FINAL PLN

From the "How To Teach" blog a post was put out as a strategy to teach younger students pieces of music. It said to reverse roles, and have the student try to teach the music to you. Do EXACTLY what they tell you, and make them realize what needs to be done to the music. This is more of a self exploratory exercise that makes the student think critically of the piece, and forces them to make musical decisions. This blog generally has many good tips and guides to how to teach privately and in a classroom setting. I enjoy reading all of the tips and advice that are not necessarily taught in our ed classes, but are more specific, and are "tricks" that can be helpful to teaching.

Soundbeam Reading

I had never heard of soundbeam before, and when I saw the composition that Arty did with it I was amazed at what was able to be done with this technology. Although, I'm sure, there are limitations, the idea and concept that is currently at hand is amazing, and I am extremely impressed at what can be done with students with mentally disabilities. This would be a great way to let students who cannot participate in ensembles physically still be involved with music in their schools.

I did feel, however, that this seems pretty advanced, and could be rather expensive for schools to purchase. My only concern would be teachers who wanted this for their students, but could not get it due to sufficient funding. Other than that hats off to soundbeam! Seems like an excellent technology that would be really helpful to students with disabilities!

Classics for Kids- Leonard Bernsten

The "Classics for Kids" podcast is a great resource for children to learn about music. What exactly it is is a podcast that is basically a story. It is a women telling a story about Leonard Bernsten. While the story is going on, music supporting the story about the composer is being played. There will often be 30-45 second breaks with just music. This is a great way to get any level of musician interested in composers. I enjoyed this story myself, and enjoyed the history about Bernsten and the music!

Do Newborns Show Musical Skill?

An article from Music and Cognition showed research that said that babies may actually not just be crying and cooing at random, and that they are making musical choices. For example, German and French babies could be easily distinguished. German babies would cry from the upward, down, while french babies cry downward up. Also, babies start to imitate their mother's voice and musical traits from day one, not 8-16 months after they are born. The musical aspects of speech that were being considered were rhythm, melody, and stress.

GIMP Software Review

Throughout the week I have been exploring GIMP, and have even used it to enhance a few of my own photos. GIMP is not hard to use after exploring it for a while. Many of the concepts though were confusing in the videos until I actually did them for myself and applied them. What I was told in class was that GIMP is basically a "free version of photoshop." When I heard this I thought, "well ok, its free how great can it really be...?" I was proved wrong after exploring the program. Its a great program that is relatively easy to learn. I would definitely suggest it to any students or colleagues who need to alter their photos for whatever reason!

Technological Immigrants

This article was about how students these days learn differently because of their integral life with technology. Although teachers now did not grow up with technology, and have to try to assimilate themselves with this new culture, my generation will not necessarily have this problem. Since high school, nearly every single person has a phone, and now, many people even have iPhones and phones with internet capabilities. It will not be as hard for my generation to teach with technology, and to have to take more classes out of college because we have been exposed to it in both educational settings and social settings. Although teachers now have to deal with this problem, I do not believe that it is going to present as big of a problem with me or any other students my age when we become teachers.

PLN 11

This week while doing my delicious project I discovered the Tubanews.com website. It is a website dedicated to tuba and euphonium players. I found plenty of information about both repertoire and accessories that is hard to get opinions from otherwise. It also had many articles that I could read and give input about. Overall, it was a great find!