Teaching Notes, Kindergarten, 20120924

It's Kindergarten time again! This would be my last K class until December, as our school's intersession break is coming up, and the new docent will probably be picking up the classes after the break.

Like last time, I wanted to have the students "march" in with an activity in mind. At first the students trickled in, but then I had them line up again until we had pretty much the entire class in a line; we then proceeded in…

Come And Follow Me	Lead students around the classroom and vary movements
I started this a little higher than I did, and even though I was clearly in falsetto, there were no snickers from the students. Ah, the joys of teaching Kindergarteners. :) The students had a lot of fun with this, and it was surprisingly easy to get them to follow in a circuituous route around the classroom. I made the mistake of walking alongside the carpeted area (my target for a seated circle) and then walking around a desk. That meant that by the time I came back to the carpet, I had formed a circle with the students, but with the desk inside the circle. Rather than keep the students walking around, I simply ended the song ("come and sit right down in your space, in your space"), and I had the few students around the wrong side of the desk simply break the line and come over to the carpet.
Tempo review	Review tempo terms
The previous docent last week introduced tempo terms to the students, and since I always want to try to extend something taught in the previous class, I decided to revisit terms like "tempo", "largo", "andante", "adagio", and "presto". But first, I simply tried getting the students to copy me - first I clapped softly and slowly with my hands near the ground - and then I raised my hands while speeding up the clapping rate until I was clapping very quickly with my hands high in the air. The students followed me pretty effectively here, and once I stopped, I asked the students what differences they noticed with clapping down low vs. clapping up high. Different students noted the speed change, and some noted that I was clapping more loudly up in the air. That eventually led me to talk about speed, and then the Italian tempo terms. I don't think coming from that exercise that all of the students remembered all of the terms, but I think they did understand that "tempo" meant "speed", and speed some somehow relevant in music.
Bee Bee Bumble Bee	Review chant, and then play a game with the chant
Most of the students remembered the chant, and by the time we did it twice, everyone was chanting with me (and also motioning as I tapped, pointed to my knee, pointed to my nose, and then motioned an "out" move). I then wanted to do a little game by passing around a yellow and orange tennis ball that was supposed to represent a bee. I gave the explanation that I didn't want to bring real bee - plenty of the class remarked that they didn't want to be stung; however I could not locate the toy laughing bee that my own child had before I left for class, and so the tennis ball had to do. In retrospect, the tennis ball was actually pretty good; that's a lot of hands (and rolling on the ground) that I don't think my child's toy needs. I had the students keep passing the ball around while we chanted, and when the chant ended, I had the student still carrying to ball to come with me into the middle of the circle. However, to make sure that the student wasn't really out or in some sort of penalty box, I told the student to help me lead the rest of the class while we restarted the chant. The next child who was "out" simply swapped seats with the previous student. The students quickly caught on, and the tennis ball became a bit of a hot potato. I then modified the tapping/pointing into a simple clap-tap-tap-tap pattern, and I asked the students to give the ball to the next student only on a clap - but the students kept trying to pass the ball as quickly as possible. I suppose it was a bit of a stretch, but more importantly, the kids were clearly having fun while still maintaining the chant.
Razzama Tazzama	Immerse students in song and motions
Because I've been teaching mostly older students, I had not used Razzama Tazzama since my first year as an MfM docent. I wanted to see how well students could follow my motions, so I started with two high claps (left, right), followed by two hand stars (left, right). The students seemed just ok following that pattern, so stuck with that pattern during the chorus of Razzama Tazzama. I then proceeded to just dive into the song. The students did well to follow me, and around the 3rd or 4th iteration of the chorus, I could hear a few voices singing along. Of course, the students enjoyed "wally woo-hoo" the most, but they also had a lot of fun with the verses. We got through 5 different verses, and ended with tummy/funny.
Halloween Surprise	Teach song and motions
As this was the last class before Halloween, I felt it was my duty to have a song for that momentous day. Before singing, I had the students to mvoe and chant with me. I also had the students shout loudly "goodbye" at the end of the chant, which of course the students loved.
Halloween Surprise	Teach song and motions
As this was the last class before Halloween, I felt it was my duty to have a song for that momentous day. Before singing, I had the students to mvoe and chant with me. I also had the stduents shout loudly "goodbye" at the end of the chant, which of course the students loved.
Tony Chestnut	Teach motions, then immerse with song
I had just a few minutes left, and so I decided to try Tony Chestnut, yet another song that I haven't done in many years. I first simply had the students point to each body part, and I had to explain that the "nut" was going to be their head. After just walking the students through each motion and saying each body part. Then, I slowly sang the song while having the students simply follow my motions. I didn't really have a good motion for "yes he" (in "yes he knows"), and while I did start motioning the ASL "yes" during that part of the song, I didn't really point out why I was nodding a closed fist. Also, using the version that I was trained in, I clapped during "that's what" (from "that's what Tony knows"). The students predictably had a good time with this one. I went through the song twice, and then warned the students that I'd try it faster - they kept up pretty well. Only a few students were singing something with me by the end of this faster iteration.

I ended the day with Goodbye My Friends, and the students sang along with me.

During the past weekend, we had the MFM Kickoff event, which included the teaching of a very simple dance by the Shenanigans: Syncopated Cyril. I was inspired by its simplicity that I had planned to use it in the middle of today's class. However, upon my arrival to the classroom, I discovered that we had a substitute teacher (albeit a very competent substitute). And so, I decided at the last minute to scrap it. I'm always worried about not having enough things to do, and being ready with alternate plans in the event of a substitute is a good reason why to always overprepare.

I had to use "Show Me" twice in order to recapture the students' attention - once after "Come And Follow Me", and once after "Razzama Tazzama". I used the same words, and while the repetition didn't strike as strange to the students, I do think I need to be ready with other variations - if anything, to keep myself entertained.

Teaching Notes, 2nd Grade, 20120913

It's week 2 for me, but it's week 3 for the 2nd graders, as they had the other docent last week. I am now alternating weeks, and with the year-round schedule, I only have one more class (in two weeks) after this one before the October break.

The original plan was to combine elements from both the first class (which I taught) and last week's class. However, what I ended up doing was a bit different.

Everybody Oughta Know	Lead students in with song, teach song, and solicit ideas for the song
Everybody Oughta Know is pretty much a staple that I teach nearly all of my classes, and while I originally thought about starting the class with "I Had a Chicken" (which I will likely do in two weeks), I did feel like I should introduce this song early if I ever needed to use it as a longish class refocusing tool. The first class again started outside, and so I simply led the class in while I sang the song; after they sat, I had the students echo me each line of the song. The second class started already seated on the mat, and so I led them straight into echoing me. I asked the students to share something "good" that they experienced that day; similar to past years, few students initially wanted to offer ideas, but once I zippered that first idea into the song, I had plenty of volunteers with followup ideas. Just about all of the ideas from the kids were related to sports. Like in past years, during the first day of this song, I don't bother getting the students to sing the 3rd line in unison (rather than echo'ed); I'll get that happen the next time we sing this song.
Name Rhythms	Get students to attach rhythms to each name
This was the exercise from last year's kickoff - for each name, we invent some sort of rhythm/percussion while seated to that name, and we concatenate eventually names in groups of no more than 4 (except for the very end). It seemed to work pretty well, particularly for the first class; students got to giggle at their names being attached to movements, rhythms, or percussion, and I think they had a good time trying to do names grouped together. The second class also started strong, but halfway through the exercise, I found it harder and harder to keep the students' attention, and by the end of the exercise, I barely had half of the class with me. This exercise takes a long long time. With 25-26 students a class, this easily took nearly 20 minutes which didn't leave a lot of time for much more.
Scales/Do A Deer	Review the scale, and sing the song
I asked the class if they knew what a scale was from last week (even though I wasn't their teacher last week), and I was able to get a reasonable answer in both classes. I led the students up the scale, and they sang it well. I also pointed out to the students that the scale starts and ends with the same note, one clearly higher than the other. I then started Do A Deer, and both classes went ahead a started singing the rest of the song without much effort or prompting from me! I had pictures that I used last year of each note printed, and I showed them to the class as they sang, but while it revealed some chuckles, they clearly didn't need it. For the first class, I pointed to the pictures of the notes out of order, and the students sang them ok, enough to show a difference in pitch, but not necessarily in tune. The students, when not guided, tend to go up dramatically in pitch with each rising note. I wonder how low they'd go when starting at Do and going down the scale. For the first class, I had the students stand and go through body solfege signs; for the second class, I totally forgot to do this! And so, I'll have to remember to do it again for both classes.
Doughnut Song	Review song, and teach motions
With the students standing up, I asked the students to copy my motions, and I sang through the songs while gesturing the parts of the song. I purposefully sang this quickly so that the students would follow the motions rather than the words (and also because I was short on time). I ended with the same "Thanks for the doughnut", but fewer than three students per class remembered the last line. And so, that gave me a great excuse to do it again, this time more slowly. The students did appear to be able to remember many of the lyrics this way with the motions, which was good to see. And at the end of the 2nd iteration, plenty students remember to say "Goodbye" loudly.

I realized that both classes, but especially the first, have pretty strict cutoff times. The first class, coming right after lunch, takes a little bit of time for the students to line up; this time, I had the students line up in line order which takes a little longer and burned more time than I had planned. In addition, nametags were handed out outside as well, further eating into class time. Unlike last year, I don't have the flexibility to bleed the class time a little longer than usual. I'll probably have the teacher give out nametags after I lead them into class.

The second class this time did not sit in a circle; they sat scattered on the colored mat, which meant that they were seated quickly. But, I do wonder whether or not the scattered (yet densely populated) seating meant for more chatter, as the class was noisier - so much that I had to wait for students to quiet down at times. I'll insist on leading the students into a circle on the mat; that way, if the students fidget, they can only disrupt the two people to their sides.

I had a lot more prepared for this class that I never managed to get to, including "I Can Sing Up High", "Little Tommy Tinker" with body solfege, and Bee Bee Bumblebee (utilizing the overhead projector), which I had prepared two weeks ago also. I may also try to do "I Had A Little Chicken" the next time I teach.

Teaching Notes, Kindergarten, 20120910

This year, we're spinning up a new docent for one of the Kindergarten classes, but at training hasn't started yet, and so the docent isn't ready to teach yet. Also, that docent will only be able to teach about half of the days, and so myself and another returning docent are going to have some opportunities to teach some K classes for a bit. For the rest of this calendar year, I'll have three (including this class). 

The students already had one session (taught by the other returning docent), and that session covered Hello My Friends in 4 languages, followed by a number of Mandarin songs. I don't really have a repertoire of Mandarin songs (even though the school is a Mandarin immersion school), and so I planned on mostly covering what I'd usually do for the start of the year.

The class starts right after lunch, and so leading them into class with a song was a natural way to start the class. I relied pretty heavily on the set lesson plan for Kindergarteners, which is something I know I shouldn't do too much so that the new docent can use those plans, but I figured I'd try it out just to see how the students would respond.

I Like You	Lead students around the classroom and vary the activity after each phrase
Kindergarteners are small and slower than 2nd graders, and so I had to have a number of the students follow me into the classroom before I started singing so that most could hear. The first iteration has no activity (other than walking), and before I went to the next iteration ("we will clap"), I told the students to clap with me. I then proceeded to jumping, hopping, stomping, walking backwards, and just walking; each time I told the students what was happening next. Walking backwards actually was pretty challenging for the Kindergarteners. By the time I ran out of ideas, there were still had some students that didn't quite make it back to the carpeted mat, and so I had the remaining students shuffle into the circle.
Hello Echo	Introduce myself
This was nothing more than singing in sol-la-sol-mi things like "Hello Boys and Girls, my name is Mr. Chen… can you sing back Hello Mr. Chen?" At first, few students responded after that, and so I encouraged the students to try it again; during the second time, I got a better response. However, not everyone was responding, and so I had the students to go through a warmup with me by standing up, stretching to the sky and stretching voices high. I then had them hang their arms towards their toes while dropping their voices down low. That allowed me to segue to…
I Can Sing Up High	Teach song by echo, and lead the motions/td>
I first just started singing along while stretching, and after going high and low, I asked what was in between. Eventually we converged on "the middle", which allowed me to finish the song. I then asked the students if they knew what an echo was. I received a variety of mostly accurate answers, including a cave-related answer, and so I asked the students to be my cave. We walked through the song in echo a few times, a little faster each time, and finally we sang once together.
Hello in Many Languages	Return to my name, and talk in a few different languages
I asked the students if they remembered my name, and they were mostly successful. At this point, I mentioned that they students would have multiple music teachers during the year, and that they'll get music in different forms, including different languages. Since I was still trying to introduce myself, I offered to the students that even the word "hello" could be spoken in different ways - i.e. languages. I then had the students echo hello in English, Spanish, Mandarin, French, and Swahili. One student really wanted to also contribute hello in Portuguese, which we then shared with the class.
Blow The Balloon (Ella Jenkins)	Tell the story behind the balloon, and have the students sing/act it/td>
I basically copied the song and the story as recorded by Ella Jenkins on one of her CDs. It allowed me to have the students say certain words with me such as "Padma", "India", "Hindi", "Lotus", etc., which aren't words that Kindergarteners might say in everyday K-level conversation. When I had the students "blow the balloon", their reactions, especially when I clapped, were almost exactly like the recording. This was the first time I did this song, and it worked out fantastically. However, I don't think I can re-use the story.
Animal Sounds	Talk about the sounds of animals heard today
I asked the students what sounds they heard during lunchtime, and they immediately gave me sounds from their fellow students - laughing, screaming, etc. While I had the students replicate laughing, I didn't have them replicate screaming. I quickly moved to animals, and we covered the usual things like dogs, birds, etc., and while I didn't overtly make the connection that small means high-pitched, I did consistently ask about whether or not things were small or large before having the students replicate the sounds of the creature. I then moved the students to insects, which included crickets, mosquitoes, and bees. Of course, that was nothing more than a coerced segue to…
Bee Bee Bumble Bee	Get students to chant, follow beat
I told the students that the bee reminded me of a chant, and then I started the chant while keeping beats with my hands and thighs. I then asked the students to be my echo again, and while I didn't ask them to copy my movements, many did! I changed the movements this time so that during the second line, I tapped my knees. During the 3rd line, I kept beat on my nose, and fort the last line, I threw my hands up at the end to signal that someone was "out". The students really caught onto the motions, and it made it easy for me to get the students chant with me.
Thank You and Goodbye	Get students to chant, follow beat
I was just out of time, and so I wanted to have the kids echo me saying "Thank You" in Arabic, Hebrew, Japanese, French, Spanish, and Mandarin. I then sang "Goodbye My Friends Goodbye", and knowing that the students had heard "Hello My Friends", I knew that they'd quickly sing along (and they did).

Before and after Blow the Balloon, I also spent time introducing "Show Me" (the 10-second song) as a game for the students, and we did it with different lyrics both times. I encouraged the students to echo me when pointing.

I realize that I didn't really do any activity that had the students mention their own name, which is a bit of a departure from most every other class opener that I taught. Perhaps it was because the students already had a music class. But, no matter, I'll have the students get a chance to introduce themselves to me.

There was another observation that I'd like to note: a few students knew who I was, and some called me "Mr. Erik". It turns out that I had taught some of the Kindergarteners knew me from that one class that I taught at the school's preschool last year. I was impressed by their ability to remember that!

I had also ready The Itsy Bitsy Spider, and Razzama Tazzama just in case I ran out of activities.

Teaching Notes (2nd grade), 20120830

…and we're back! This year, I'm now tag-teaming with another docent to teach two 2nd grade classes (really one 1/2 split with mostly 2nd graders, and one pure 2nd grade class). For this first class, both of us came in and taught the class, but in subsequent weeks, we'll alternate. This will mean that I'll probably be blogging about these 2nd graders only once every other week, but I may be also moonlighting as a Kindergarten class teacher, and so you might see some blogs about that class.

Similar to past years, I was hoping to cover many different activities while learning the students' names. However, new somewhat to this year is some subtle differences. The first class (the 1-2 split) starts basically right after lunch, and so the students could line up from the outside, allowing us to walk in. That class also has a hard stop right at the 30 minute mark as 2nd grade math class, which requires the 1st students to leave and other 2nd graders to enter, takes place at that point. The second class is already in session, and so there is no line-up opportunity. That class too also has a 30 minute hard stop so that the teacher can end the day with some final instructions or activity. As you might have guessed, there's no music room - at least for now. The music room is supposed to be attached to the gym, but the gym is still under construction. The music room should be available again in January.

Come and Follow Me	Lead students around the classroom and vary the motions/walk
For the first class, this was easy to start off, as I simply had students follow me into the room; I asked the students to memorize who was in front of them, and asked if they could follow and copy that person. (Of course, they all nodded.) For the second class, all of the students were on the carpeted area of the classroom, and so I started at a corner of the carpet; when I started moving and singing, the other docent fed the line one student at a time. In both classes, I snaked through the room, and wasn't quite able to get all of the students back onto the carpet in a circle (there were too many students still left among the desks), and so I had to end the song earlier than I had hoped, and I asked the remaining students to fill in the circle. The students had a good time with this. After each "this way", I stopped, and the line stopped pretty effectively; I recall really only one instance of someone crashing (and it did not require any teacher intervention). I varied my steps, step height, volume, and the kids followed well. I even turned around and walked backwards at one point, which presented a little challenge to the class as they were trying to copy the person "in front" of them, but it still worked well. One quick observation: 2nd graders are noticeably smaller than 3rd graders; they all fit in a circle pretty well, albeit tightly, especially with two music docents and one classroom teacher in the circles.
Hello in many languages	Introduce the word/phrase in several languages
After introducing myself and the other teacher, I asked the student what "music" meant to them. I received responses ranging from dancing to singing to something close to the definition of "rhythm". I then asked if music had to be in English, and I got many students saying "no". And so, I noted that since today was our first day meeting everyone, we'd practice saying "hello" in various ways - first with variations in English ("hello", "hi", "howdy", etc.), and then in Spanish, Mandarin, Swahili, French, German, Polish, and a few other languages. This was pretty much the same thing that Ella Jenkins did in a recording that I have of her introducing different languages to her students. In keeping with this mini-theme of different ways representing the same thing, and given that the students had just had lunch (even the second class - I stretched the situation there), I asked the students what they had for lunch. As the students were spouting off what they had just consumed earlier, the other docent was preparing four dishes of grains/legumes...
Oats Peas Beans and Barley	Teach song, with props in hand/td>
The four dishes contained (in order) Oats, Peas, Beans and Barley. The other docent led this exercise, and initially passed around the dishes for all of the students to see and observe. Many of them took their time sniffing the contents. (Oats, apparently, smells better than dried beans or barley.) The students were initially immersed into the first stanza of the song, and then they were taught both the first and second stanzas by echo. A few students recalled the song from last year, but for most, it seemed like they didn't recall enough of the song from last year to be able to sing it without help. In order to transition to the next exercise, I asked the students about the last line, where the farmer was surveying his land - I asked the students why a farmer had to stand high to see the land. After talking a bit about high-growing crops, planted from the oats, peas, beans, and barley, I then had the students stand up, pretend they were surveying the land…
Keep The Kettle Boiling	Teach game/td>
I started this by simply telling the students, "let's play a game" - and I had the students imagine that they were boiling something in a big kettle. (Note: this may come in useful around Halloween when the witches are out brewing goo in their kettles.) This meant that I had to ask the students what a kettle was, and I had them motion as if they were stirring something with a big kettle. I then had them imagine that they had a huge kettle, big enough to fit the whole carpet, which meant that we needed something bigger than a spoon to stir the pot - we needed ourselves! I had them do a body shake (which they'd end up doing during the chant), and then I jumped into the pot. I had them practice with me reciting "in jumps…" - which also forced them to get used to saying my name. Next, I led them through the main chant, at which time I jumped out while chanting "out jumps…" Then, I had the student to my left jump in, and off we went! I deliberately took a lot of time framing this exercise, and I think it paid off well, as the students understood once the second student jumped in. After 6 students or so, I stopped the class and told the students that they had to not only watch the students, but they had to watch and listen to me - multitasking for the 2nd grade world! And then, I started changing tempo, pitch, volume, all to the students' delight. Near the end, in the 2nd class, I found myself out of ideas, and so I tried doing the chant on one foot, and most of the students followed. I had enough time to switch feet for the last two students. Anyhow, this was a blast. The kids had a ton of fun.
The Doughnut Song	Sing, and teach the ending/td>
I told the class that it was nearly time to go (and indeed it was), and so I had them practice singing (not saying) "goodbye" (ti-do) a few times. I then had them do it after I clapped, which they did successfully on the 2nd try. I then told the students to wait for me to clap - I started singing the song. I really like this particular song as a class-ender, since the students don't have to do much other than listen for most of the song. After singing the first half, I asked the students "what is a 5-cent piece?" To my mild surprise, I didn't get an immediate answer, but eventually someone fessed up that it was a nickel. I then proceeded to sing the rest of the song, ending with "Thanks for the doughnut" and a clap. Most of the first class remembered and shouted (not sung) "Goodbye", but few students in the 2nd class remembered; in that class, I asked if the students could try again, and the second time around (through the whole song), they did.

During the second class, I tried out two short attention-grabber techniques - an easy echo clap before Keep The Kettle Boiling, and a "Where are we/right here/right now?/right now" call and answer before the Doughnut Song. I plan on trying to experiment more with these short exercises and use them later in the year.

This was a very successful first day, I must say. The students in both classes were well behaved - better than I had anticipated, and I think significantly better than past years at this school. I never had to stop and pull a student out, and that was wonderfully refreshing. I'm definitely looking forward to the next class, even if it is two weeks away.