A Review for ME!
How excited I was when yesterday I saw a wonderful post by Shelley Krause @butwait about my book, Inspired by Listening: Teaching Your Curriculum While Actively Listening to Music. This book is where is all started years ago when I decided to make music part of my life forever. I took the lyrics by Led [...]
I Remember You
Heard this song before? It’s one of my all time favorites: hard, passionate, rockin’, beautiful; it hits me to the core every time I hear it bringing me back to a time when guitar solos ruled the radio. It had no less of an effect on me the other day when it came on in [...]
Working with Audacity
Recently, I taught two workshops using the open source audio editing software, Audacity through the Somersworth, NH School District. @brophycat (AKA Cathy Brophy, a good friend and colleague) invited me to share my knowledge of the software with preK-12 teachers and make it practical for their teaching. I was excited to do [...]
Authentic Integration of Music – Grad Course
Music is a great way to reach out to your students, motivate them and teach your curriculum. In this course, we will explore ways to make music part of your classroom culture as you create a safe learning environment for your students. Then we will discuss ways to integrate these musical experiences in creating, performing [...]
Teacher Talents
I teach with some very talented people. Take the other teachers on my fourth grade team: one is a great artist, one is a pianist and singer and the other wows me at every staff meeting as she sketches boarders around her notes. And I think to myself, do their students [...]
When You Can Make it Jazz
What is jazz? It is the ultimate freedom in structure. The goal for me in teaching is to teach as if I were playing jazz. But how? First by finding the structure, and allowing myself to be creative and free. Here is what I mean.
Growing up, my piano teacher trained [...]
Drum Circle
One of the best ways to illustrate freedom in structure is in a drum circle. Here, a leader starts by drumming an ostinato or rhythm that is repeated over and over. Then the others in the circle begin to play. Some play alongside the leader, others play their own creations, adding their [...]
Jazzy DADA
This month we celebrate POETRY and JAZZ. Here is an activity I would like to share with you that you can use immediately with your students to celebrate jazz, poetry and promote freedom in structure!
DADA poetry was first written by artists and poets in Paris France. They clipped words from newspapers, [...]
Erosion Blues
This past week, my students and I had a great experience as we created a makeshift recording studio in our school and recorded an original piece of music: The Erosion Blues.
It is a great example of integration, collaboration and freedom in structure.
Integration: The blues was meant to be a culminating project for our unit [...]
Effects of Quality Community Building
Shared experiences are what bond a group together. Whether the group is taking a nature walk, creating art, or sharing personal reflections about music or literature, it is all part of the process we need to share with our students. I believe that these experiences can all be linked to and integrated into [...]
