Black History Month

I have posted the music lessons that I created using picture books. Please let me know of any questions that you may have; I would be happy to help. The music that I used for these books can be found on I-Tunes. I'm sorry that I took so long in posting these.

Marion Anderson Lesson Plan

Lesson #1

Read Aloud

Performance Standard: MMSIC.7 – Evaluating music and music performances

MMSIC.8 – Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts

MMSIC.9 – Understanding music in relation to history and culture

Objectives: Identify and describe relationships between music, dance arts, theatre arts, and visual arts.

Identify and comprehend new vocabulary used in the text.

Demonstrate literacy skills through reading and discussing musical settings of varied literature.

Supplies: When Marian Sang

By: Pam Munoz Ryan

                                                                            Music CD

Alpha Boxes worksheet

1. Read the story aloud, showing the pictures after reading each page.
2. During the read aloud, the teacher references many songs in the text by singing the lyrics. The students joined in singing “My Country ‘tis of Thee” during the reading of the text.
3. Students discussed the new vocabulary notated in the alpha boxes and developed a definition of their own with a partner.
4. The class discussed all of the new vocabulary words that they encountered in the reading of the text. Student-created definitions were shared and discussed and the book was summarized through student-led discussion.
5. Vocabulary: opulent; trepidation; metropolitan; momentous; and contralto

Lesson Two

When Marian Sang

Performance Standard: MMSIC.7 – Evaluating music and music performances

MMSIC.8 – Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts

MMSIC.9 – Understanding music in relation to history and culture

Objectives: Identify and describe relationships between music, dance arts, theatre arts, and visual arts.

Demonstrate literacy skills through reading and discussing musical settings of varied literature.

The students will study the correlation of reading phonemes and singing phonemes.

Discuss stylistic characteristics of a varied repertoire, including world music and analyze vocal performance.

Discuss the relationship between music, world events, history, and culture.

Supplies: When Marian Sang

                                                                           
                                                                            Music CD

Comprehension Worksheet

1. The students will independently answer the questions on the worksheet.
2. The class will discuss the answers to the questions.

Extension activity: Students will listen to a recording of Marian Anderson to analyze the classical techniques used and observe the opulent range that is displayed in the song. The Students practiced the techniques using “My Country ‘tis of Thee” from the book. The vowels of singing were discussed and the syllables were broken down into phonemes. The students practiced these to develop correct singing diction.  This method works very well for ESOL students as well as English speaking students. We use hand signals for the vowels and extended the vowels sounds into syllabic formation.

The next time I teach this lesson I will focus on the comprehension of the text and use a different worksheet for vocabulary. I feel that the KWL chart might be more helpful with the content that I want them to focus the most on. The alpha boxes were not as functional for the higher level vocabulary.

Harriet Tubman Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan #4

Read Aloud

Performance Standard: MMSIC.7 – Evaluating music and music performances

MMSIC.8 – Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts

MMSIC.9 – Understanding music in relation to history and culture

Objectives: Identify and describe relationships between music, dance arts, theatre arts, and visual arts.

Demonstrate literacy skills through reading and discussing musical settings of varied literature.

Reflect on the nature of performance in music and in related arts through discussion.

Essential Question: How are spirituals connected to the history of the late 1800’s?

Supplies: 

Moses: When Harriet Tubman Led her People to Freedom

By: Carole Boston Weatherford

                                                                             Music CD

KWL Chart

1.    The students wrote down what they knew about Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. The class discussed any prior knowledge they had on the subject.

2.   The students made suggestions on what they would like to know about Harriet Tubman and the Underground Railroad. The class discussed what they would like to learn.

3.   The teacher read the story aloud and showed the pictures after reading each page.

4.   At the end of the story, the teacher read the authors notes about Harriet Tubman.

5.   The students dictated what they learned about Harriet Tubman.

6.   We had a classroom discussion about the facts that were learned. The class also discussed vocabulary: safe houses; refuge; cures; spirituals; and coded – spirituals.

7.   Extension activity: The students will listen to “Wade in the Water”, a coded-spiritual. Students will analyze the text and compare the similarities of the Moses of the Bible and the Moses of the Slaves.

The next time I do a lesson of this nature, I will allow for more time to fill in the KWL charts.

Martin Luther King Jr. Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan #5

Read Aloud

Performance Standard: MMSIC.7 – Evaluating music and music performances

MMSIC.8 – Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts

MMSIC.9 – Understanding music in relation to history and culture

Objectives: Identify and describe relationships between music, dance arts, theatre arts, and visual arts.

Demonstrate literacy skills through reading and discussing musical settings of varied literature.

Reflect on the nature of performance in music and in related arts through discussion and writing.

Essential Question: How did the Civil Rights era influence the music of this period of time?

Supplies: Martin’s Big Words

By: Doreen Rappaport

                                                                             Music CD

Vocabulary Worksheet

1. The students will work in pairs and develop their own definitions for the new vocabulary words.

2. The students will listen to the book as it is read. Pictures will be shown after reading each page.

3. After reading the book, the teacher will read the author’s notes adding more factual information to the reading of the text.

4. Selected students are chosen to read their definitions to the class. The class chooses the correct words for the definitions that are given. Corrections are made in analysis of the text.

5. Vocabulary: Hymns; peace; freedom; strike; protest; and convinced

Extension activity: Students will listen to “Free at Last” based on the speech “I have a Dream”. Students will write a comparison of the spiritual and the speech.

The next time I do this lesson I will use it with sixth graders. The text of the book is too juvenile for 7^th grade students.

Ella Fitzgerald Lesson Plan

Lesson Plan #3

Read Aloud

Performance Standard: MMSIC.7 – Evaluating music and music performances

MMSIC.8 – Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts

MMSIC.9 – Understanding music in relation to history and culture

 Essential Question: How is jazz related to the visual artwork of this historical era?

Objectives: Identify and describe relationships between music, dance arts, theatre arts, and visual arts.

Demonstrate literacy skills through reading and discussing musical settings of varied literature.

Supplies: Ella Fitzgerald: The Tale of a Vocal Virtuoso

By: Andrea Davis Pinkney and Brian Pinkney

                                                                                 Music CD

New Word Vocabulary Worksheet

1.    Students will listen as the teacher reads the book aloud. The pictures are shown after each page is read.

2.   The students listen to the story and write down any unfamiliar words on their worksheet.

3.   After the story, students are given time to complete the worksheet. Students create their own definition of the word based on the story. They also make any personal connections to remember what the word means. Drawing pictures or making a visual connection is also a great way to remember a new word and definition.

4.   The class discussed the vocabulary words discovered.

5.   Vocabulary: scat; bebop; jazz; syncopation; improvisation; and virtuoso.

Extension activity: Students discuss the Apollo Theatre and Carnegie Hall and the types of music that made these music halls famous. The students will also listen to Ella’s scat singing and experiment with improvisation. The students discussed the art work in the picture book, talked about the style of the art, and how the illustrations made the text come to life.

 The next time I teach this lesson I will bring some instruments to demonstrate different jazz techniques. I will also let the students listen to recordings before the book is read.

Common Core Activity

I really enjoyed the activity on the new Common Core Standards. The activity highlighted the connections that the cummulative process has on education as a whole. Each year really builds on the other. There will be a lot of prior knowledge acquistion with this new process! Year after year students will be called to go more into depth and detail. I see a real need to pull out the old interdisciplinary units
that we used to do. I really enjoyed the Native American units, rain forest units, and civil war units that my school used to do. Students can really make the connections between disciplines throught units like this which increases retention of the material. There are so many non-fiction books that can be used with interdisciplinary units.

Content Literacy VS Domain Literacy

How should I define these terms? Let me start with literacy. What is literacy? Is it just having the ability to read and write? I think that it is much more.......I believe that literacy is having competence in a specified area. Music literacy is something that is acheived with much dedication and practice, but teaching music and being proficient in communicating the knowledge that I have to others is a little different. I believe that this is the difference between content knowledge (literacy) and domain knowledge (literacy). Content literacy is the ability to use reading and writing for the acquisition of new information. It identifies three principal cognitive components: general literacy skills, content specific literacy skills, and prior knowledge of content. Domain literacy is the ability to access information, manage information, develop information, evaluate information, and communicate information. Understanding the difference is what great teachers do. They can gather needed information from students, develop, manage plans and implement strategies for improvement, communicate valuable and instructional feedback, evaluate, analyze, and assess student's progress. This reminds me of the "tried and trusted" Bloom's taxonomy. Bloom's was the way to create great lesson plans way-back-when...............if it ain't broken, don't fix it!

Non-Reader

A non-reader is a person who does not read or cannot read; they are very slow at learning to read, or learning new literacy concepts. Some find text as mere letters on a page and have no comprehension of the text meaning. With this definition, I feel as if we have more non-readers than we are aware of. This scares me!

Diagnosis: The Missing Ingredient in RTI Assessment

According to the article RTI or Response to Intervention is an approach to identify students as learning disabled. I could not disagree more. Response to Intervention should be the platform to identification of gaps in a students learning. All students should be labeled as exceptional. No child is identical to another child, therefore, the way each child learns is specific and unique to that child. Each child should be taught by a teacher that knows their strengths and weaknesses. RTI is the process in which we should examine, evaluate, and implement a plan of instruction for each child in our classroom.

The model that we use in Georgia is very effective if used properly! Tier I of the RTI pyramid is for the general population in your classroom. Again, this does not mean that you give everyone in the classroom the same "prescription". Tier II of the RTI pyramid is small group interventions. Here there are a lot of programs that could help students at this level such as: READ 180, math enrichment programs, and other reading enrichment programs. These programs have been effective for some, but I tend to think that they would be more successful if the classes were much smaller. Having fifteen struggling readers in one classroom is not conducive to any intervention that I know of. The same can be said for fifteen struggling math students. Tier III should be individualized interventions or the SST tier. The problems I see here are the teachers are not adequately trained on strategies that are effective for struggling students. They don't know how to identify and assess the needs of the students, much less develop an individualized map of interventions that would put the child on the road to success. If we utilized the pyramid at level two as we should, there would be fewer students referred to tier III and tier IV (special ed and gifted) would be a true reflection of learning disabilities, not just gaps in learning

I totally agree with this article on the fact that some school systems are adopting the enrichment programs and identifying "bubble" students, as a one-size-fits-all philosophy of fixing our test scores and helping children to meet their potential. Well, what happened to No Child Left Behind? I'm sorry, but that whole program got the boot from the get-go. Our government took a  wonderful program that worked in Texas and turned it into something that it wasn't intended to be! That just goes to show you that something that works somewhere doesn't mean that it's going to work everywhere.

According to this article, matching students' needs with instruction by using "if-then" thinking is at the heart of effective and efficient assessment instruction and is essential if RTI is going to make a difference. Can I say amen?! RTI is our road map to help each child in our classroom reach their potential. I hope I am making sure that I take the time to evaluate each child and give them a prescription that will cure their ailments, not just the symptoms.