Thirty Days Has September

Several years back, I had the privilege of participating in a series of master sessions with Orff Schulwerk stalwart Jane Frazee at the AOSA national conference.  Aside from the privilege of learning from one of the true masters of the Schulwerk, I also found myself as a student peer to several of the teachers who had taught me in my Orff levels coursework.  It was both overwhelming and exhilarating.

Beyond the specific activities we learned and the group work we created in the moment, what I remember most are a few sage words of wisdom from Ms. Frazee.  In addition to pieces from the Music for Children volumes and folk material from different cultures, she advised us to plan a curriculum that included time tested rhymes, prose and adages.  One that stood out to me as a musical possibility is the rhyme I learned as a child to remember the number of days in each month:

Thirty days has September, April, June and November.

February has twenty-eight alone.  All the rest have thirty-one.

Say for leap year; 

That's the time February's days are twenty-nine.

I have used this rhyme as the basis of a rhythm and body percussion lesson with my older students (4th and 5th grades).  At first, I teach them a simple body percussion piece by rote.  After learning the short example, I guide students to talk with a partner about how it might be written down.  After a few minutes, we regroup and students answers.  And, in an age of social media and portable technology, I am thankful that they can still find so many possibilities.  The body percussion could be written with:  music notes, words, letter abbreviations, numbers, colors, drawings, shapes, Morse code, etc.  Sometimes, I have to set a limit or their answers will eat up too much class time.  Finally, I focus them back to the answer of color and present the following visual:

I give them time to learn the body percussion of the rhyme,then we perform it together.  After they are pretty comfortable with the rhyme and body percussion, I followup the color coded version with its music notation:

Now, this is all fine and good and could probably stop there.  But, having been immersed in a body percussion piece about months for a class period or two, my students are ready to take it to another level.  The rhyme will have more meaning to them students if they have a personal connection to it.  So, to that end, I extend the lesson one more step by having students work in groups to create body percussion pieces based on the rhythms of their birthdays.  Suddenly, January 16th is not just a day on the calendar, it is a rhythm (s=s=s=s e-e) that has many musical possibilities.  This past week I witnessed my students' group work and, as always, was blown away by what they created together.  And it all came from a rhyme I learned when i was a child.

In defense of Real Music Making

Has it really been over a year since I posted anything?  Wow!  Let's just say, I've thought about it - for a really long time - but got a bit busy.  I'm not one of those truly dedicated bloggers who post something every week or day, but when I do you can be assured that I have put a lot of thought into what I'm saying and, like I said, this one has been brewing for a long time.

A couple of years ago, I was chatting with a couple of colleagues and the topic of sound systems and such came up.  I casually commented that all I really used was a microphone to address the audience at performances or for the occasional soloist.  One of the other music teachers looked at me incredulously and asked, "Well, don't you need a sound system and monitors?"  I replied by saying that I did not use recorded music in my performances and only use recordings on occasion for movement activities in class.  She had gotten so used to the default music program that so many teachers cling to - pop-style "kidsongs" with lush accompaniment tracks an no lasting value - that I thought her eyes might pop out of her head.  She then asked, "Well, what do you DO?"  In a matter of fact tone, I explained that I played the piano and ukulele and had the students themselves play instrumental accompaniments they had learned in class.  She just couldn't seem to wrap her head around it.  I might as well have been speaking another language.  And, in a way, I was.

I am an Orff specialist.  I take great pride in saying that.  I worked very hard to be able to say that.  And I work very hard every day to make sure I can keep on calling myself one.  It would be easier to fall back on packaged musicals, prepared lessons, accompaniment tracks that don't change with the needs and whims of students aged 5-11, overuse of technology and videos, videos videos.  But then I would be teaching my students, and myself, to be dependent on tools in order to make music rather than nurturing the musician that lurks inside of them.  They would become the family in that AT&T ad who freaks out when the internet is out and has no idea of what to do without it.  It makes me want to scream at the TV, "Go outside and play!  Do a crossword puzzle!  Sing a song!  Draw a picture!  Write a story!  DO SOMETHING!"  Yeah, sure I might catch the occasional eyeroll or bored look from one of my 5th graders for not teaching the latest pop song or using all of the technology that fills the rest of their day.  But when they leave my classroom at the end of the day, even those students say "I can't get that song out of my head!"  And then they have something to do whenever the internet goes out.  Score one for Real Music Making.