Welcome to the December NewsLink!

Dear Collegiate Member,

The holiday season is upon us! I'm sure that you're all looking for a nice break before the new semester begins. Good luck on finals!

This month we'll look at the music education department at the University of Colorado, Boulder, which conducted a community outreach program for preservice teachers as a supplement to their degree program requirements. Working with band students in grades 6 through 8 from 12 schools, undergraduate music education students served as sectional coaches, instrumental specialists, and conductors for the full ensemble in ten 90-minute evening rehearsals. The benefits gained were plentiful and varied greatly according to each individual’s needs and level of personal development. Parts I and II will be featured in this issue of Newslink and Parts III and IV will be featured in January.

As always, if you have comments, questions, or would like to share your chapter’s activities or recruitment strategies with us for publication in a future issue, e-mail Shauna Leavitt.

Happy Holidays!   

Shauna Leavitt, Student Programs Manager

University of Colorado, Boulder:  Community Outreach Program

Introduction

This collection of student reflections represents a sampling of the possibilities for growth and preservice teacher development that are inherent in a university community outreach program. The outreach program included band students in grades 6 through 8 from 12 schools in the surrounding Boulder, Colorado, area. The band students participated in individualized, sectional, and full ensemble instruction across ten, 90-minute evening rehearsals. Undergraduate music education students from the University of Colorado, Boulder, served as the sectional coaches, instrumental specialists, and conductors for the full ensemble. All contributors served as instructors in a middle school band outreach ensemble as a supplement to their degree program requirements. The benefits that preservice teachers can take from programs such as this are plentiful and vary greatly according to each individual’s needs and level of personal development. Each story sheds light on the process of becoming a thoughtful and effective teacher. The lessons these students share are important for preservice teachers, teacher educators, and practicing teachers alike.

First, Jessica Swift uses metaphor to describe her experience grappling with the necessities of planning and how planning is essential to effective rehearsing.  Second, Tricia Cannava reflects on the challenges and growth possible through working with students of multiple ability levels.

Part I: The Game Plan: Preparing to Prepare

by Jessica Swift, Conductor & Percussion Instructor

Benjamin Franklin once commented, “by failing to prepare, you are preparing to fail.” Most would agree that it's important to think ahead in many facets of life. This allows us to be more efficient in completing tasks and working towards success. As someone striving towards achievement in my own life, I’ve noticed these trends reflected in my developing career as a music educator. During my studies, I’ve spent quite a bit of time and effort developing effective teaching strategies, and I've concluded that the "wild card" in my teaching-- which either makes or breaks my lesson-- is rehearsal planning. Throughout my experience working as a conductor/teacher for this outreach ensemble, I’ve tried a variety of lesson planning methods and ideas, some with greater success than others. I've found that some of the most important aspects to planning ahead for teaching are making good predictions about the rehearsal, setting achievable short and long term goals, and having a variety of strategies/solutions for potential problems at your disposal.

Making Predictions:

Not to completely deface teaching by comparing it to a poker game, but in all honesty certain aspects are quite like gambling. You see, with teaching there thankfully isn’t the same consistency from day to day that you may find with some other jobs, because the products of teaching are not money, capital, or merchandise; they are human beings, who are not static or predictable like machines or computers. How is this relevant to effective rehearsal planning?

Predictability.

Round one, I have my cards on the table face down, and I have no idea what I have to work with;  I just know how to play the game. Day one, I know nothing about my students or their capabilities, but I have a lot of great ideas about music and have prepared my score extensively. I’ve predicted that because we are sight-reading, things will likely sound far from perfect and therefore I’ve highlighted parts in the music where I predict the students will need immediate attention. By knowing the score, I am able to keep my ears open for other problems. Now, as teachers we don’t have the luxury of looking into a crystal ball and foreseeing every missed note, rhythm difficulty, distraction, and focus problem before they occur. However, by making predictions and preparing for a certain margin of error, we’ve established much better preparation than someone who sits down at the poker table blindly, without knowing anything about the score or having any ideas about what could happen in rehearsal.

Setting Goals:

Going hand-and-hand with making predictions is setting goals. It's my philosophy that if you aim big (e.g., for the jackpot), you can achieve more. Accordingly, I wrote on each of my plans that a part of the lesson rationale was to “make great music.” Although my middle school students were unlikely to sound like the Chicago Symphony after our eight rehearsals, they were certainly able to make great music based on their ability level and experience. This is an example of my long-term vision and goal. If I turn my cards up and see that I have nothing to work with, then I may be doomed to fold this round, but a good card player is always able to see the potential and with a little luck can make a lot out of a little. As a teacher, if I look to the future and set goals for what I would like the students to achieve, I will be much more likely to guide them to success.

The other aspect of goal setting is the shortterm. Short-term planning is much more specific and measurable. If I have three good cards in my hand, I trade in my other two with a pretty specific idea about what I’m hoping to get back. Musically, this translates to working with specific sections (e.g., clarinets from bars 31-36). Whether you work best by notating these goals in a template or simply placing sticky notes in your score to highlight what you want to hear, it’s crucial that you have some form of reminder to illustrate these goals for you while you are on the podium in front of the class.

Reflecting after the fact and reexamining goals in the moment:

While goals are a great driving force in effective rehearsal,  sometimes you don’t always achieve what you set out to do. This can happen for a variety of reasons that, unlike in a game of cards, may have little to do with luck. In most cases, the instructor can learn a great deal by considering what could have been done differently in a given lesson. As a young teacher, I’ve learned to examine all possibilities to determine what made my lessons effective and what derailed them. In the words of Mike Tyson, “Everyone has a plan, until they get punched in the face. Sometimes you may think you’ve done what's necessary to prepare, but then you find yourself way offbase, and things just don’t go well. One particular rehearsal comes to mind. The lesson plan for this rehearsal was the most extensive and detailed of all my plans. I had what I thought to be a great conceptual objective and a great set of procedures to carry out my objectives. I was confident that in 15 minutes my middle school students would be enlightened about intonation and pitch tendencies and would miraculously transform their sounds into beautiful harmonies that locked perfectly in tune. However, the students’ lack of understanding and interest in this particular lesson sent the rehearsal spiraling down in a crash of confusion. Clearly, this was not my best hand. But as they say, “You win some, you lose some,” and what’s important is that you pick yourself up and keep trying. In fact, this proved to be a turning point in my planning, because I realized the importance of striking a balance between focusing on the lesson plan and focusing on student reactions in the moment.

Teaching Strategies:

It’s important to have a great bag of tricks or collection of strategies to address issues as they arise in rehearsal. I found I needed several methods and strategies for teaching basic elements of technique. I referred to both expert advice (my teachers and print resources) and my previous experiences (what has or hasn’t worked for me in the past) when considering ideas. After trying several in rehearsal, I found that the most effective methods for correcting basic errors in pitch and rhythm were isolation, singing, and sizzling.  To be more sensitive to students’ needs in the moment, I began listing different strategies to address the issues I predicted would arise in rehearsal. This allowed me to be more flexible and react better to what I was hearing from moment to moment.

The Actual Plan:

“Plans are worthless. Planning is essential.” - Dwight D. Eisenhower, general and president (1890-1961)

I very purposely have not gotten into specifics about the actual outline and content of lesson plans. There are many templates and suggestions for lesson plan components in the music education community, several of which I tried throughout my work in the outreach ensemble. My conclusion is that how you choose to notate your plan is a very personal matter.  I found that “less-is-more,” because it keeps me on my feet and engaged in what the students are doing. Additionally, I'm a visually oriented, so often pictures or color in the score caught my eye easier than lengthy verbal statements.

Understandably,it's encouraged that lesson plans contain a certain amount of elements for the sake of accountability. Most public schools require records of plans, and having well-outlined and inclusive plans is clearly important. For example, in addition to what I've mentioned about predictions, goals, and strategies, plans should include the National Standards, procedures, forms of assessment, and the setting, time, and place of the lesson. Obviously, the more detailed these plans, the easier they are for someone to interpret. As a result, I’ve found it best for me to essentially have two plans. One which is typed neatly and sequentially that my supervisor can view and one which is more conducive to my teaching style (more rough, pictures, etc.). Yes, this is more work at times, but it also allows me to really think through and rehearse my lesson prior to teaching it.

Conclusion

I’ve learned a great deal about lesson planning through my experience as a director for the outreach ensemble. In school they teach you the "what’s" and the "how to's," but it isn’t until you have the chance to "do" that you're truly able to understand how to play the game. For me, lesson planning has always been a challenge, because the idea of predicting events and having solutions for things that have yet to occur seemed so abstract. Now, after practice, I feel much more confident and think that I have a better variety of cards up my sleeve to lay on the table.

Part II: On the Same Level: Dealing with Mixed Ability Levels in the Ensemble Setting

by Tricia Cannava, Clarinet Instructor & Woodwind Chamber Ensemble Director

I learned a great deal about my personal teaching style and how I must adapt instruction to meet the needs of students with very diverse levels of ability. Coming into this experience, I don’t think I was ready for such a wide variety of ability levels. The outreach ensemble had students ranging from sixth grade to eighth grade. Many of these students were still learning fundamentals of note reading while others were proficient sight-readers taking private lessons and preparing for honor bands. As the program progressed, I discovered multiple ways to accommodate each student and adapt my teaching for the variety of levels present.

As the clarinet sectional teacher, a challenge was the sheer number of students. I had twenty clarinet students, and after the first day, I remember thinking, “How am I ever going to teach all twenty of these kids when half of them haven’t yet learned to read music and the other half can sight read perfectly?” I came up with a teaching plan in which the top players modeled fingerings and styles in the music for the rest of the group. By contributing to the ensemble, the advanced students felt needed since they now had the opportunity to share their knowledge with those around them. Another challenge was keeping everyone involved. On one occasion, the third clarinets struggled with a rhythm, and I had to go over it multiple times while everyone else was idle. I suddenly stopped and had the rest of the group finger and sing their parts while the third clarinets clapped or played their rhythm. These are just two small examples of how working with twenty clarinets helped me become a more creative teacher. By necessity, I learned to develop a variety of teaching techniques to keep everyone involved and engaged.

A pull-out, woodwind chamber ensemble was created as another method for coping with the variety of ability levels.  The ten-person, woodwind chamber group included an oboe, two flutes, two saxophones, and four clarinets, who rehearsed as a group on selected weeks during the usually scheduled sectional time. As the leader/conductor of this group, I learned much about the benefits and pitfalls of creating a select ensemble. By far, the biggest struggle was deciding who would have the opportunity to be in this group. Because this was a nonauditioned outreach program and we only met once per week, it was incredibly difficult to choose who needed the challenge of participating in the woodwind chamber ensemble. Often the choice was based on the voices of parents and students who expressed a need for an even more challenging musical experience.  Although I was worried that students who weren't selected would feel left out, they didn't express any ill feelings. Through this process, I also learned that simple auditions for seating placement can be beneficial on many levels. An audition procedure that gives the students a chance to earn a place in the select ensemble could help identify students who are ready for more challenging material in a fair and relatively objective manner.

The wide variety of student ability levels challenged my teaching the most. Although at times it was difficult to accommodate all students, I grew in leaps and bounds as a teacher as I realized that not everyone learns the same way, and that it's my job to keep everyone interested and engaged no matter their level.  One of the most exciting elements of being a teacher is that I will never be bored in my future profession. I'll always be searching for new ways to make music challenging yet attainable for every student. As a teacher, it's my duty to make sure that every child learns something valuable and that no one gets left behind. Teachers can make a difference, but to make a difference each teacher needs to be tuned into the individual needs of every single child.