Teaching Notes, 20111208 (1st class)

Last week's class with instruments worked so well. so I wanted to keep working on instruments. I still did want to try to catch the students up with the other class, and so I tried to sneak in some extra activites today. I had the students again in two lines, but this time, I laid down blue painter's tape to mark the lines rather than use the old rope that I've used for the past year and a half (which seems to be more a distraction these days).

March of the Toy Soldiers	Have students listen while entering the classroom
I had the students walk into the room to the March of the Toy Soldiers (from The Nutcracker), and a few students recognized it. I didn't have any actiivty associated with the song ready for the children, but we did talk about the various instruments that the students heard during the song. I'll end up repeating the song the next week.

Hello World	Revisit the stanza of the song
Similar to previous weeks, I was strumming away at my guitar while getting the students to line up. This year, I have been particularly unsuccessful at having students sing while they are walking in. I had prewritten the lyrics in red and blue, with alternating lines, and after singing through the chorus once, I had the students sing the stanza via echo once through. We then sang through the stanza together, followed by an iteration of the chorus. Finally, I had the students echo the stanza with the front line reading the odd lines and the back line reading the even lines. We practiced this twice, followed by a singing of the chorus. During the last sung chorus, I sped up the singing, and the students happily followed. During this exercise, I realize that it would have been preferable to have lines also split left and right, rather than just front and back, or to have tape lines that were colored like the words.
Jingle Bells w/ other instruments	Add sand blocks, rhythm sticks
I felt that instruments during the previous class went so well that I'd try adding more instruments this time. I ended up trying to add sand blocks and rhythm sticks (not exactly a new instrument, but this time I made sure that each student received one rippled and one smooth stick). We talked about how to play instruments in at least two different ways. The front line received blocks while the back line received sticks. Before we started to play parts, I introduced the concept of the rest, and we practiced a bit trying to play different combinations of 4-beat measures with either quarter notes or quarter rests. We also talked about having 4 beats in a typical measure, with each beat representing a quarter of the measure. The concept of 4 appearing in music proliferously is something I do plan to emphasize over the course of the year. We spent more time than I expected practicing quarters and rests, and eventually I tried a rhythm that I thought would work well with the stanza of Jingle Bells, which was basically |_|| |_|| |_|| |_|| |_|| |_|| |||| |___ twice. However, it turned out that the rhythm was a bit too complex, particularly when I tried to have the students sing this. I actually had hoped to introduce cymbals and a triangle as well, but the blocks and sticks were plenty for the students. Adding to the difficulty was that the students had a harder than usual time trying to focus on the instruments, and as we had run out of time before we could run through the entire song, I had to end the exercise prematurely, as I asked the class to focus better the next time.

In retrospect, even though instruments went so well last week, I probably shouldn't have brought them back during the very next week. Perhaps the students didn't find them so novel anymore after seeing them during the previous week.