MUS150In class, my partner, Devina, and I, chose to go with the first prompt about the disabled student in band class. Even though our experiment was designed for this prompt, it could have gone well with the second one too. We figured that since our subject would have limited capabilities and musical knowledge, we could create something with everyday objects that were easily recognizable to everyone. We set up many ordinary things on a piece of cardboard. We used things like play doh, tin foil, washers, hangers, and even screws to make up our instruments. By taping them to the cardboard and hooking the makey makey wires up, we created our instrument. We associated the size of our objects with the pitch of the notes. The lower notes were represented by bigger objects, and the higher notes were the smaller ones. We figured this could be very easy to someone with limited musical knowledge because usually, lower noises are associated with larger objects, and vice versa.
In a listening-based experience with middle schoolers, we could sit them all down, and instead of having a regular band class, we could expose them to scratch and makey makey. We could set up different inanimate objects like food or toys or anything of the sort, and associate them with different loops and beats. This way, the middle schoolers can learn that theres much more to music than just notes on a page. This will also help the kids that may not enjoy band as much as others. They will have their minds opened to the endless possibilities that come with learning music. Not only will this experiment open their musical minds, but it will also give them a break from their average band class that they might not always look forward to. We could set up the program on a smart board so they can all hear and see what is occuring, let them come up in small groups and add loops or beats until they come up with a finished product. This will teach them that creativity is a great thing, it has no boundaries, and that it's okay to make mistakes, as long as they're good, meaningful ones. This will hopefully cause them to leave the band room feeling excited and refreshed. They would be able to go home to their parents or non-band friends and tell them about the "super cool" experiment they did in band class that day. I know as a middle schooler, I would have thought an activity like that was astonishing. For a more non-formal community aspect, you could incorporate things that everyone can do, whether they have musical knowledge or not. We could create squares of tin foil connected to the makey makey and scratch, that when someone steps on them, (like Dance Dance Revolution-style), it would make different beats and loops. (trying to stay away from notes here, these people probably won't know much about that.) Also, because we're trying to reach a very diverse audience, in addition to the DDR floor mats, we can code scratch to create sounds by detecting movement. Not all of our subjects may have the ability to make the floor tiles work. Because of this, we will be able to reach a vast audience whether they can move, read music, or have any musical knowledge or not, they will be able to enjoy and interact with this experience. As for a more advanced group of subjects, such as an honor band, you have many more musical possibilities because of how much knowledge the students have for music. A very effective activity to put together could be to take a piece of a piece that the band may be struggling with, and connect the scratch/makey makey program (on different instruments) to some inanimate objects. Since these subjects actually have musical knowledge, they could read the music and play the parts on the inanimate objects/scratch instruments (depending on what instrument the certain part is written for). And then compiling all of the different parts into one piece of music, like a score. This could be a lesson for them in many ways. 1.) It will familiarize them with the part they are struggling with by making them create the same part with different objects that they aren't particularlu familiar with when it comes to making music 2.) Show how important each individual part is, and why it's so important to have those parts prepared. 3.) Also emphasize, however, how all of the parts fit together to make one big piece of music. |
EricaThis page will be for videos of myself teaching, lesson plans, and reflections. Archives
February 2020
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