Purposeful Pathways: Possibilities for the Elementary Music Classroom Roger Sams Friday, January 11, 2013. 11:45 am 12:45 pm Sponsored by Music Is Elementary www.musiciselementary.com Rain on the Green Grass Pathway to Singing: Vocal Exploration What brings in the rain? The wind! Explore the head voice by following wind pathways on ooooo. Rote teaching of song and text through echo imitation. Pathway to Literacy: Decoding so and mi Students pat the steady beat while singing the song. Teacher points to icons as they sing.
Teacher uses questioning to support the children in discovering that when the umbrella appears there is one sound on the beat and when the raindrops appear there are two sounds on the beat. What happens when the sun appears? No sound at all! Label the beat with no sound as a rest: $ Pathway to Literacy: Decoding so and mi Students determine when the melody moves to mi and move the icons down one space. (All of the icons begin in the so space.) Convert the icons on the staff to rhythmic notation. Sing in rhythm syllables. Sing in solfa with hand signs. Sing with text.
Pathway to Ensemble: Steady beat chord bordun with color parts by word cue Pat the steady beat and sing the song. Transfer to chord bordun on BX/BM. Teacher claps on the rests. Students determine the pattern and join in. Transfer to triangle. Prepare guiro part by scraping arm with finger on word cues, green grass and roof top. Transfer to guiro. Put all parts together with song. Pathway to Rhythmic Improvisation: 4- beat motives using 4 h $ Speech followed by four beats of rest (2X). Fill in the rests with four 4 (clapping). Fill in the rests with h. Teacher models improvisation using 4 h $. Students improvise. Small groups of students transfer improvisation to unturned percussion.
Put together with song in ABA form. For an advanced challenge transfer the speaking part, Hear the raindrops, to a contrasting timbre instrument. Pathway to Form: Creating a soundscape with movement Consider reading the following poem, by Roger Sams, about the rain with sound effect chosen by the students, then bring in the BX and begin the orchestration for the song after the steady beat has been established. Teacher Talk: The accompaniment for the rain poem does not need to be metric. The students can create an ethereal soundscape to accompany the poem inspired by the words. This is a great opportunity to explore various timbres and unconventional ways to play the instruments. Consider using this poem as an opportunity to explore dynamic contrast, emphasizing the difference between the gentle rain and the storm. Pathway to Creative Movement: Sudden and sustained movement accompanied by percussion soundscape Students begin in one place, exploring the way raindrops fall (sustained movement).
Slowing drifting in the wind, straight down, swirling, twirling. (List more with the class) Explore the various rain movement ideas in self- space. Students imagine they are raindrops and chose a spot somewhere else in the room where they will land. Can they travel to that place (locomotor movement) in a way from the previous list? Explore several different ways. Now explore sudden movement very angular, like lightening. Encourage angular movement in legs, arms, head, etc. Create a movement sequence: sustained, sudden, sustained Combine with poem and soundscape. Use with song in ABA Form. Johnny s Gone to Tea Pathway to Literacy: Finding and labeling do Use the solfa tone ladder to practice echo patterns containing so, mi and la. Teacher sings the first measure in solfa followed by four beats of rest (4X). Students join teacher in above pattern. Students sing the first measure. Teacher sings the second measure with the text I don t know what note this is. Teacher asks the class if that part is so, mi or la. Students discover that it isn t any of those choices. The sound is lower. Label our new note, do. Teacher sings the second measure using the text, Then a low note we call do. Students and teacher trade jobs. Everyone sings the entire song this way. Rote teaching of the text, using visual and echo imitation. Sing entire song with text. Pathway to Ensemble: Steady beat chord bordun with color parts Pat 4 $ 4 4 while singing the song. Tap shoulders for the rest. Transfer to BX/BM on chord bordun. Add a jump on the word jumped and chaps on Little Johnny s gone to tea. Transfer to a big drum and rhythms sticks. Put orchestration together.
Pathway to Improvisation: 4- beat echo patterns Teacher leads 4- beat echo patterns as B Section. Students are jumping, dancing fish when they echo. Put the rhythm in your body. Students tread water (stationary movement) when the teacher creates the patterns. Individual students become the improvisers. Put it all together in ABA form.
Pathway to Composition: 8- beat patterns Students create 8- beat rhythms containing 4 $ h using the names of fish on cards. These patterns may be used as ostinati with the song, as an interlude between performances of the song, or as layered ostinati in a B Section. Fishpole Song Learn melody through reading. (Rhythm, then solfa, then text.) Learn ostinato through reading. Put two vocal parts together. Rote teaching of BP. Put two vocal lines together with BP. Create an improvised B Section. Use the first measure as a 4- beat question. Give a 4- beat solfa answer using do, re, mi. When the students have demonstrated some mastery using do, re, mi use do, low la, low so for the answers. Add text to the answers. Perform in a final rondo giving students an opportunity to improvise alone or in small groups.
Consider this alternative B Section. Using the fish composition lesson (above) as a model, have the students improvise 8- beat patterns using fish names. Ask the question, What kind of fish did you catch today? followed by 8- beat improvisation.