Deborah Barber
15 April 2002
Grades K-4
4.1.1. Recognize similarities and differences in the meanings of common terms
(e.g., form, line/contour, pattern, contrast, sequence, texture, etc.)
used in the various arts.
1. Provide ongoing opportunities for students to compose.
2. Ensure that every task has the potential for a musical outcome.
3. Keep the tasks simple.
4. Allow students to work in friendship groups.
5. Keep the groups small - 2 at most to begin with.
6. Allow exceptional students to work on their own.
7. Set clear boundaries.
8. Review progress regularly.
9. Learn to ask questions rather than provide solutions.
10. Allow sufficient time for students to bring their own ideas to fruition.
11. Do not worry when some of the students go off-task.
12. Expect that each group will perform, but do not insist.
13. Let each new task emerge from the previous ones.
14. If the product is unmusical, question the process.
15. Learn to trust the students.
16. Reflect on values and work practices.
Noela Hogg http://lfa.atu.edu/music/barber/Inservice/Hogg.pdf
1.1.2. Explore and demonstrate basic elements of music through playing melodic
and percussion instruments
(e.g., beat, rhythm, tempo, pitch, melody, harmony and phrasing).
1.1.4. Experience reading music through movement
and graphic and/or symbolic notation.
1.1.5. Improvise, compose or arrange short melodies
and rhythms using a variety of sound sources
including traditional, nontraditional and electronic means.
Grades 5 - 8
1.1.14. Demonstrate teamwork and self-discipline through musical performance.
Grades 9 - 12
1.1.19. Improvise, compose or arrange stylistically appropriate melodies,
variations and accompaniments
Strand 1: Create and Perform
Content Standard
Students will demonstrate musical competency through creating and performing.
Student Learning Expectations
Grades K-4
1.1.1. Recognize, explore and demonstrate the ability to sing unison, rounds, descants, ostinati
and partner songs with correct posture and accurate pitch.
1.1.2. Explore and demonstrate basic elements of music through playing melodic and percussion instruments
(e.g., beat, rhythm, tempo, pitch, melody, harmony and phrasing).
1.1.3. Explore and demonstrate expression and interpretation through body movement.
1.1.4. Experience reading music through movement and graphic and/or symbolic notation.
1.1.5. Improvise, compose or arrange short melodies and rhythms using a variety of sound sources
including traditional, nontraditional and electronic means.
1.1.6. Develop awareness of musical accuracy.
1.1.7. Exhibit respect for the contributions of self and others within a musical setting.
Strand 2: Listen, Perceive, and Analyze
Content Standard
Students will demonstrate a response to diverse styles of music through listening, perceiving and analyzing.
Student Learning Expectations
Grades K-4
2.1.1. Explore and identify simple music forms through listening, movement and visual symbols
(i.e., AB, ABA, rondo, theme and variations).
2.1.2. Explore, identify and analyze non-musical sounds, various instrumental and vocal timbres
(i.e., band/orchestra and adult/children's voices).
2.1.3. Demonstrate perception of musical styles and elements through movement and verbal response
(i.e., tonality, beat, pitch, melody, rhythm, form, harmony, timbre, dynamics, tempo, meter).
2.1.4. Develop a musical vocabulary relating to notation, instruments, voices and performance.
2.1.5. Explain personal preferences for specific musical works and styles.
Strand 3: Cultural and Historical Contexts
Content Standard
Students will develop an understanding of the relationships of music to history and culture.
Student Learning Expectations
Grades K-4
3.1.1. Identify aurally types or styles of music from various historical periods and cultures.
3.1.2. Sing and play a variety of music from diverse world and American cultures
(African American, Asian American, European American, Hispanic American, Native American)
with special emphasis on the local school population.
3.1.3. Describe in simple terms how the common elements of pitch, rhythm, dynamics and timbre
are used in musical examples from various historical periods and cultures.
3.1.4. Identify and compare the role of musicians (e.g., composer, conductor, performer)
from various historical periods and cultures.
3.1.5. Demonstrate appropriate audience behavior for the context and style of music performed.
Strand 4: Connect and Apply
Content Standard 1
Students will demonstrate an understanding of the relationships between music and the other arts,
and disciplines outside the arts.
Student Learning Expectations
Grades K-4
4.1.1. Recognize similarities and differences in the meanings of common terms
(e.g., form, line/contour, pattern, contrast, sequence, texture, etc.) used in the various arts.
4.1.2. Develop an awareness that music is interwoven into the structure of all disciplines
(e.g., foreign languages: musical terminology and songs in various languages;
language arts: using the expressive elements of music in interpretative readings;
mathematics: mathematical basis of rhythmic values;
science: vibration of strings, drum heads, or air columns generating sounds used in music;
geography: songs associated with various countries or regions;
social studies: songs associated with historical occurrences;
computer technology: keyboards, and basic MIDI devices).
Content Standard 2
Students will demonstrate an understanding of the relationships of music to career and life-long applications.
Student Learning Expectations
Grades K-4
4.2.1. Exhibit an understanding of how commonalties and differences in musical heritage
influence individual daily life.
4.2.2. Identify various musical experiences relating to daily life
(e.g., holidays, religious services, civic events, special occasions, etc.)
and describe characteristics that make certain music suitable for each use.
4.2.3. Explore the world of work in music related careers.
4.2.4. Explore the role of technology on composing and performing music.
Arkansas Music Curriculum Framework
Strand 1:
Create and Perform
Strand 2:
Listen, Perceive and Analyze
Strand 3:
Strand 4:
Cultural and Historical Contexts Connect and Apply
All "Student Learning Expectations" should be considered cumulative.
That is, all "Student Learning Expectations" from preceding or earlier grade levels
may be used at any time by curriculum planners creating curriculum
at a specific grade level.
EarthBeat Unit
Introduction:
"Percussion Instruments Around the World" (Listening) Introduce the theme by
showing students a web page (Drums Around the World) containing links to sound clips,
photos, and examples of percussion instruments from many cultures.
Explain that during this unit leading up to the Earth Day celebration,
students will explore percussion from around the world,
learn about famous drummers,
and create their own instruments, music, and art from recycled materials.
Refer to the web page daily to introduce additional instruments and performers.
Process:
"The Drum Game" (Reading, Playing, Improvising)
1. Display iconic notation of rhythms distributed across top, bottom, and sides of a rectangle.
(A web page with animated icons such as The Drum Game may be more motivating than a static display
and can be posted to the school web site for home practice.)
2. Engage students in rote learning of rhythm patterns through echo-clapping.
Guide practice from each corner to it's adjacent corners.
3. Model clapping from one corner to another (across row left or right; or up or down a side)
and ask students to identify which row/column was clapped.
4. A student who answers correctly moves to the drum area.
5. Continue steps 3 and 4 until three students have been assigned to three distinct-sounding
percussion instruments (such as bass drum, snare drum, and high-hat).
These students then perform the identified pattern.
6. As an extension of the game, on another day have students select team members.
Each team chooses a pattern from the web page and practices it independently in groups.
Each team perform their pattern for the class to identify the pattern.
Students who identify the pattern correctly move to the drum area and perform the pattern for the class
as all play along.
7. Another variation involves having the students who are in the drum area secretly choose a pattern and
rehearse it independently while another student improvises on a MIDI keyboard to distract the class.
The group then plays the pattern for students to identify and perform.
Students who perform well then move to the drum area.
"Stomp Out Loud" (Listening, Analyzing)
1. Show the video "Stomp Out Loud."
2. Engage students in a discussion about how the music and instruments were constructed.
"Tin Can Cacaphony" (Improvising)
1. Pair large and medium empty tin cans in the drum area. Place students at pairs of cans with beaters
(pencils are adequate beaters).
2. Lead students in a discussion of where the instruments (cans) came from. (They are recycled.)
3. Allow students to explore ways to make a variety of sounds.
4. Play a rhythmic ostinato on a bass drum for students to improvise over.
"Singing Activity" (Singing)
1. Teach children to sing "I Have A Car" through the whole-song technique.
The song is about an old jalopy and has accompanying movements that children enjoy.
"Sound - Waves and Vibrations, Big and Little" (Listening, Analyzing, Interdisciplinary)
1. Allow children to explore the sounds of various steel cans.
2. Demonstrate patterns created by beads or BBs on vibrating drum heads.
3. Lead children in discussion of what they discovered concerning the relationship between the size
of the wave patterns and the pitch of the instruments.
4. Show students photos of steel drums from web page. Explain that steel drums are made from recycled
oil barrels. Ask them to predict what the different sizes of drums will sound like. Play clips from the web.
5. Assign students to build their own instrument at home from recycled materials.
6. Have students present and demonstrate their instruments for the class.
"Rhythms in Nature" (Composing, Playing, Interdisciplinary)
1. Use a computer attached to a television to display images of nature found on the Internet.
2. Ask students to identify and describe patterns in the images.
3. Choose students to compose and play sounds on percussion instruments in response to the
inspiration of the images.
4. Guide students to respond to the patterns from the left to the right of the image.
5. Have students discuss how the sounds reflect the image's patterns.
"Earth Beat Poems" (Interdisciplinary)
1. Take class outside to view a natural scene or a small area of the playground.
Students are to call out colors they see, plants and trees, insects and birds.
2. Return to the classroom. Display a word processing program using a computer projector, S-video,
or a scan converter (computer -to -TV). Type some of the words students called out.
3. Have students choose a few of their favorite words to find rhymes using the rhyming page handout.
4. Lead children's discussion during the process of writing the poem to discover how descriptive words
give a poem a mood or character.
"Wishes On the Wind" (Interdisciplinary)
This project was inspired by Tibetan prayer flags, which are said to bring happiness, long life and
prosperity to the flag planter and those he or she encounters on the journey to fly them in the
Himalayas.
1. Display the class poem in a word processing program using a computer projector, S-video,
or a scan converter (computer -to -TV).
2. Distribute 12" x 18" rectangles from a white twin bed sheet and crayons or permanent markers.
3. Have students copy the poem on their flags and illustrate it as they wish. Play drum music from
around the world in the background as they work.
4. Take the class outside to a spot where the winds can carry their good wishes and good thoughts
to others (i.e., two trees 15' to 20' apart).
5. Stretch yarn or string between the trees. Staple the flags to the yarn, not just over it,
to decrease bunching up. You may also staple flags to adjacent ones.
"Earth Day Celebration" (Listening, Interdisciplinary, Cultural Connections)
1. Invite a percussion ensemble that uses recycled materials (steel drums, drum brakes, etc.)
as instruments to perform for the school.
2. Invite a local conservation group to speak about their efforts to improve the environment.
3. Have the 4-H Club or scouting group build and present bird houses to the school.
4. Have the school chorus perform songs about the natural environment,
such as Teresa Jennings' "Mother Earth" and "Nature Starts a Song.”
5. Post photos of your celebration on the web for family and community to share.