middle school

30 Day Blogging Challenge Day 3

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Day 3: In which area do you think you can improve the most?

There’s an ease to master teachers when they are in the classroom that I

David Newell’s new book Classroom Management in the Music Room: “Pin-Drop Quiet” Classes and Rehearsals

sincerely admire. When I think of the best elementary music educator that I’ve observed, I think of someone with an intense mastery of the craft, a curriculum design that gets results, and an infectious personality. (I should go visit her at school sometime soon!)

One thing that I recognize in master teachers that I haven’t managed to pin-point and define. I’ve written about David Newell’s seminar on classroom management for the music classroom before here, but until I have my own classroom, I won’t be able to fully implement his strategies in a meaningful way with my own students.

While I was implementing his strategies I wasn’t fully confident with them. They weren’t my own. I was borrowing from an expert. And that’s okay. I often told my choir students at my second placement school that I didn’t much care if they really believed the words they were singing, but they needed to convince me that they did. “Fake it ’till you make it” may sound like a disingenuous practice, but I think it’s a valid way to come into new teaching strategies and find success outside of my comfort zone.

Some things will come with time. I’d love to be the best teacher ever right away,

Photo Manip by karl683 2012

but I realize that so much of what a great teacher great is experience working with students and learning from mistakes.

So here’s to some new mistakes and new lessons!

Related articles

30 Day Blog Challenge Day 1

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Day 1: How did you decide to become a teacher?

When I started college I was a pre-seminary student pursuing an undergraduate degree in Vocal Performance. During my sophomore year, I decided to drop the seminary certificate and pursue education as a career.

Photograph of The Boxcar Children books on a shelf.

I loved The Boxcar Children books as a kid! Will need to find a set before I have children of my own! Creative Commons License 2011, janielle23, http://www.flickr.com/photos/janellie23/5557021621/

I’ve always loved school. In elementary school I would have my father drive me to school early to get everything ready and make sure I was prepared for the day’s learning. I’ve always loved to read. We joke in my family that my mother once collapsed in the library while pregnant with me, and that I’ve loved to read ever since. I’ve always loved music. I remember standing and singing in my classes at my first elementary school and being told I had one of the best voices in the class.

But I’m not a teacher because I love school, because I love to read, or because I love music. I’m a teacher because I believe education is the place that I can best make a change in this world. Teaching is the most fulfilling work I’ve ever done, and I’ve only been a student teacher! There’s something incredible about making music with students and helping them find their voice and their song.

As a student teacher I worked at two different schools, with four different cooperating teachers, and with close to 700 students from grades K-12. I will never remember all of them. But I will remember that it was there that I discovered my love for teaching. It was not a chore to get up in the morning and drive 30 minutes to school with coffee in hand.

Instead, I greeted my students cheerfully (even at 7am!) and asked how their weekend was, or how the One-Act was coming along. I decided to become a teacher because I think I already was a teacher. When I wanted to be a pastor, I was drawn to the teaching aspects of the office.

Keep Calm and Teach On

Copyright 2012 Ashley Kipp at Simply Designing http://simplydesigning.blogspot.com/

As I wrote in my post, Teacher to Student, I have felt a great loss in my transition back to being a college student. I don’t receive the same fulfillment as I did during student teaching. But a bit of that spark comes back each time I browse the classifieds of districts I’m hoping to apply for, and I look forward to the day when I have students of my own again.

I guess I never did really decide to become a teacher. Instead, I chose a major and teaching found me along the way. I’ll never look back.

 

NMEA 2012 Day 1: “Real Teacher”

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MENC logo

MENC logo (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

 

It’s the most wonderful time of the year! Not Christmas (which I do love), but conference week! Today was the first day of the Nebraska Music Educators Association (NMEA) conference in Lincoln, NE. This is my 3rd or 4th year attending, and I have looked forward to it every year.

 

Today, collegiate sessions included a keynote address by National Association for Music Education (NAfME) national president Nancy Ditmer about the transition from student to teacher. It was amazing how many of her comments I found supported my experiences as a student teacher!

 

My favorite session of the day, however, was a panel with eight or nine young teachers about what teaching is like. I love talking with young teachers, and really enjoyed hearing the perspective of these teachers who have been teaching for a few years! I got some fantastic advice about middle school classroom management with large numbers of music students!

 

Mostly, I enjoyed a day of talking about music education with my peers and hearing about best practice for music education from working teachers in a variety of settings. Conferences always provide solid strategies for behavior management and interventions, conducting technique, and teaching in the challenging field of music education.

 

I’m looking forward to full days of performances and sessions over the next few days of conference! The closer I get to being a “real teacher,” the more serious I take these conferences. When asking about the middle school management issues, I had real live human beings in mind, not just the concept of a difficult classroom.

 

That’s the thing that student teaching offers that no practicum experience, class simulation, or case study could ever prepare you for: you are responsible for the musical success and education of young people.

 

It’s terrifying.

 

It is the best job in the world.

 

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Student Teaching v.2, Weeks 1-3: The Joys of Choir and Middle School!

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Three weeks ago, I began my second student teaching placement in a small-town school district teaching band and choir at both the middle school and high school. My previous placement was at a private school in a moderately sized city teaching K-12 and a variety of classes.

So far, I love it! I’m more convinced than ever that music education is wh   ere I’m supposed to be, and I wake every morning excited to go to school and see my students. My first placement, was mostly general music and band, so I’m thrilled to be working with choirs again!

I’m working with the women’s chorus on two pieces: Carol of the Bells (which they were very excited to see when I was pulling music), and an arrangement of the torch Bring a Torch, Jeanette, Isabella (which I felt would be a gorgeous carol for women’s chorus). The girls struggle with many of the musical concepts, but are willing to try things and laugh with me! Well, they probably think I’m a little off my rocker, but that comes with the territory.

I’m also working with the high school concert choir on an arrangement of Joy to the World and the Hallelujah Chorus, as well as “The Twelve Days After Christmas” with the men’s chorus.

On the band side of things, I assist with the concert band and will begin conducting a piece that my CT will give me this week. In addition, I am conducting a jazz band of my very own which I will post more about in a separate update! I’m attempting some more creative things with that group that I’ve never really seen or tried before!

On the middle school side, things are a little more challenging. Middle school students are a subject that my teacher education program never could have really prepared me for. I love them. They are incredibly challenging, and test the limits of both my creativity and my temper almost every day. They range from students yelling and throwing chairs to a boy asking me if I had ever been bullied when I was in middle school.

One of the more successful strategies for middle school I have found is the sound monitoring iPad app Too Noisy, which provides a simple classroom sound meter that can be adjusted for sensitivity. The students of each class named the smiley face and the objective became to keep George/Rupert/Alfred/Antonio happy! After a few days of distraction, it has become fairly effective at keeping general noise levels down.

There is a lot to be said about my experience over the last two weeks, and I hope to update with some more in-depth posts about the methodologies I’ve tried and observed as well as the experiences I have had. More than anything, I am thrilled to be teaching in a school that supports the music program, as well as an administration that is generally very supportive of the arts (and student teachers)!

Personally, life has been a bit hectic since my mother was diagnosed with breast cancer! Surgery is scheduled for Friday, and your thoughts and prayers are certainly appreciated.