Progress

This is my first year teaching in the same school as the year before.  After my first year teaching I ended up moving and getting a job at my current school.  This is now my third year teaching.  And let me just say, there is a big difference when you go back to the same room, instruments, and students.

I can actually see the progress we made last year and we are making even more this year!!  I'm actually quite excited with the progress of some of my students.

I took my Orff Level 1 training this past summer.  One of the things I learned about was letting go and letting the students create.  I'm trying to do this as much as possible now that they have learned the basic foundations last year.  The students get to chose the instruments when we do different songs.  the students get to create "B Sections" to a piece of music we are doing.  The students get to create some movement, choreography to pieces and perform it for their teacher.

I'm having so much fun letting them take control!

New Year!

It's that time of year again!  We are headed back to school tomorrow for pre-planning and the kids come a week later!!  This year I am going to promote reading in my classroom.  In order to do that I decided to theme my room as a harry potter room after seeing a blog post about dividing kids into Harry Potter houses for class discipline,etc.

I kind of went overboard - banners above the instruments:

Cast a spell with Solfege Bulletin Board (with owls!  I got the idea to use records for the eyes on pinterest!)

Music Rules

Alphabet pennant banners!

Instrument Bin Labels

"I solemnly swear...."

"Music Managed"

Orff Level 1 Certification

I just completed Week 1 of my Orff Level 1 certification.  I'm taking it with Sandy and  Gretchen.  I've been to a number of workshops led by them over the years but I never fail to learn something new from them every time I see them.  It's been a really great time getting to know them as well as my classmates.

As a young teacher who just finished her second year teaching, I know I have a lot to learn which is why I am taking this class.  I am very happy to see that I am doing so many things "right" according to the Orff method.  My process for teaching is what they are teaching us in this class which is good to see.

The best thing is that they are helping me learn the little intricate details and rules.  I have composed my own music for the classroom...for my students.  But there are so many things they are telling me that I never knew before and I am so excited to use them in my classroom.  This includes WHEN to use a bordun, what kind of bordun, what voice to put it in, etc.  I'm super excited to go back and refine my lessons and use this information in my class!

New Instruments!!

So last year I taught at a school where I had 6 Orff instruments that were so broken that they couldn't be used to their full potential.  I changed schools last year and moved to where I grew up.  I happened to get a job at a school with 14 Orff instruments!  I was incredibly happy and felt so blessed to have them!  Well I quickly discovered that even though I had more, I had class sizes that did not work with 14 instruments.  I have classes that go up to 26-28 students.  Some of them are in 6th grade which means their bodies are pretty big and so sharing a small instrument doesn't work so well for them.

I started doing some fundraising on donorschoose.org.  I managed to raise 1400 dollars towards new instruments!  Like a true rookie, I accidentally made my first project 2200 dollars total!  While I didn't fulfill my project by the deadline, my boss at the county level found out I needed more instruments and bought me NINE more.  I'm so incredibly blessed!  So in addition to the money I raised through donorschoose, I now have 9 beautiful new instruments! (Although one is on backorder and has not come in yet).

With the donorscoose money I will be starting a couple SMALLER projects and fulfilling them for other needs around my classroom!

Take a look at some pictures:

BEFORE:

AFTER:

I will definitely be making good use of them both in the classroom and with my Orff ensembles.  I can accept MANY more students into the ensembles!  I'm excited and so are my students!!!!

Frozen Listening

I don't know about you, but many of my students are obsessed with the movie Frozen.  I love to do listening and critical thinking with my older students.  http://miscellaneousme.wordpress.com/ has a lot of really great music listening files available on TpT.  I have purchased a lot of them over the past couple years.  But I have also started to branch out and make my own when I need them!!!  (And I need them a lot).

So I decided to do Frozen.  But I used the Alex Boye version as well and did a compare/contrast.  This is great to use with a Venn Diagram.  And to just have student write the answers to the three questions.  It incorporates critical thinking AND writing into the music classroom which is something I'm required to do.

I actually have nothing in my TpT store.  Although I'd like to someday be up there with the greats like Amy Abbott and Cara at Miscellaneous Me! 

Donorschoose.org Project!

http://www.donorschoose.org/project/orff-instruments/1173970/?challengeid=365066&rf=link_dccontent_2014_01_teacherid_2005780

Please help support my donorschoose project!  Any little bit helps!  I want to get a few more orff instruments so that we can get all the kids in each class to play together as a group!!  Any advertisement helps!