Different methods for teaching music

Orff-Schulwerk

Kodály  part 1/2

                         Kodály part 2/2

  Dalcroze Eurhythmics

All these videos had an active component to them, which I like because children relate to new material better if there is something active to remember it by. The Orff Shculwerk video used the beat as its active component, the students passing their stick to the next person as the beat went on. The Kodaly video also used beat as it's active component with the students making conducting motions with their hands or softly clapping to the beat. The Dalcroze Eurhythmics video had the most active component because the children in it were doing different movements to the beat and also to different rhythm notes the teacher shouted out as he told a story. 

In the Orff Schulwerk video the students are chanting a song. While they are singing they are passing sticks to the person next to them and doing so to the beat. After so many counts they pick up the sticks and play out a rhythm on the ground as they continue to sing. I think the movement with the beat here is beneficial because they are learning that everyone needs to stay with the beat to keep the song together. If you pass your stick too early then you throw off that person who throws off the next person and the beat is no longer steady. You can see a couple of times where one would mess up and the song would slow down or sound off. 

The video I chose for the Kodaly method came in two parts and was in a completely different language. However, you can clearly see that when they are learning a new song they are starting out easy and working their way up to more complex. It's all about being fluent in the notes, vocally and written. The teacher has the students repeat the new melody numerous times using do-re-mi-so-la. He also has them come to the blackboard and write the rhythm and the notes. When I was learning to play music my band teacher taught us a similar way and I never enjoyed it too much. It was a lot of repetitiveness when you just want to get on to playing and hearing the song in its entirety. I can see how repetitiveness would be beneficial though. That melody really gets stuck in your head when you repeat it. Likewise, when you go to write the notes they stick out clearer in your mind and it becomes easier to write, almost like you can see the melody or rhythm in your head. 

The Dalcroze Eurhythmics video was my favorite to watch. I really like how the teacher integrated reading into the lesson by telling a story. The students played out the different parts he read to the beat, but they still had free movement around the room to move however they felt. He also related the different types of notes or musical elements into their movement as well. For example, the children dug into the ground to sixteenth notes the teacher played on the piano and the alarm clock was a forte alarm in which he played a drum loudly to. He gave the students a movement to relate to each musical element and I think that is great experiential learning. The next time the students hear the term sixteenth note they are going to remember that they are fast notes because they dug into the ground fast. The next time they hear the term forte they are going to remember it meant a loud sound because the alarm in the story was loud.

Teaching a dance

I really got a workout with this one. I was out of breath! I've never been great at dancing, even when it is meant to be dance for young kids. Coordination doesn't run in my family.

Recorder assessment

You can't completely tell but we had crazy hair day at school. This video was easier for me to make cause i'm more familiar and comfortable with instrumental music, even if it is a recorder. :)

Instrument Family Examples

For my first video I chose an instrument from the woodwind family. The flute is in the woodwind family because you have blow across a surface, in this case the aperture, a hole in the mouthpiece. This video is interesting because the guy beatboxes the Inspector Gadget theme song while playing. I think it's a neat way to show how a musician can manipulate the sound his instrument makes.

This gentleman is playing a french horn. It is in the brass family. Brass instruments get their sound from buzzing your lips into a mouthpiece, then the air travels throughout the pipes and gets cut off in different areas when the keys are pressed down. This guy uses technology in a cool way and loops different recordings he makes to play all the parts to a popular song. 

String instruments like the violin produce sound by making the strings vibrate. This can be done by sliding a bow across the strings or plucking them. I would love to learn to play the violin. 

For the percussion family I used a video of the WVU Drumline. I was part of WVU Marching Band for four years and I couldn't think of a better example of percussion instruments all playing together. A percussion instrument's sound is created by hitting something. This could be drums, cymbals, xylophones, a cowbell, etc. 

Teaching a Song

Last week I had a horrible case of bronchitis. Excuse the bad singing. It's usually always pretty bad, but especially this week because I still haven't fully got my voice back. There's a song that I taught to my own class a few weeks ago called "Vowel Bingo." It's to the tune of "Bingo" and instead of saying B-I-N-G-O, you sing A-E-I-O-U. It's super cute and it was a great way for them to remember their vowels. Since I needed to reteach the song a different way so that they were saying the sound the vowels made, I killed two birds with one stone and used this as my song teaching blog as well. For my melodic contour map I made the shapes of the vowels with my hands so that they would remember which letter went with each sound. We are making the song part of their daily routine now during calendar in the morning. They like to sing and dance and I like it when they can remember which letters make which sounds!

Bad and good singing technique...Let's start with the bad.

 

Just a warning, you may want to turn your volume down slightly for this video. You'll see why in a minute. A few years ago my friend sent me this video of this girl singing a cover of Taylor Swift's song "Love Story." She had a bunch of these covers and she really didn't think she sounded bad. She needs a lot of vocal coaching, but I have no room to talk because I sound like a dying cat as well. 

The first thing wrong with her technique is that she looks to me like she is sitting down leaning against a wall when she should be sitting tall with her spine straight. Another issue I noticed was with her breathing. She doesn't look like she is taking a big enough breath, therefore she isn't supporting her voice like she needs to. It looks like she isn't opening her mouth enough for words to come out or to be enunciated. She's trying to imitate a pop singer like most young girls tend to do, but not keeping in mind proper singing technique when doing so. Taylor Swift sings with good technique and has done so for so long that she makes it look effortless. This girl's voice just sounds strained and painful. 

For the example of good singing technique I'm going to promote a friend of mine. When she was a teenager she was signed to a record label and thrown into a girl group. Sadly after 9/11, they decided to shelf the album and the girl group never got to hit it big. However, she still makes all these amazing cover videos and recorded an album a few years ago of original songs. Back to singing technique, even though she is playing the piano while singing you can see that she is sitting up straight. Her jaw is relaxed. Most importantly, she takes a deep enough breath to support her voice. You can hear and physically see the breath she takes. She has a lot of control over it and uses dynamics very well. When a line is about to crescendo or the pitch gets higher, she anticipates it and pushes it over.

How did I do on last week's rhythmic poem?

   After viewing the correct way to say the poem I realized that I did it wrong. I thought it was
ta ti-ti ta ta
ta ti-ti ta shh
ta ti-ti ta ta
ta ta ta shh.
In the second line I should have used a ta instead of a ti-ti. As a musician I was sure I had seen and heard the rhythm the correct way. I can read music, but I can play it better by ear so I thought this activity would be simple for me.
   The way I said the poem sounded the same, at least in my own head. I feel like I said the poem clearly and at the right tempo. Hopefully I'll become more comfortable recording myself on video. Last week's video was difficult. I had to remake the video seven or eight times because I didn't keep with the tempo or I was saying the poem wrong or I messed up a line in the poem. Finally, I pulled the words to the poem up in a side bar on my computer and wrote out the ta's and ti-ti's on my phone and read from those. I could plan my videos a little better. Instead of just thinking about it a little first, maybe I need to write out everything I need to say or do. It'd be like a lesson plan for a video. As a teacher I can usually make up things on the spot to say or do, but as a blog video-maker I cannot.