Teaching Notes, 2nd, 20130425

Last week, we spent time exploring tempo, and so this time I wanted to have the students work with dynamics. I also was thinking of having the students fiddle with the movable Do, but I didn't think that I'd really have enough time, so I wanted to introduce a short song for future starting pitch changes. I also wanted to experiment with a potential second song for the spring sing.

Pay Me My Money Down	Lead students into class with ukulele, introduce song
I started leading the students in while strumming my ukulele, and I started singing the chorus of the song a few times. With all of the students in the room, I had the students practice singing "Pay Me My Money Down" (just that line); I would point to the students, and they'd sing. I tried both a chorus and a stanza this way, and the students mostly got the hang o fit. The response shows up with two different sets of pitches during the song, but the students seemed to figure this out, possibly from my original singing. Pay Me is a worksong, and it certainly have lyrics that can generate a lot of questions from children. ("Go to jail?" "Pay me money?") And so I told the students that the song was indeed a worksong. I asked the students where they thought the people were working, and although I tried providing some hints by re-singing a few stanzas, the students couldn't figure it out, and so I simply told them that the song was sung by workers working at a shipyard or at the docks. I then had the students pretend they were pulling a rope whenever they sang their response; we tried this for a stanza and a chorus pair. The movements really help with the students' response; unfortunately I did this only with the first class as I simply forgot to try this with the second class.
Little Tommy Tinker	Teach Song and Movements
I've typically taught Little Tommy Tinker with the full body Kodaly signs. This time, I started with just doing the motions in silence, and I had the students mimic me. I then sang the song once through, still doing the signs. I thought some students might have known the song, but it turned out that none did, and so I then taught the song in echo, one line at a time, twice. We then sang through the song together once through. In the second class only, I asked the students how we could change the song. The first few answers all were around changing the words, but then someone noted that we could change the speed, similar to the previous class that I taught. I then suggested that we could also make it softer. At this point in time (in both classes), I told the students to try singing it quieter, which we did (still with motions). I then asked the students to try to sing it even quieter. I asked the students right there what we changed, and the first answer was that we sang it "lower". However, I explained to the students that we didn't lower our bodies when we sang the 2nd and 3rd times. I had preprinted "piano" and "FORTE" (in all caps) on sheets of paper, and I then taught the students the meaning of the terms, in a music setting. I also taught the word "dynamics" to the students. We sang Tommy Tinker once in piano, and once in forte. The students, when given permission to be loud, always try to be as loud as possible, and so I clarified that forte wasn't top-of-your-lungs loud. Also on separate sheets of paper, I had "p" and "f" printed out. I then proceeded to tell the students that for some reason, music doesn't have a perfectly centered "medium" dynamic; instead I showed a piece of paper with "mf" on it. Some students knew it was mezzoforte, but I had the whole class repeat it. I didn't have "mp" on a paper (mainly because I didn't want four dynamics for the next exercise), but I did explain what mezzopiano meant.
Oh My Goodness	Review while changing dynamics, tempo
I displayed the lyrics to the chorus on the overhead projector, and the students sang it with no issue. (I was glad to see that no students had that "not again!" look on their face.) I didn't even have to sing along with them past the first line. However, as I was about to display the first stanza, I asked the students to sing the next part in piano. As the song went on, I would change the dynamics on them. Later in the song, I started changing the tempo as well, but I would have to snap the beat with my fingers and then lead them into the song lyrics. Near the last few stanzas, I started changing the dynamics during the middle of a stanza, which really captivated the students. I did notice that the later parts of the song weren't sung with the same crispness as the other parts. Certainly the later parts are less known to the students, but even the regular recording by Sweet Honey In The Rock is 3:20, which is long. I likely have to cut some stanzas from the song (there are 6!) in order to make the song easier to learn and sing for the Spring Sing. That said, I think the students had a good time with the changing dynamics and tempo.
Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers (Trout Fishing In America)	Teach first half of song very slowly
If you try to search for this song, you won't find much, because it hasn't been formally released by Trout Fishing. I was inspired by this song after hearing it performed at a Trout Fishing concert only a few weeks ago. It's a really great song featuring several tongue twisters, and it is so new that even the band admitted that they had "never sung it correctly yet". A web search, in fact, yields only one little video, found here. This is the only resource that I have, in fact, in order to learn the song myself. I had Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers pre-written on a hidden board, and so it was time for the big reveal. I asked the students to not say anything until I said it first, and so I had the students repeat me, word by word. I don't think any of the students understood what was going on yet, and even when I had them echo all four words at a time slowly, still the students weren't quite sure what they were saying. I then had them say it a little faster, then even faster, and finally some of the students realized it was a tongue twister. I really wasn't expecting the students to really learn the song well, nor was I planning on having them sing everything, so I had the students simply practice saying, then singing, Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers (those four words only), when prompted by myself. I then proceeded to sing the stanza (without the students singing along or echoing), but when those four words came up, I pointed to the students (and they answered). There were times when I would prompt them by counting 1-2-3-4, which helped their timing and helped keep a steady beat through the song. When it came to the chorus (which contains a bevy of additional tongue twisters), I had the students echo each line. One line ("three grey geese in the green grass graze") I had to split into two separate echoes, just so the students wouldn't get lost. I wanted to cover only the first stanza and first chorus, anticipating that the song was going to be pretty hard for them. After finishing the chorus for the first time, I displayed the full words to them on the overhead, and so I again ran through the song in the same way; this time, however, some students tried to sing the stanza with me. (It's a very simple stanza.) I found it difficult myself to try to speak or sing the tongue twisters correctly, and while the students clearly noticed this, I don't think it bothered them much or detracted from the song, as they were having similar issues. But, they all pretty much were giggling while struggling to sing the right words, and that still was good fun for all. The song ends with the same tune found at the end of the Donut Song (but with RBBB), and so we ended up practicing that a bit. I had some extra time with the second class, and so I ended up asking them where they heard that tune before - eventually settling on the Donut Song, which we practiced one last time.

That was actually a lot of fun, even if in the second class I still had my typical struggles keeping the students in line. (I had to send a student to the office, which is no fun for anyone.) Originally I had imagined that I could have students choose the tempo and dynamics rather than myself, but that is going to have to happen later in the year. I also do plan on doing something similar with a changing Do (or starting pitch), and that should amount to more fun.

Rubber Baby Buggy Bumpers went pretty well - better than I imagined - but it is still going to take a lot of work to get it to performance shape. The song actually has a bridge with spoken words, and that (mild apping) might be something for the students to try. Some of the stanzas in Oh My Goodness in the original recording also are spoken rather than sung, and I might also let the students try that.

I'm starting to think that if we ever have to use a song for an impromptu sing for these students, it would have to be the donut song. If Oh My Goodness or RBBB are not ready for the Spring Sing, at least I'll have the Donut Song, which I'm sure the students would enjoy performing over and over again.

Teaching Notes, 2nd, 20130411

This was the first week after returning from break, and looking back, thanks to a week of minimum days and a field trip, it had been 6 weeks since the students' last music class, which definitely seems like a long long time. It's too bad during those minimum day weeks that there isn't some way to inject a music class in the morning just for that week.

There were two things I wanted to cover today - tempo and a review of Oh My Goodness for the Spring Sing. The Spring Sing is definiitely on, and I'm also still looking for that 2nd song or activity. We also were going to have class in the empty room near my students' regular classrooms, and so I thought it was safe to bring in a variety of instruments for the students to play.

Well Enough Said	Lead students into class, introduce instruments, explore tempo
Before I had the students walk in, I told them that I would be giving some, but not all, of the students something, and they could use it in a way that would "fit" the music that they'd be listening to. I didn't elaborate beyond that, and so as the students came in, I had a variety of instruments to pass out - cymbals (hand and finger sized), triangles, shakers, tambourines. The room that we were having class in isn't huge, and so I still wanted to limit the sound (noise) that the class would be able to generate; thus, I had enough to give every other student an instrument. In the background, Well Enough Said was playing, and after everyone was in the room, I tried to encourage the students to keep a beat with a tambourine that I had on my own. By this time, there wasn't a lot of time left in the song (the song is barely one and a half minutes), and so I then led the students to follow my beat, 8 beats/2 bars at a time. Each time, I counted off, and the students mostly followed; by the 3rd try, just about everyone with an instrument was playing with me so that you could finally hear spacing in between the beats. Just like in previous classes, even though I had asked the students to walk in a circle, by the time everyone was in the room, the students were in a bit of a glob. I had to get the students to reconstitute a circle after the song had ended. This was the first time the students had access to lots of different instruments, and so we spent some time examining the different instruments, one instrument type at a time. I had students who had, for instance, tambourines, show the class how they would play it. I then suggested that for nearly all instruments, including these, there was more than one proper way to play it. You could continuously shake a tambourine instead of beat it; you could do cymbal circles instead of crashes, etc. When we go to the triangles, I also pointed out the importance of holding the triangles from the dangling handle rather than holding the metal, and we talked about the reasons. (That also allowed me to review with the students about the correlation between vibration/motion and sound.) Back to playing on beat - I had been counting off to four each time, and so I then asked why they thought I was doing that. Some students thought that it told the students when to start, which is correct, but it wasn't quite what I was looking for. Eventually someone suggested that the counting told them how fast I wanted them to play - yay - and so then I introduced (or re-introduced, for some) the term "tempo". I then said, I'd teach them all some Italian, and we covered the terms (in this order) Andante, Allegro, Presto, Largo. I usually do tempo terms in this way, starting in the middle or with one of the terms that one can relate to (e.g. Andante/walking pace). Next, I counted off at a moderately fast pace; the students played 8 beats, and I then asked them what tempo they thought it was. Before continuing, I had the students who had instruments give their instruments to someone else. (Invariably, one or two students got to hang onto their instrument, which got some other students grumpy.) We continued with various tempos with the new instrument-wielding students, and each time I tried to take a poll as to what tempo the students felt they were playing. When I felt the students had enough, I then had the students put the instruments back in a bin that I held as I walked around the room. I then started to sing the chorus to Oh My Goodness as I collected the instruments. In the second class, I tried this with a student, but she walked too slowly, and I had to sing the chorus twice.
Oh My Goodness	Review Song, sing entire song
Before the class started, I struggled but eventually succeeded in getting the overhead projection system to work, which was essential since I had the words to the chorus and each stanza printed out. I wanted to cover the *entire* song, and that was impossible to do if I had to write everything on the board. After I had sung the chorus (and many of the children followed me singing), I asked the students what part of the song that was - many shouted out "chorus", and so I followed up with asking them what came next. Once someone shouted out "stanza", I then displayed the first stanza overhead, and we sang it together. Plenty of students remember how the stanza roughly went, and so it was an easy sing. At the end of the stanza, I again asked what came next, and the students responded with singing the chorus. We proceeded to cover stanza after chorus after stanza. By the 4th chorus, I didn't display the lyrics again, and there wasn't much drop off; I remarked to them that they didn't need it anymore. (Well, some might have benefited from them; I'll bring them again next week.) Parts of the stanza aren't really sung in the original recording, but I kept the students singing the standard tune to all stanzas. At the end, when the chorus words change ("Oh my goodness, look at me…"), I definitely had to show them the ending words. They sang through that chorus once, and I then wrote in a repeat symbol (||: :||), and I had the students repeat the chorus one more time. Yay! The students are definitely enjoying the song. It's a little different from anything else I've taught - I've been explicitly teaching the song without doing a lot of other general music instruction with the song; we're learning the song just to learn the song. However, I think the students are having a lot of fun with the words.
Tempo Game	Have students explore tempos of various songs
I wasn't sure if I really was going to have another opportunity to spend time focusing on tempo explicitly in a later class this year (it will for sure come up anecdotally), I wanted to play a little game of Tempo 4 corners. I hung the four tempo words (each printed on a piece of paper) in different corners of the room. I then had the students walk to a particular corner that matched the tempo of the song I played. I tried to choose music that the students heard in past classes: Raisins/Barenaked Ladies, Syncopated Cyril/Shenanigans, Skaters' Waltz, etc. I wanted to illustrate that tempo was also subjective, and for the most part (except for Skaters' Waltz), we didn't have a unanimous opinion on tempo. Just to play with their brains a little bit, I told the students while the Skaters' Waltz was slow, if you were to clap it in 3, then it's actually faster than they thought. I ended the exercise with instructing the students to line up in front of the sign that matched the next song. I then played Sunshine and Lollipops/Lesley Gore. I had purposely put the "Presto!" sign by the door to exit, and so the students all lined up quickly by that sign, ready to leave. Incidentally, Sunshine and Lollipops, even though it's a song form the 60s, was also featured in the kid movie Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, and so it always works well as a fast song.

Well, that was it. We covered tempo, and I reviewed Oh My Goodness. But there was a *lot* of things I didn't get to. For instance, I wanted to explore Well Enough Said's lyrics a bit, including adding "Still gotta get up in the morning" as a followup response to the "Well Enough Said" interjection that I use. WES also has an interesting bridge that involves some overlapping call-and-answer, whose lyrics I actually had prewritten on the board. I am also still looking for that 2nd song, which might be Tuwe Tuwe (if I can pull off a round).

There were other things that I still left abandoned from my original plan, but rather than spoil the surprise, you'll just have to come back in 2 weeks and see what I chose. :)