took a little bit of practice getting used to. At this time, I was also gesturing with my body the scale up, and I asked the class why I was making that sort of motion. In only one of the classes did I try zippering in a few changes to the song, but I didn't ask the students for ideas. I thought that that would be a little too dangerous at this point.
Names on Board - rhythm/accent intro	Group first names by syllables and accent config
I prewrote all of the students' names on the board, arranging them by syllable/accent group. When it was time to do this exercise, I had the students speak the first few names of each group, and then we talked about what was similar among the names of a particular group. I then tried to see if students could notice differences between two-syllable names that had the first vs. second syllable accented. Unfortunately, that eureka took at lot longer than I had hoped, which didn't leave me a lot of time for the 3- and 4-syllable names.
Body Rhythms	Have students echo whatever rhythms I did, one measure at a time
This was meant to be a lead-in into the next item, but I also felt that it would be a good way for me to try to capture the students' attention. I'd start out with simple half-measure tap/clap combos, and then they'd respond. When I moved to full-measures, it took a little while for the students to adjust. (This really makes me believe that the students had very very very little music before this year.) I eventually moved in some stomping with the clapping and tapping.
Oonie Koonie Cha	Teach chant, then song to students, then apply rhythms to the chant
I got a lot of giggles (understandably) when teaching this, but I was finally able to get the students to repeat me, and perhaps keep some semblance of a beat (without explicitly explaining it). Of course, they were constantly repeating whatever I was saying, but at least they were listening to me and watching what rhythms I was producing. I did keep the rhythms pretty simple, and perhaps the next time I do this, I'll do something a lot more complicated. As this was the end of class (already!), I had the students eventually walk in a circle while we did the song/chant/step.

I meant to interject items with a "Well Enough Said... About That" answerback, but I forgot to do that for the first class. I'll try to do it again for both classes, as I do want to start teaching that song.

A few students asked me what the ukulele was, and I told them that we didn't have time to talk about it. I hope that translates to more focus and less chatter for the following week.

I prepared a whole lot more for this week, including introducing 'sol', playing the cookie jar game, epo i tai tai e, botendere, and yes, even talking about the ukulele. I think I'll have plenty for next week as a result.