JOYFULNOTE MUSIC - Teachers Corner

Veterans Day - Composer of the Month - John Phillip Sousa

2011-11-11T10:00:00.001-08:00

Above is the Marine Corps band playing Stars and Stripes Forever, the National March of the United States. I will, in future posts, be talking about my band program, and some of the instructional practices that I implemented in it that were quite successful that may be helpful for other music teachers to use in their own programs. For today, let me just mention that one of the things that I implemented as a regular part of the advanced band class was a "Composer of the Month". This involved focusing in depth on one composer each month within the context of the regular band program. The composer was introduced each month with a video presentation as part of the 'opening exercises' of the first week of each month. Each week of the month would then highlight one composition by that composer, and the beginning of 3 classes during each week would consist of listening to the same composition, and then reacting, responding, and writing about the composition in the student journals that each band member was required to keep. During that same month, one composition by that months composer would be included in the regular repetoire of music that the band would be practicing. This was my way of incorporating a time-intensive component of Music History instruction into the band program and it proved to be quite successful.
In honor of it being Veterans Day, I thought today I would just share with you, a few resources about John Phillip Sousa, the 'March King' whose military marches were famous in his time, and are standards in bands, parades, and sports presentations even today. John Phillip Sousa was the composer of the month in my classes, and I compiled the video that I used for him from online sources such as the ones that follow.

There are ample resources on 'Youtube' about John Philip Sousa, and I will simply refer you to that source to hear as many of them as you would care too. Perhaps the most interesting and extensive source of data is the Library of Congress which has an extensive online collection of selected music manuscripts, photographs, printed music, historical recordings of the Sousa Band and other assorted memorabilia. It is available here, and will take considerable time to browse the wealth of information. It contains historical recordings of the Sousa Band, which I find to be most interesting, as well as contemporary copies of his music, and resource information.
An informative article on his life in conjunction with materials from the National Archives can be found in an article from the National Archives entitled Music at the Archives – John Philip Sousa. There is a also a digital library of Sousa Material at the University of Illinois. And finally for today, an interesting way to view and listen to the Stars and Stripes together may be found here, where midi information is animated, and viewed in real time thanks to musanim.com.

Practice makes Permanent

2011-10-27T13:39:00.000-07:00

In a previous post, I talked about practice, and how studies have shown that regular practice of 2 1/2 hours per week has been shown to make a significant impact on the part of the brain that has to do with connections and communication within the brain (the corpus callosum) A more recent series of studies is reported in the August edition of Scientific American. In the section on "How to build a better learner" the magazine reports on significant connections between language, sound, and music training at an early age, especially that which requires practice. "Intensive musical training from a young age fosters skills beyond just an ability to play an instrument. The musician's concentration on the fine-grained acoustics of sound helps with language comprehension and promotes cognitive skills: attention, working memory and self-regulation".

Today, I want to share a few of my personal thoughts and recommendations on practicing. As you can probably imagine, - I've given the question of practicing a musical instrument a great deal of time and consideration in working with students, and in my own experience. I suppose that I have two levels of practice recommendations for students and parents. The first level is for beginning or casual learners, and the second is for those seriously studying the art.

Let me begin by saying that having a goal or a reason for practicing is an important way to keep each practice session productive. Having immediate and tangible goals that are spelled out are an important means of advancing quickly. This is why having a good teacher is so important. Long-term objectives are important also, but they may influence younger learners less than more mature students.

My own parents established a routine' of practicing the piano for 1/2 hour a day during week-days. I did it after I came home from school, and after I had enjoyed a snack, and some play-time. They may not have had all of the scientific research that we do today to back up what they did, but I think my parents had a pretty good handle on what was needed to develop a good musician. I could always practice more (and often did), but never less. As I became more proficient, my 'minimum' practice time went up to an hour a day until I got into college, where it went up even more.

So, establishing a regular routine is an important part of what helps students to progress. The studies I've referenced, and the work that I'm aware of with regards to practice, all point to the importance of a regular time and place for practicing. For my younger students, I encouraged them to practice 15 minutes to 20 minutes a day if they wanted to have satisfactory progress on their instruments. That - combined with the regular classes in school made for about 2 1/2 hours per week, the amount of time that researchers say makes a measurable difference in brains. I encouraged students NOT to practice too long at any one time, so that they didn't become frustrated - or bored. I think thats important also. Asking too much of a learner, especially an early learner, can have unintended negative results that may last a lifetime. Drill and kill does not work. Meaningful and purposeful repetition with variation does. I think the 20 minute mark is a good reference point for older students also. 20 minutes is a good time to take a mini-break, get up, stretch, walk around, re-focus, and then go back to work. I don't know if there is a top end of the end of the spectrum with regards to practice time while you are learning. That again depends on your time available, and your purpose for doing it. I've heard musicians say that if you weren't practicing 5 hours per day, you weren't serious. I personally think 5 hours a day is pretty serious, but if thats your profession, it probably isn't.

I recommend starting each practice session with a warm-up activity to get the mind/body connection established, and functioning. In the group piano classes, after we had done the initial opening routine, we would begin by playing songs that were familiar. In private lessons, generally I would have students start with scales and finger exercises before moving to something familiar. If new songs were introduced after that, as I've said in the group classes, we would sing the songs and the rhythms prior to playing them. This had the noticeable effect of reducing the learning time for the students considerably. In my band classes, which I will begin discussing in the near future, singing the rhythms of new music before we played it also dramatically reduced the learning time for new songs.

Finally, in the practice sessions, we would break difficult songs into sections, and work on the each section separately before adding it to the ones we already knew. I often would have students learn the last section of a piece first, and then 'back-up' from there to the beginning, one section at a time. This would have the benefit of helping the student to always 'play into' the part of the music that they knew the best. This tended to make learning less frustrating, and more satisfying.

Thats all for now
Until next time
Ron Zell

Encouragement for Music Educators

2011-10-19T09:54:00.000-07:00

I want to introduce you to someone today that we music educators owe a debt of gratitude to. Some of you may already know him. His name is Dr. Peter Boonschaft, and he is one of the most inspirational and motivational speakers that I have had the privilege of learning from. Fortunately, at about about the same time that I began directing a band program, I first had the opportunity of hearing Dr. Boonshaft at a summer conference where he was the keynote speaker. Dr. Boonshafts enthusiasm for the arts is infectious, and his passion for kids and his enthusiasm for teaching is boundless. Dr. Boonshaft has written 4 books on music and education, and they are international bestsellers. The first three are: Teaching Music with Purpose, Teaching music with Passion, and Teaching music with Promise are directed toward music educators. His fourth book, Teaching with Passion, Purpose, and Promise is directed toward educators of all disciplines.

Here is a sampling of some of the comments that Dr. Boonshaft has shared at conferences, and that he expands upon in his books.

Never underestimate students potential. Kids can do anything - if they are just shown.

The words SILENT and LISTEN have the same letters!

A student by definition is someone who does not know what he does not know.

All great teachers get excited about what they teach.

Find exceptional qualities in everyone.

All great learning begins with the words "I don't know"

Make at least one part of every rehearsal beautiful.

Review what was learned rather then repeat what was done. We need to be taught much less than we need to be reminded.

Make what you teach memorable.

Make what you teach - fun - Fun is memorable.

Humor - it is the most exciting and engaging way to teach.

Prevent problems by over-planning

Always use positive reinforcement

For teachers to be truly great - they must polish their art. As teachers, our art is our students, and we spend our lives polishing students buttons so that others may see by its glow.

As teachers, we are care-givers. Sometimes caregivers need to pause, and be encouraged in what we do. Dr. Boonschaft does that for you. I recommend him to you.

Til next time
Ron Zell

The Importance of Practice

2011-10-17T02:44:00.000-07:00

In 2008, Malcom Gladwell wrote the book 'Outlier's, which posits that the key to success in any field, including music, is the 10,000 hour rule. His premise is that it requires 10,000 hours of practice to achieve mastery in any field of endeavor. The book was #1 on the New York Times bestseller list for 11 weeks in a row, and touched off a significant amount of interest and debate.

One commentator, Daniel Levitin talks about the theory of 10,000 hours in his book This is Your Brain on Music :

… ten thousand hours of practice is required to achieve the level of mastery associated with being a world-class expert — in anything. In study after study, of composers, basketball players, fiction writers, ice skaters, concert pianists, chess players, master criminals, and what have you, this number comes up again and again. Ten thousand hours is the equivalent to roughly three hours per day, or twenty hours per week, of practice over ten years. Of course, this doesn’t address why some people don’t seem to get anywhere when they practice, and why some people get more out of their practice sessions than others. But no one has yet found a case in which true world-class expertise was accomplished in less time. It seems that it takes the brain this long to assimilate all that it needs to know to achieve true mastery.

Now, I suppose that the logical thing for me to do at this point, would be to launch into a protracted polemic about the importance of practicing music, and about why students should practice harder and longer, and more often so that they too can become experts musicians. A reaction from almost any student that I have had would be - 10,000 hours - 'thats ridiculous. I could never, or would never put that much time in on anything'. Hmmmmm. I wonder if that is totally true.

Lets think for a minute about teenagers, - and homework, and practicing, and - - video games. Have you ever thought about how much time the typical teenager spends each week on video games. Just in case you haven't, a study was released last year from the American Pediatric Society. In it, they take a look at the video gaming habits of adolescents. You may or may not be surprised at the results, but here is what they found:

Average Teen Weekly Video Game Frequency* - Less than 7 hours 61%Between 7-14 hours 19%Between 15-20 hours 9%More than 20 hours 11%

Now lets think about the 10,000 hour rule again. If you do the math, that breaks down to 3 hours a day, or 20 hours every week, for 10 years. - When we juxtapose that information with the Peditric Societies report, - we could safely conclude that by age 20, 20% of this countries adolescents will be experts at - - video games. Now I'm not anti-video games, but I can't help but wonder what would happen if some of that time were re-directed.

Take for instance, this study, done on 6 - 9 year olds, measuring the growth in their corpus callosum (that part of the brain that connects the right hemisphere with the left) after instrumental music instruction, and practicing for 1/2 hour a day, 5 days a week. Here is an excerpt from Science Magazine:

Music builds bridges in the brain.
"The researchers collected detailed magnetic resonance images of the children's brains at age 6 and again at 9. Of the original group, six children faithfully practiced at least 2.5 hours a week in the time between the scans. In these budding musicians, a region of the corpus callosum that connects movement-planning regions on the two sides of the brain grew about 25% relative to the overall size of the brain. Children who averaged only an hour or two of weekly practice and those who dropped their instruments entirely showed no such growth. All of the children practiced instruments, such as a piano or a violin, that required two hands.
In every subject, the researchers found that the size of increase in the corpus callosum predicted the improvement on a nonmusical test.."

Food for thought. Til next time

Ron Zell

Do, re, mi

2011-10-12T20:33:00.000-07:00

Today I am releasing the next instructional video in the EZ Piano Series. - It will be available on the Joyfulnote Facebook page later today. It introduces the student to the concept of 'tonal solfege' which is better known by most people as - do - re- mi.'s. Why, someone may ask, would I include learning tonal solfege in a piano class. Customarily, do, re, mi's are used to teach sight-singing and to improve pitch identification and accuracy. Playing the piano on the other hand, involves playing keys on the piano which are named for the alphabet, that are slightly out of tune - on purpose (Equal temperment), and that can't be altered.

A great choral conductor once told me that "to learn music, is to learn to listen". In learning to play the piano, that was something that I was never taught. There is so much information to take in at one time when learning the piano, that it is easy to put listening - especially listening to the mathematical relationships of sounds (which is what the do-re-mi's really are - see What Fractions sound like?) on the back burner while other things like hand position, are emphasized. When I was taught to play the piano, I was taught that music literacy was being able to read music, and play it. I no longer believe that. I have met too many amazing piano players that cannot read a note of music, but can play a complex piece of music flawlessly after hearing it only once or twice, or improvise intricate and beautiful melodies and harmonies without a single note of written music in the room. How do they do that?

Well, the most important reason that they can do it is that they really have learned to listen well. They concentrate on what they're hearing, and understand it, audiate it, remember it, and play it back. The second reason that they can 'play by ear' is that they understand 'tonality' and music fundamentals. As I've tried to convey in several of these blogs, music is what math sounds like. Pythagorus,the mathematician who gave us the Pythagorean theorem, also discovered the physics of the musical scale - 1500 years ago. Guido de Arezzo - who I talk about in the lesson on EZ Piano, was a friar who taught singing in the 10th century. He is the one who labeled the patterns of frequency variations that Pythagorus discovered - 'do-re-mi' (He actually used 'ut' instead of 'do' but that was later changed - thankfully). If I were to give you the numerical sequence of a major scale , it would look like this. 1/1, 9/8, 5/4, 4/3, 3/2, 5/3, 15/8, 2/1 (Actually, if you use equal temperament, it's a little messier, but the idea is the same.) However if I were to sing or play for you do-re-mi-fa-so-la-ti-do, I would have done the same thing musically as I did in the numerical sequence and you would know not only what it was, but what it meant. (SAYING do-re-mi etc by the way, means nothing. Its not the words - they are only labels for the sounds the relationship of the frequencies contained and described by the sound of those labels.) If students advance in music theory, they will hear and see additional labels attached to those same relationships. Numbers, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, or Roman Numerals, I, IV V, or functional names like Tonic /root, subdominant, and dominant. All of those terms will have similar meanings to do-re-me, but take much more musical development to understand.

So why do I teach 'do-re-mi's (Tonal Solfege) to beginning piano students.

It gives a verbal and musical reference point to the mathematical relationship of pitches to each other.
It helps students identify and listen for those relationships
Once they can hear and identify the tonal relationships contained within them, they can begin to start playing by ear. If they can play, and hear that a song sounds right in the key of G, and they know the 'do-re-mi's of the song, moving 'do' to a different place on the piano is easy to do. The song sounds the same, many times it will 'feel' the same, and the 'do-re-mi' relationships have not changed - only the physical location on the piano. Its just that 'do' is in a new place. Once they understand that, they can begin to play songs by ear, from the very beginning.
It is easy to understand, and students can rapidly pick it up and use it.

Do I teach how many 1/2 steps or whole steps are in an interval, or a major, minor or modal scale? Not at first, though that will come. First they learn to sing, hear, and play songs in one tonal center, then move to others. I start with with the key of Gb, then move to G and C, than add the relative minors and some of the modes. In the group piano classes, sometimes one of the more advanced students who had learned the lessons for the day would ask for more to do. I would often send them back to their piano's with the challenge to figure out how to play the song in a different key. Their musicianship increased significantly the more that were able to do that.

Here are some references you might like to look at to become better acquainted with solfege.

First of all, the Phil Tulga site is a great place for easy, visual, and fun material

Wikipedia has a good overview of Solfege

Michigan Tech has a good site for a look at the physics of music.

Dr. Gordon Shaw, the music educator who I've reference several times has a page on tonal content, and a new book Taking a Reasonable and Honest Look at Tonal and Rhythmic Solfege

Til Next Time
Ron Zell

Parsley, Sage, Rosemary and Thyme

2011-10-10T04:00:00.000-07:00

In a previous post - I presented some charts that reflect educational theory that is taught in probably all teachers colleges. One of those charts was this one, - something that is right out of the pages of any college textbook (although Vestibular and Proprioception are often lumped together under the term - 'kinesthetic') The point of this instruction is to inspire student teachers with the need to include 'multi-modal' learning in their teaching environments. As you know however, many classrooms, lean heavily in favor of the visual learner, with an auditory component provided mostly by listening to the teachers lecture. Probably also, there is an effort by the teacher to address the 4 domains of learning (slide 4 on the PPPPP Post).

I have made a consciencious over my teaching career to include as many of those learning modalities in my classrooms as practicable. Thats not easy to do. However, I was challenged one day in one of my lower grade classes as a little girl came walkig briskly into the room, went straight to the center of the class, held out her hands, threw back her head,
closed her eyes, took a deep breath and loudly exclaimed "I love the smell of music class" I took that as a motivator to do even better at incorporating all of those learning modalities above into every class. (I never got to 'taste', but I always wanted to try to teach notes on a staff by using Candy Kisses as the notes, and having a 'plate' with a staff printed on it. I just never figured out a sanitary way of doing that with so many students- but you know the kids would love it. Maybe someone should make plates that come pre-printed that way.) Anyway, thanks for the most part, to my wonderful, creative and resourceful music aides, all of the other ways were abundantly addressed. The Visual Aspect of Piano Class was addressed by lavishly decorating the piano class with posters, and mobiles, and charts, and song-maps by the students that were situated in extravagant splotches of color on the walls, on the doors, on the ceiling, and on the bulletin boards. Almost any question about music could be found creatively displayed at some location around the classroom. Color was always plentiful behind the charts and mobiles that included names of notes, rhythms, key signatures, music vocabulary etc. I've included the chart on 'flow' here because by involving all of the senses in this way, (except for taste), students really did get absorbed in the process of learning and the "potential for retention" was increased. Apathy was never an option in one of my classes. I've talked about my approach to engaging students from the very moment they stepped into my classroom in my discussion of 'transition time' on Eduarts4us.

What about smell? Well, one the many talents and interests of one of my aides was aromatherapy. It was a no-brainer to her when I brought up the idea of smells in the classroom. We talked at length about how to introduce the practice in a public school setting without drawing attention to it, but not in a random way either. She assured me that it could done in subtle ways yet purposeful ways, and always related to learning and concentration, and memory. Suddenly, a plethora of fresh plants, and potpourri appeared around the classroom. Lavender, sage, and rosemary, were the predominant aromas, with occasional appearances by the mint and citrus families. I don't think we used Parsley or Thyme like in the song, - but maybe. I know that other teachers do this. I don't know if they have ever realized that it can actually enhance learning.

How about the aural? Well, other than the obvious in a music class, and thanks again to this same aide, a miniature fountain suddenly appeared in the back of the classroom one day. From then on, the sound of running water could always be heard when the classroom was quiet. How often did a busy classroom like mine get quiet you might ask, or how often could I actually get them to listen to the sound of this small fountain? Well, it actually occurred several times in each class. I would often signal the classes to be quiet by raising my hand, and when they did the same, and were quiet enough to hear the buzzing of the lights (a 60 Hertz hum if you've never noticed) or the sound of the running water in the fountain, we would go on. That is really quiet, and takes a good deal of attention for 30 students at a time to do. It actually happened quickly and frequently. Students immediately learned that I was absolutely serious about not continuing with class until they were silent [just like turning off their piano's if they played at inappropriate times, (see"say it once, mean it once, and do it once")]. They soon quickly and attentively listened for those sounds, knowing that when we all could hear the lights, or the fountain, class would resume. Listening is not a bad skill for students to learn, especially in a music class.

How much did all of this contribute to learning? I couldn't tell you. Not in any formal way at least. I was too busy trying to deliver the best lesson that I knew how, and didn't have time to ascertain the direct benefits from all of this. I did however make some observations over time that I think are worth passing on. Some students definitely preferred sitting close to the plants. Others liked to sit near the back corner where the fountain was located. Still others seemed to prefer certain areas of the room where certain colors predominated, - yellow and orange, or green and blue for instance. Were these students 'aural learners', or 'olfactory learners'. Of course I think thats a strong possibility, but I can't prove it. But I do know this, and think it's related. As I was sitting at my desk one day between classes, two students came in, one of whom was new to the school, and the other student was giving them a tour of the school. The new student, obviously quite impressed with all of the pianos in the room, said to her 'tour guide', - "Oh, so this is your music room". "No" said the host student, "This is a magic class". If all of this effort that I've been describing did nothing more than create that perception in students minds, it was well worth it.

Till next time

Ron Zell

P.S. - For an approach to movement in learning, see 'The Power of Play"

Team Spirit

2011-10-07T07:02:00.000-07:00

As I became more adept at teaching the group piano lessons that I have been describing in these last few posts, I was surprised by a number of things. One of them was how good the group setting worked for teaching piano. I never thought about that before. I've alluded to it some, but the 'team spirit' dynamic was something that I never considered as something that would occur in a piano class - but it did. You know, piano is not a team sport, - at least not usually. But in a sense, that's what came to happen in the classes. I think each section of the class worked to make it that way. In the 10 minutes of opening exercises, the work we did together was in a way, like warm-up drills that any team does. The flashcards set to Mozarts' double piano sonata, as well as the quick-paced tonal and rhythmic solfege set to jazz were kind of like calisthenics to music to get the group going. Maybe my experience in coaching a soccer team in Portland Oregon had something to do with that. I don't know. But whatever, I think that opening time was the start of the 'team spirit' aspect of the class that began to develop Everyone chipped in and worked hard together, because they knew that the 'exercises' helped them do what they came there to do, and in this case, that was to play piano.

In the group section of the class, which followed next, we would play songs - together, 30 students at a time. That was another element of teaching a piano class that was different (for me anyway). I think there is bonding that happens when people make music together. I don't think you can play or sing a song with another person without without connecting with that person in a multitude of ways. Esprit de Corps, camaraderie. if you will?. It happens in the bands that I've directed, and community chorales, and choirs, and handbell choirs. Its part of making music together and I think its part of what happened to the students in these piano classes. There was also a sense of group success when we played some of the songs together really well. Probably the best example of this that I could cite, was when I had 35 or so students playing an arrangement of Pachelbels' canon together for a winter concert. I'll include that arrangement in my next Piano Method book.

But I think it was the the 10 minutes or so of each class (20 minutes a week) that was devoted to individual learning that was the greatest contributor to the 'team spirt' that evolved in the piano classes. Student tutors were a big part of that success as I've said before. Having students help me who had mastered a song, or section of material helping other students brought a social element into learning that proved to be a delightl. Students began to enthusiastically help each other master one or another part of the songs and take pride in each others work. A great dynamic that developed was that students began looking to other students as resources for learning. On the other side of that coin, was the pride that came as some of the tutors would bring me over to their 'tutees' (sorry about that) and proudly show me how well that other student was doing. Since each student had to successfully play each piece of music for me to get checked off on the chart at the back of the class, - Often the 'tutors' of particular students would be just as happy as the student when they passed. The social aspect never became a problem in large part because of the parent volunteers and aides that were plentiful, and who were also helping the students in the room . I have talked, and will talk more about 'adult modeling', but for now let me say that positively interacting with adults (other than the teacher) is good for students in a learning environment.

And that brings me to the final 'surprise' that I want to share with you today. I was surprised how many parent volunteers came up to me before, during, or after class, and asked if they could take one of the piano books I had made up for the class, to go over at home. Frequently I would hear stories of how they had started taking piano as a child, and hated it then, but now they wished they had kept it up. Many of them told me that they were helping in the class at least partly because they enjoyed learning some of the things that they had missed out on back then. My surprise was that the piano book that I wrote out for the students, wasn't too juvenile for these parents. It was kind of like an opportunity for them to step back in time, and pick up where they had left off when they were kids. To just sit back, relax and learn to play these songs that they already knew was probably a little like reminiscing I suppose. For that reason, I have not yet tried to write an adult 'beginning' piano book. I've written well into the hundreds of songs, and no doubt some of them will show up in future volumes of the EZ piano method. But for now, the 'elemental' music has worked, and is working quite well with a variety of age groups.

Two more things. - Remember that October is 'National Arts and Humanities month, and today is Arts Day in California. Go out and enjoy the arts in some way today. Do something creative.

Secondly, I will post the video for EZP Lesson 5 later today. When I do, it will show up on the joyfulnote.com site and on the Joyful Note Facebook page. Check either of those if you are interested.

Til next time

Ron Zell

New Blog Format

2011-10-05T10:02:00.000-07:00

I really like this new 'dynamic' format that blogger put out. For A.D.D. people like myself, the ability to 'play' with the settings is probably one of the things that I like most. If you haven't tried it, - at the top left of the screen, right under the word 'Joyfulnote' is a black bar, and a word (probably 'magazine'), followed by a downward facing triangle. Click it, and you will find multiple formats for viewing this page in. I like the 'magazine' format, but they all have something nice. The only part of the format that I don't like is that there is no place to put static elements, like links, video's. profiles, etc. Maybe I'll create a separate page for that and make it accessible in that top black bar.

On to music. Today I am including lesson 3 from the piano method series. I know I'm out of order, but I had some technical issues in getting this one ready. This is the last of the lessons on the black notes, and the first to include the rhythmic solfege in written form. If you watched the video from my last post, you already know where I'm headed with the rhythmic solfege. Of course this is new to a number of people who, probably like me, were taught with 1-e-and-a, 2 - e - and - a, or something equally obtuse. My personal opinion is that one reason that many children drop out of music classes is that the method used to teach them doesn't resonate with anything they already know. As I've said before, this method was developed by Dr. Edwin Gordon and his associates. Similar to other great music educators like Carl Orff, and Zolan Kodaly, Dr. Gordon has focused on learning music by reducing it to its most 'elemental' forms. The more I used this method with children, the more I became aware of how easily and accurately they identified the sounds with the beat. By using this method, it became possible to introduce quite complicated rhythms early on in the classes. I was then able to move on quickly, using the short amount of time that I had with the students to focus on the mechanics of learning to play the piano rather than to dwell on (and bore them by) the basics of rhythm. By using a combination of rhythmic and tonal solfege, I was also able to incorporate ear-training (i.e. hearing the relation of pitches as well as their rhythms simultaneously) into every session. I will talk about the addition of tonal solfege in later posts, but for now, if you are interested, take a look at my post 'What do fractions sound like' and go play with some of the games of Phil Tulga. Here is the link, but if your venturesome, try going to that tab that I told you about at the top of this page. Go to the 'flip tab' format, and there are all the posts I've done on this website within easy reach. Click away.

If you've clicked on the graphic at the top of this page, you've noticed that it doesn't take you to the video for lesson 3. As I said in my previous post, I'm going to use the new Facebook page as a consolidation point for the various online activities that I'm engaged in that are of general interest. Soooo, if you want to watch the video, go to

Once you are there, click on the link to Lesson 3 (you don't have to be a member of Facebook to click on the link) it will take you to the video. If you do happen to be a member of Facebook, it would help me a great deal if you could 'like' the page. The more 'likes' the page has, the more services I can put on it that will be useful to us all. Thanks for your help.

Before I close for the day, I just want to add a couple of links for anyone who is interested in some classical music. As I was writing about Dr. Edwin Gordon, I was reminded of my struggles in conducting class in college. There I had to learn to conduct multiple, complex, and alternating meters in such masterpieces as Carl Orffs "Camina Burana", Igor Stravinsky's Rite of Spring symphony, and Johann Brahms Requiem. The meters in these pieces are complex, varying, and elusive (Brahms like to 'elide' the beat). None-the less, they can indeed be broken down into 'duple and triple' meter components. Enjoy.

Ron Zell

Rhythmic Solfege - The Video

2011-10-03T07:38:00.000-07:00

Todays video instruction is from lesson 4 of my RZ's EZ piano method. It covers, in detail, the concept and application of Rhythmic Solfege. I've talked about this on many occasions in this blog, with regards to the RITMMAP Study, where I first applied it to lower elementary age students, and found it extremely productive in eliminating rhythmic problems. There are several blogs where I talk about that, but a good example of how I used it in the younger grades is in the form books that I used for every class. In that work, and in all my subsequent work with the lower elementary ages, rhythmic solfege was a staple of each class, but in its verbal form. With verbal solfege, I was able to sing and play the songs with the children, (MMP) while simultaneously being able to teach and emphasize accurate rhythms. When it came time for the written application of the rhythms, again my principle of 'use what you know to help you to grow' came into play. Since my students already were well-familiar with the 'sound' & look of the rhythm of songs, learning notation was a natural and easy step for them.

That was the case in my piano classes - as well as later on, in my band classes. In piano, after my students were able to play their first melodies on the black keys of the piano, - I introduced them to the notation of those songs that they were already playing. This video lesson above is what I have now incorporated in my piano method as lesson 4. For adults, or those who have not learned this way, it might seem a bit different at first. - If so, I encourage you to try it out yourself and become familiar in it before you try it with your students. I'll guarantee it works, I've used it with thousands of students with great success. The system was developed by noted researcher, Dr. Edwin Gordon and his associates. It has been used for years in schools across the country, and in Dr. Gordons Music Learning Theory classes. The syllables are always consistent with the part of the beat that they occur upon. This is a great advantage in singing, teaching, and learning the songs. It is also a significant aid in teaching students how to articulate wind instruments, - including recorders, and band instruments. There is much more about the system that is especially helpful when incorporated in a holistic approach to music education, and I will go into them in future blogs.

Until then. Ron Zell

Where it all comes together

Notation to Location

2011-09-30T10:07:00.000-07:00

I've had some people ask about the 'Notation to Location' flashcards that I described in my last post, so I'm putting them online for those individuals, and anyone else who may be interested in viewing and / or using them. This was the next 'layer' in learning to read and play piano for my students. The first layer was learning to sing a song and then to sing the rhythm for that song (rhythmic solfege), then learning to play that same song on the piano. The final step in the learning sequence was recognizing what the notation for that song looked like on a staff and connecting sight, sound, and feel. In times-gone-by, they used to call at least a portion of that method a 'song-based'curriculum, and it was used in many in California schools - which shows you how old that idea is / was. However, with the advent of 'brain-based learning', researchers began to understand more about how we learned. Of special importance to education was learning language, especially as it touched upon reading and writing, and learning a second language. Leaders in the field of language acquisition emphasized the separation of 'fluency' and literacy, and the 'sound to symbol' concept that I've described above, gained currency. I don't know how direct the link is between learning a new language, and learning music, but I know there is a substantial one, and I'm joined by many of the researchers in the field of learning today. I've referenced many instances of that research, and will continue to do so. The principle and the method based on that principle is what I employed in teaching the group piano classes that I've been describing in these blogs. The method worked extremely well with those students in those classes. The video flashcards were part of that method, - but not the first part. First the students sang, and played 'elemental music', and then, when it was the right time for them to 'name' what they were already doing, (singing and playing), - the flashcards were introduced.

I've talked about 'transition time' and utilizing 'music from the masters in all of my classes, and the visualizer program that I used in all my music classes. I've decided to go into more detail about that in my next post over at the Eduarts4us site, so check back there for updated information.

Till next time.

Ron Zell

Flashcards - The Movie

2011-09-29T07:59:00.000-07:00

Today's video is the first set of the bass clef Flashcards movies. As I said in my post describing how I used these videos in my classroom, the videos were popular with the students and proved to be very effective in keeping their attention, and in improving their understanding of notation.
Students watched these videos after entering my classroom, and either sitting on the chairs at the front of the room, or laying on the floor after they had watched the transition video which consisted of classical music being played as the iTunes visualizer projected moving images on the ceiling. (I'll talk more about this in a later blog). We also spent time at the beginning of the year dissecting Mozarts sonata into its component parts. This greater familiarity with the piece helped the students to become more interested in it. I would even hear some of them humming it in the hallways outside of class.

After the initial few viewings of the videos by the students, it became obvious that many of them were not only memorizing the notes, but they were also memorizing the order that the notes came in on the video flashcards. For that reason, I went back and made several alternative versions using the same music, Mozarts K448, but with a different order for the flashcards. That again worked well with the fourth and fifth grade students, and they quickly mastered the notation cards for the Treble Clef, I then added 'notation to location' cards. In other words, for the second series of treble clef cards, the students sat at their piano's while the video flashcards were playing on the ceiling. In this second series however, not only did the notes on the staff appear, but also a blank piano keyboard (C4 - G5). For these cards, the students had to a) identify the correct note on the staff, and b) play that note on their piano. Since the headphones were unplugged, I was able to listen, and immediately could tell who was playing correctly, and who needed help. This was another time when the music aide and parent volunteers were able to step in and were of great assistance in helping students who needed it.

After the notation and keyboard location of the notes on the treble clef were mastered in this way, I presented the classes with flashcards for the bass clef like the on above. One of the important elements in teaching the group class as I did, was not to present too much information too quickly. Students that had not assimilated the treble clef information, would have only become frustrated even more by trying to add the left hand too quickly. I'm a strong believer in 'Mastery Learning'. For that reason, it was 2-3 weeks after the class began that I added the left hand. For the students who had mastered the notation for the right hand, I utilized rounds and partner songs in the group time to challenge them musically, while not leaving the other students behind. When it came to individual practice time in each class, students could then move ahead at their own pace, and their progress was charted on a large chart at the back of the classroom.

More next time. Until then
Ron Zell

Instructional Videos

2011-09-28T10:37:00.000-07:00

Above is the second instructional video in the The RZ's EZ Piano Method series that will be available online in its entirety in the next month or so. There are 25 videos in the series,
and I'll be releasing them on this site, and on the Eduarts4us site as they become available (where you can access Lesson 1). The videos make use of the method and understandings that I have been discussing in this blog, and used in my class piano lessons. The method itself is designed as an ebook to be used with the videos, and it can be downloaded and used from any computer, or by printing it, (preferably on card-stock) and having it spiral bound along the top border so that it stands upright on the piano for students to use.

In keeping with the philosophy of hybrid learning that I have been advocating especially in my eduarts4us blog, this method is also downloadable to an iPad, where it can be opened in the iBook application, and be used anywhere you take your iPad, - especially to the students keyboard. Combined with the instructional video's, which can also be viewed on the iPad, the method is designed to be an alternate to beginning piano lessons for students. If used with younger students, the method will work best with adult oversight. It will work well with individually motivated students, and it obviously works well in the group piano setting that I have been describing in detail in my 'teachers blog'.

Price: $9.99 - download as an ebook, or to your iPad

RZ's EZ Piano method is designed to move the student naturally from
'sound' to 'symbol'. In other words, in this first book, the songs that are used are familiar songs that encourage the student to 'use what they know to help them to grow. The new learning is concentrated on learning to read and play these familiar songs, rather than overloading students with having to learn everything from scratch. A 'song bank' where Sound files for all the songs are available may be accessed at joyfulnote.com and every song in the book may be downloaded, or listened to online. The instructional videos which accompany the course will be released as they become available, and a second book featuring Holiday songs will be released in November. Supplemental video reference materials and resources such as 'Flashcards, the Movie', which I released on this site in my last post will also be released periodically. These are designed to augment the book and the instructional video's.

They may have been able to take this Teacher of the Year out of the school with their stupid pink-slip, but they can't prevent me from teaching.

Until next time,

Ron Zell

Benefits of the Group Piano Classes

2011-09-26T05:00:00.000-07:00

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Today I am going to continue with the series of posts on group piano lessons that I began last week.
To recap what I have stated to this point, I instituted a class piano program into a school district that I taught music at for several years. The classes were designed to be given to every fourth and fifth grade student in the district, as part of their regular studies in the school. There were about 120 4th and 5th grade students each year, and they received piano lessons twice a week in 1/2 hour sessions. There were approximately 30 students in each class. It was during the height of this program that, after being visited by numerous County and State Officials, the entire music program at the district was designated as a California 'Featured Practice' program, and I was honored by receiving the County Teacher of the Year Award.

Though the school provided the classroom for the music program, all of the piano's were provided and paid for by the city which had purchased and donated them to the music program for in-school piano classes. For that reason the classroom was equipped with thirty-two 61 note piano keyboards, and an 88-note keyboard for the instructor.

In addition, there were 10 computers in the classroom, equipped with the music education software "Music Ace", which I used as part of the program to help, assess, and insure that the students were keeping up, or catching up to reading music. As the class went on, I would assign students to the computers, or to the piano's depending upon their need. Music Ace comes with an assessment component, so it was easy to track each students progress in comprehension.

As I've stated previously, I had a great deal of help from my music aides, whose salary was paid for from grants that I wrote and applied for each summer during my sojourn at this school district. In addition, the aides for the classroom teachers would often come in with the classes, and assist as I taught the class. Since the program was so unique, and so appreciated by many parents, I also had a number of qualified parent volunteers who helped with most classes. In addition, I had the 'student trainers' that also helped me help students that needed it.

Differentiated Curriculum

All of this allowed me a great deal of flexibility to work with most of the students, most of the time. The full 1/2 hour of each class was divided into 4 parts. The opening sequence was about 7 minutes each class that consisted of transition time listening to classical music -(Mozart was prominent, but also the CD - "Conversational Solfege" by John M. Feierabend was used extensively, as were short introductions to the works of great Classical composers.) Video flashcards, and rhythmic solfege practice then followed the initial 2-3 minutes of 'transition time. If you haven't done so already, - click on the video at the top of this blog. I've reformatted and released the first of several of my video flashcard series, and will be releasing many more on this site in the next few weeks. As I've said, they were extremely productive in terms of keeping the students attention while increasing their musical literacy.

The next 10 minutes of each piano class was group time, where all students played their piano's together - out loud, with no headphones. Basically during this time, I would direct the group much as I would a beginning band class, highlighting certain techniques or parts of the music, and dividing the group into sections as I've described. The next 10 minutes of the class time was individual practice and instruction time, with aides and the student helpers assisting students that needed it. During this time, I would assess and assist students one at a time at my own keyboard which was central to the classroom where I had an overview of the entire class. It was during this time also that selected students were able to go to the computers to work on the Music Ace software. The last 3-4 minutes of every class was performance time, where all students would listen to two or three students 'perform' what they were working on for the class. Many of the students used this opportunity as a time to 'show off' what they had learned. I gave every student an opportunity to 'perform' at some time during each few weeks, and this was an incentive for them to show the class their hard work, and it also served to motivate many of the students to strive harder to catch up, keep up, or get ahead. It also provided an opportunity to teach the class how to be a good audience, as well how to perform in front of others.

Cohesive, wholistic philosophy and approach.

One of the reasons for the success of this program was the consistency in approach to the music classes I had given the students in earlier grades (see RITMMAP classes) and continued on into the upper grade band program. One of the welcome surprises that I had was how well the group approach worked in teaching piano. As we started each new song or exercise, I would have the students start with the right hand, then add the left, and finally play both together. In the group setting, one way of helping students to do this was to divide the class into two sections, and have one section play the right hand, while the other section played the left, then switch. This accomplished several things. First of all, it was not too intimidating for any of the students to do one hand at a time. By playing together, there was the peer-pressure for every student to keep up with the group. During this time, my aides and parent volunteers were available to assist any of the students that needed it without stopping or interrupting the group process. Students that had already learned the pieces were encouraged to play both hands together, or 'solo' during the group time by selecting a different sound that would stand out from the piano sound that the rest of the group was using, and allow me to hear them individually, even as everyone else was playing. By separating the learning in this manner, I also set a pattern for learning that was valuable for them to continue learning songs on their own.

The group setting also allowed me to do something that I couldn't do in a private setting, and that was to have the students play songs as rounds, and to use partner songs. This contributed to increased musicality on the students part as they had to listen, play, and work together as a group. This 'playing together' aspect of the program generated enthusiasm and enjoyment for the students, and allowed me to have students with different ability levels, still work together.

As I've said, initially, students also sang the songs out loud (in the group setting) as they played them on the piano. This also was an extension of "using what you know to help you grow'. Singing the songs, (either rhythmic solfege or the words to the songs) gave a one to one correspondency between each syllable of the song, and the correlating finger movement. Now, let me assure you that the quality of the singing diminished dramatically when they were engaged in playing at the same time - which was to be expected. But the quality of the learning increased just as dramatically. I didn't need to tell the students if they were playing the right note or when to play it. - They could hear it, see it, and feel it for themselves. In that sense, they took on the role of being their own teacher, and my role as teacher changed from telling (or showing) them what was wrong, into one of guiding or helping them to correct what they already knew was wrong, and wanted to fix.

At the end of the group session (also about 10 minutes) students would again plug in their headphones, for the 'individual practice and instruction' time. During this time, they would work on the music that they needed to for their own individual progress in the music books that I had created, or on the 'Music Ace', software program, or on duets if that was what they had been told to do. As I stated earlier, some students were designated 'music trainers' and they were allowed to go around and help students who needed it. Many years ago, when teaching even more students each week (1000+) rather than the 540 or so that I was teaching each week in this district, I had discovered the value of student assistants. Rather than allowing students who knew the material well to get bored in class and become discipline problems, I rewarded their accomplishments by having them be 'music assistants', which also accorded them some degree of stature in the classroom. They were a great help in many ways, and since it was easier for some students to relate to another student rather than to an adult, it worked out well for everyone. Students could only be designated as a 'trainer' if they had satisfactorily completed the songs on the 'progress chart' that was located at the back of the classroom, which was an incentive for some to complete the progress chart quickly. There could also be no behavior problems for them to remain as assistants.

Because there was an very wide cross-section in the ability level of the students in the classroom, and since some of them were taking, or had already taken piano lessons, - One of the things that I did that proved very helpful was to connect two pianos together with a signal splitter, so that two students could hear each other play simultaneously. I would then have them work on duets together. I usually wound up arranging music that was of an appropriate difficulty level for these students, and then leaving them to work together on their own, while I addressed other students needs. This worked quite well for keeping the more proficient students fully engaged, - especially when they were working toward future public performances, i.e. winter or spring concerts, open house, performances for the class, etc. It also allowed me time to focus on helping or assessing the majority of students individually.

More next time.
Until then, RZ

Group Piano Classes - Continued

2011-09-22T07:47:00.000-07:00

I am going to continue today with the overview of the group piano classes that I developed and talked about in my last post. Every 3rd and 4th grade student in my school district (around 120 students each year) received piano lessons twice a week in 1/2 hour sessions with about 30 students in each session. The physical elements of the class consisted of a large music room, consisting of an open space, and 32 Yamaha PSR series electronic piano's. In addition, the room contained 10 computers which were equipped with music education software.

As I've made clear on other occasions, one of the factors in the success of the program was the importance of the opening sequence of each class being the same pattern. The establishment of a routine was an important way of setting the 'tone' for learning.
The picture above is of a 5th grade class immediately after coming into my music classroom. I projected video flashcards on the ceiling and gave the students the option of sitting on the chairs, or laying on the floor to watch them and interact with them. As you can see, the floor was the preferred option. As I stated in my last blog, these flashcards were accompanied by the sounds of Mozarts sonata in D for two pianos , K448.

After the sonata was completed, students would sit in their chairs, and we would work on rhythms. For this, I would have background music playing on the sound system from the GIA Music Education Series by John Froseth. The cd - Blues Showcase was especially useful as I would play the cd, while holding up flashcards of rhythms in time with the music. The students would respond, also in time with the music, using the rhythmic solfege developed by Dr. Edwin Gordon and associates. Saying the rhythms in time with the music was an authentic learning experience that gave the students an enjoyable, and effective way of learning their rhythms, while at the same time, giving me a way of 'authentically assessing' the students at a glance, and identifying those that needed additional help. When we were through with the rhythmic solfege, the students would go to the piano's, and I would have my teachers aide and parent volunteers go with those students who I had identified as needing additional help. The total time required for all of what I have described above, - Notation flashcards, and verbal solfege with cd, etc, took less than 10 minutes.

At the piano's, the students could turn them on, and play at them with the headphones until I was ready to begin the group session. When all students were seated, and all 'issues' were taken care of. I would signal that I needed their attention, and the students would stop, unplug their headphones, and wait for everyone to start together. I enforced the rule that when it was group time, there was to be no individual playing. We would be working together. Anyone who didn't, would have their piano turned off. No exceptions, and no problems. The students understood that I would follow through every time they played out of turn, and so they didn't. If that sounds simplistic, its not. It just works. "Say it once, mean it once, and do it once". No warnings, no exceptions, no second chances, and no wasted time.

When I first conceived the idea of having a group piano class, I thought that I would be having the students use their headphones much of, if not most of the time. This was the model that I had seen used by the piano companies, and it included some very expensive hardware that allowed the teacher to monitor each student individually - electronically. In working in a group setting with an actual class of students, I found that it was extremely effective and managable to have a substantial time for all of the students to play out loud, and together. It was in fact, not much different than working with a beginning band class - (which I also did, so maybe I just transferred my own experience from that to this new situation). I was surprised by how well the singing of the songs as we had done in previous grades, transferred to the piano class. As I described in my last post, we would sing the songs we were working on each day, first with the words, and then with rhythmic solfege. Since singing had been part of the students experience in my music classes since kindergarten, they were good at it, and it proved to be a natural step into learning to play the piano. I don't think I can emphasize enough how important singing the songs with rhythmic solfege was to the ability of the students to play the piano. After incorporating rhythmic solfege into my classes, I never had to work with students on rhythm. When the students could sing the rhythm, - they could play the rhythm, and I could focus on teaching them which notes to play, how to hold their hands etc, - not when to play the notes. In teaching piano for years, this was new to my experience, and it was a welcome surprise.

As I was developing the program, I knew that one of the keys to its success would be to have the students playing the piano quickly. 'Immediate gratification' in other words, was an element that I wanted to build in initially so as to capture the students interest and involvement, which would then lend itself to a willingness to practice and work on their part later on. That is why I started teaching them to play songs on the black keys from the very beginning. The black keys are just more visible and individually identifyable than the white keys. The black keys are arranged in patterns, which makes them 'feel' different, and that sense of feeling, or to be more exact - proprioception, is an important feature in learning to play the piano (or any instrument for that matter).

I also started by having the students play fun and interactive songs that they already knew. The reason for this was that I had been struck in the recorder classes that I had developed (subject of a future blog) with the rapidity that students were able to play songs well, when they were not asked to learn new songs. New songs came easily after the skills were developed. They were only a source of frustration when concurrent with learning a new skill. When students were asked to scaffold on the material they already know - i.e. the songs, - and focus on learning just one new skill set at a time, - in this case the fingering, they learned much more rapidly than when they were overwhelmed with new material. I used, as Carl Orff termed it "elemental music" which has been defined as "pattern-based music built on natural speech and body rhythms, familiar melodic patterns, and simple forms that can be learned, created, understood, and performed without extensive technical or theoretical musical training."

(To be continued in next blog- R.Z.)

Overview of Group Piano Class

2011-09-19T06:03:00.000-07:00

In previous posts, I've alluded to the class piano program that I developed and incorporated into the k-8 music program that I taught. Today I want to expand on that program, and give a bigger picture of what it came to be.

The program and the setting that I designed it for was a large group of students at a time, in a dedicated music classroom with electronic keyboards for each student, and a 30 minute time-slot twice a week. The age of the students in my classes ranged from lower to intermediate elementary in age, and this approach evolved into something that was quite successful in this context.

Other pictures here; and here

If you were to have been one of the many observers from the community or adjacent schools who frequently came into my class, you would have noticed classical music and a video presentation playing prior to any class entering my room. As I've described in other blogs, that initial few moments of a class is, I believe, a critical time to the success of any teaching. In those first few moments when a student crosses the threshold, it is possible to capture their attention, and immediately focus it on what is about to happen - or lose it, and have to spend the next several minutes of valuable class time trying to regain it. Call it 'creating a positive feeling tone', or 'anticipatory set', I always felt that making the best possible use of 'transition time', was one of the keys to the success of much of my teaching.

After I welcomed the students, Piano class began in a circle of chairs at the front of the music room with video flashcards playing over the strains of Mozarts double piano sonata in D, K448. Mozart's Double piano concerto in D was an important part of the 'Mind' institutes research, and listening to it each class-period was part of their recommended protocol. After doing it this way for some time, I modified the experience by making video flashcards and setting them to the music of the Sonata. The results were extraordinary. Instead of listening to the same music, and thinking of it as becoming 'dull', and doing flashcards being 'boring', the students enthusiastically entered into this time, and became engaged in learning both the material on the flashcards, and listening to the music, which most of the came to know quite well, and enjoy. The video flashcards were so successful, that I wound up having to create several sets, - varying the information, and speeding up the delivery as students became more advanced. (I've re-designed these cards for use online, and will begin making them available on this site in the next week or so.)

The next part of the class was to go to the piano's, and we would then sing the songs that we would be working on that day. - Yes, sing. We would sing both the words, and the rhythmic solfege while following along on the music with our fingers. Though it may seem counter-intuitive, this process actually resulted in students learning new songs much more quickly and accurately than by trying to go 'from rote, to note'. I would frequently tell the students, to get the song in their head, before they tried to play with their hands.'

The next part of the process was to move their fingers to the keyboard, and sing and play at the same time. Rather than delaying the process of learning to play the piano, I believe that doing this greatly increased their musicianship and allowed them to learn more quickly. A mentor of mine once said it this way: "What I see, I hear, I say, and I do, that will I learn". Though the syntax is a bit awkward, the point is well taken. Applied to learning music, as I understand it, What I see (the staff, the notes, musical literacy) I hear (aurally and through audiation; i.e. in my head), I sing (not performance singing, but being able to connect note and sound and recreate it at some level), and I play (again, that sense of the bodies place in space, proprioception, - connecting all the senses in learning). The visible result was that most students learned to play the piano in this group setting at a rate that would have been satisfying in a private lesson setting.

For awhile I tried having the students sing the name of the notes while they played the song, but this involved too many processes at the same time for many of them to do easily. What worked out much better, - and what I later incorporated, was to divide that process of recognizing, and then of playing notes into two parts, and work on each part separately. One of the parts was to have them concentrate on how the song 'felt' to play. Getting their hands in the right position at the beginning, and then not looking at them. I know that many piano teachers right now are saying 'well, of course', but, I don't think I ever understood how important 'proprioception' was to the learning process until I had to apply it to this group setting. Properly understanding it helped me to properly teach it, and the students benefitted greatly from the time that I took to work with them on this. Having them close their eyes and then trying to find the correct notes as I called them out became both a challenge, and 'fun' to see if they could do it. I addressed the second part of the discrete process of seeing, recognizing, and playing the right note, by making up sets of video flashcards that the students could see from their piano's. These flashcards showed the notes on a staff, and the students then had 2 seconds to play the note on the piano's they were seated at, before the correct note position on the piano was shown on the video flashcard. Again, that element of competition - which I always tried to focus on themselves trying to do it better than they did last time, rather than better than someone else, became an element of enjoyment in learning and improving.

I'll continue with more in my next post.

Until Then - RZ

What do fractions sound lilke?

2011-09-12T08:28:00.000-07:00

When working with music, it always amuses me that it is fundamentally math - expressed as sound. So much of music involves math, and yet so many people today consider math and music as unrelated, and do not make the connections that are so obvious when you look at the 'fundamentals' of music.

Einstein wasn't one of those people. An interesting analysis of his musical/mathematical/creative thought can be found in this article from Psychology Today, as can his famous quote "The theory of relativity occurred to me by intuition, and music is the driving force behind this intuition. My parents had me study the violin from the time I was six. My new discovery is the result of musical perception"

Pythagorus - the 6th century BC mathematician and philosopher that gave us the 'pythagorean theorem that every student has to learn in math, also discovered the mathematical relationship of pitches that we recognize today as the musical scale.

Guido de Arrezo - a monk and music theorist in the 11th century formulated a way of expressing those sounds musically. His system of 'solfege' (do-re-mi) is in use today, and the best way that I can explain Solfege is that it is the musical way of expressing the mathematical relationships of sound.

What do fractions sound like.

What do I mean by that. We'll for instance, lets go to a wonderful site by Phil Tulga, a California educator who has given us some great multi-sensory examples of how music relates to math, science and reading. Here for example are the fractions of the harmonic series in an aural, visual, and entertaining way.

Want to write a song in musical fractions, - try his page on Musical Fraction Bars

Or maybe write a new 'groove' with his 'fraction pie' page and a 'water' rhythm.

And don't forget your 'do-re-mi's' on his virtual digeritube page

There's lots more, so explore and enjoy.

Until next time

Ron

Music and Math

2011-09-02T06:58:00.000-07:00

One of the things that I've always enjoyed, and had success at teaching was piano. In my career, I have taught adults, high-school and college students, and children and even small group piano classes of up to 4 students at a time. So when I began planning a program to implement class piano lessons in the music curriculum at the elementary school I was teaching at, I anticipated a lot of hard work and preparation, but felt confident, especially given the success and acceptance of the music program at the school I was working at, that a piano class for all the fourth and fifth grade students in the district was possible, and would be an exciting dimension to both their schooling, and their musical development.

So I began to make preparations to implement a program. The first step I knew was to convince the stakeholders in this endeavor, staff, administrators and parents, of the value of having a program of this sort in the school. I knew where I was going to turn. Someone whose work I had followed for many years, Dr. Gordon Shaw. For today, let me share with you a video from the MIND research institute of Math + Music to begin to explain it. We will talk more about it in the future.

Demise of a model arts program

2011-08-25T13:21:00.000-07:00

Today I am including a video that I made of the music program I developed in the district I worked in subsequent to the Ritmmap study. The purpose is to give some context to that program, and to see how that basis for music education exploded into a comprehensive, and acclaimed music education program for k-8 students.

Moving On

2011-08-19T16:47:00.000-07:00

For these last few weeks, I've focused on work I did in the early grades at a k-8 school that later on went to be featured as a model California music program. For someone who may be a casual observer, all of this talk about the early stages of musical development may seem time-consuming and not-too-important. Let me assure you that nothing could be further from the truth. The fact is that these early stages of musical development were a vital and critical factor to the wonderful music program that came to be part of that school over the next several years. Each childs experience of singing and playing song-experience games, 'audiating' sound and songs, and using tonal and rhythmic solfege in their early years made music a part of each child, and a part of each child's development. In the RITMMAP study, one of the instrumental effects of learning music was the improved reading scores of 2nd graders that was documented. As will later be shown, one of the instrumental effects of the piano classes that were introduced was to increase Math scores in 4th and 5th graders by a significant amount. Rather than take away from the educational value of the NCLB tested subjects, participation in the music classes enhanced the students abilities in these and other areas.

In the music program that developed from these music, movement, and play beginnings, there came a vibrant Orff program, recorder classes, a piano program for all 4th and 5th grade students in the district and beginning and intermediate band programs that included a marching band and a concert band that performed several times each year. Students in the upper grades participated in computer-music classes where they learned music theory and composition. Students in the advanced band program wrote music on Garageband, and created podcasts about their favorite jazz, classical or rock composers. None of that would have ever been possible if the needs and musical development of students in the earliest grades had not been addressed in the manner that I've been describing in the previous posts. For anyone that wants to know where or how to start a music program, - start there - in the earliest grades, and grow your program like you would a garden. Then watch it grow and develop beyond anything you could have imagined.

By the way, - I do not mean to suggest that the program that I introduced was adequate. I was never satisfied to have k-3 students 1 day a week. As much as was accomplished, I can only dream about what might have been possible if music and art and dance and drama classes had been taught 2-3 times per week, as the original NCLB guidelines and California state law requires (but is more often than not- ignored).

I wish I could take you inside of some of those k-3 classes where there were 'tingly' moments of absolute beauty when the children's singing, and harmony's, and spirit of participation and cooperation were breathtaking. These moments of beauty can and need to be part of every child's life when their brains are developing, neurons are exploding with possibilities and curiosity, and their bodies are absorbing habits and skills and behaviors that will stay with them for a lifetime. Music, art, drama and dance are too important to leave out of children's lives.

Next week I will begin to talk about the group piano lessons that became part of the regular instruction of all 4th and 5th grade students in the district. I have developed an online course based on that work in those classes that I am previewing on another site. It won't be fully operational until the first part of September, but I'll be adding some elements each week until then. I'm including a preview video for those who are interested.

The RITMMAP Study and ETM

2011-08-16T15:38:00.000-07:00

I have focused for the last few weeks, and will for the next couple on the study that I completed in 2001, which I have called the RITMMAP Study (Reading Improvement through Music, Movement, and Play). Though the study has been available to teachers at no cost since then, I am highlighting the study now partly to emphasize the importance and effectiveness of quality music education
in schools, and in the development of children, and partly to give practicing teachers a look at, and a resource for, materials that can be drawn from, and relied upon for use in their own classrooms. The study wasn't perfect, wasn't even close I'm sure, but it did have some significant features that are important and relevant to anyone interested in education today. I continued to use the material as a part of the complete program of music education that I developed which became one of the model music-education programs for California.

One feature of the study was that there was a significant improvement in the reading scores of the 2nd graders involved in the study. Though I administered the Music, Movement, and Play portion of the program (more about that below), I had nothing to do with assessing the students or analyzing the data. As I've explained in another blog, reading specialists administered the Academy of Reading computer reading program that provided the reading instruction to the non-music group, and assessed all the groups. This fact alone makes the increase in scores of the control group significant. The MMP group, improved their reading scores at a faster rate in the music part of the study than they did in the reading portion. I just wonder what the combined effects on students would be from participating in semi-weekly MMP classes as well as the reading program. Let me emphasize again that there are far more reasons to include the arts in children's education, but here is one more piece of evidence (and there are many) that one of the bonuses of teaching the arts, is improved reading abilities - and if you look at the data, especially in English as a second language children

There was however, much more occurring in this study than just reading improvement, and those features are more important today then even when the study was done. Musical empowerment, behavior improvement, attentiveness, self-regulation skills, socialization skills, and improved focus and attention were just some of the aspects of student development that improved. Many of the reasons for the improvement in these other areas have been explored and explained through contemporary studies in neuroscience, education, and psychology. At the time of the study, it was called brain-based learning, and I incorporated as much of this knowledge in my teaching approach as I was able. For that reason, I included the philosophy, methods, and material of the Richards institute of Education Through Music as a significant part of the program. I'm including a current promotional video from the Richards Institute to explain more about the program, and I'll have more to say about it in future blogs.

Until next time - Ron Zell

Ritmmap 11 Old MacDonald / Down by the Bay

2011-08-11T14:16:00.000-07:00

The importance of hearing rhymes was a focus for this lesson because of its importance in learning to help students discern the differences among individual sounds (or phonemes).
In the sessions of the RITMMAP study to this point, the students had played with rhymes in all of the song-experience-games, however rhyming had not been the primary focus of any of the lessons to this point. Since rhyming helps students to hear the differences and similarities in how words sound, and since so much attention in this study had been devoted to the initial sounds of words previously, this session concentrated on word endings, and ending words.

Here is the text of the session from the intervention log that I kept with the data and notes from the study:

11th intervention: The class began by singing “Down by the Bay”. Much opportunity was given to the students for making up rhymes for ending words. The class then sang “Old MacDonald” using different words, e.g. Old MacDonald had a Farm... and on this farm he had some chocolate, e-i-e-i-o. - with a Ch ch here, and a ch ch there.. Several familiar songs were then sung, and the phonetic possibilities of many of them were incorporated into the class.

In this session, the opening activities, were abbreviated, but present with all of the components that I've discussed. In the eleventh session however, I did not include any Song-Experience-Games's. The reason for this was so that the students could focus on the element of 'rhyme', but also because by this time, the students and the teachers were excited about music and about singing, and wanted to sing and share several songs that they had been doing in their own classes independent of work with me. For this reason, other than the opening activities, this portion of the class was conducted much like a 'singing class' - but with a few distinctions.

Normally the class configuration consisted of sitting in a large circle, with plenty of open space in the middle to play the games. For this class, much as I would for a choral rehearsal, all of the students sat close together in a sort of semi-circle, - facing me, but with no open space. I sat directly in from of them, on a chair, while they sat on carpets on the floor. The reason for this change is that it encourages a 'collaborative' element in the students singing, and helps to keep the class focused. Without the benefit of movement and play, being near the teacher and in close proximity to other students was all the more important to help some of the more distracted students stay focused and on task.

Also unlike the other sessions, I used a guitar to accompany the singing in this session. The students all enjoyed the added dimension of the guitar partly because it contrasted and enhanced their singing of the melody by adding harmony and rhythm, and partly because it made the class seem special by being different than the other music classes. Suggestions from the students for rhyming words for the songs were made, and comments like 'almost' or 'close' helped insure that no student felt uncomfortable by volunteering an answer that may have needed help to make it fit the rhyme scheme or pattern.

Ritmmap 10 Punchenella

2011-08-05T03:00:00.000-07:00

Puncinella

In the tenth session of the RITMMAP study, the songs I'm thinking of a Friend, and Puncinella were introduced to the classes. As I've talked about before, when song-experience-games were introduced, a primary focus was to engage the students, and enjoy the experience so that the SEG's were memorable to the students and could be used to build upon in later activities.
That was the emphasis of this session, though we did have time in the opening excercises to play with patterns in I'm thinking of a friend and at the end of this session to include a mapping experience for Puncenella.

Let me say a word about the amount of material that was covered in each session. Even though each class was only one-half of an hour in duration, there was never any time wasted in any class. I'm obsessive about not wasting 'transition time', and I'll have lots more to say about that in the future. Transition time is the 3-4 minutes at the beginning of every class where students come into the room, sit down, have conversations OR wait for the teacher get ready, line up to go out, etc. That is 6 or 7 minutes of invaluable instruction time that is lost. In a 30 minute class, that could be up to one-fourth of the class time. There is just not any excuse to waste time that way, and it was never allowed in these classes. From the moment the students crossed the threshold into my music room, until the moment they crossed it when leaving, they were engaged in singing, playing, seeing, hearing, and participating in the days activities. Behavior problems were non-existent because the material was stimulating, fast-paced, age-appropriate, challenging, well planned, and brain-based. As Dr. Victoria Stevens discusses in her work, and on her web-site, emotional regulation is one of the positive by-products of effective arts education, and that was a factor in the lack of discipline problems in my classes. Children were constantly challenged to use their creativity and imaginations, to be engaged and to co-operate with other students as they experienced songs, puzzles, patterns, games, and artwork (the room was filled with artwork and song-maps and student drawings).

One final observation. In this song, as in so many other American folk-songs which are language-based, and in our use of language in America, there is an anacrusis at the beginning of the opening phrase. This 'pick-up' beat was highlighted in the game by having the student who was chosen to be Puncinella get ready to jump into the middle of the circle on the anacrusis ('O'), and landing on the word 'look' (the resolution of the anacrusis - or stress point). I also had the rest of the class simulate 'throwing' Puncinella into the circle at this same time to emphasize the anacrusis as the beginning of the phrase. As Mary Helen Richards points out in her book "Aesthetic Foundations for Thinking" this anacrusis was felt by the great music educator Zoltan Kodaly to be one of the keys to helping American children read and write their songs. (Aesthetic Foundations for Thinking, Mary H. Richards, Richards Institute: c 1980, pg 158)

Following is a description of the song-experience-game as we played it.

VERSE 1:

(O - - Look whose here, Puncinella, Puncinella

Look whose here, Puncinella from the Zoo)

Students form into a circle,'Puncinella". jumps into the center, landing on 'Look who's here..' and thinks of an action to perform while the class walks in a circle, and sings the 1st verse.

VERSE 2:

What can you do?, Puncinella, Puncinella

What can you do? Puncinella from the Zoo

Puncinella performs a motion while
The class stops, stands and watches his 'motion' carefully, singing:

VERSE 3:

We can do it to, Puncinella, Puncinella

We can do it too, Puncinella from the Zoo

Children in the circle copy the action that Puncinella is doing, singing:

VERSE 4:

O - Who do you choose? Puncinella, Puncinella,

Who do you choose? Puncinella from the Zoo.

Puncinella covers his eyes with one hand and spins around,
holding the other hand out - pointing directly in front of him.
As he is doing this, the class again walks in a circle, singing the last verse.
When the song stops on the word 'Zoo', both Puncinella and the class stop immediately, and when Puncinella opens his eyes, whoever his extended hand is pointing to is the next Puncinella.

Puncinella by joyfulnote

Patterns and Names - Ritmmap 9

2011-08-02T03:00:00.000-07:00

By this time in the intervention, half-way through the RITMMAP study, I had introduced the students to almost all the types of material that I was going to use in the study. Almost everything from this point on was directed toward refining the musical abilities and reading awareness of the students with these materials
through repetition, variation, extension, and highlighting activities. As can be seen by the test-scores, the results were quite successful. Phonemic awareness, initial vowel recognition, and segmentation were significantly enhanced as a result of this work in the music, movement and play classes. One of my regrets in looking back on this study is that I did not provide for some sort of empirical evidence as to the increased musical development that was occurring in the students simultaneously. Two elements in this stage of the program were, I believe, of significant value to decoding abilities in reading. The first was the focus on each of the students names, which personalized the activities for each student and because of the name-tags, made discussions of the sounds and symbols (see below) in the names concurrent with reading them. The second element was the extensive work (play) with patterns in speech, movement, rhythm and song.

Patterns and names were highlighted repeatedly in every class; in the opening activities - which always included some form of a name game as well as imitating and identifying rhythm patterns; in the playing of the Song Experience Games - where patterns, structures, and form in movement and in the songs was identified, highlighted, and extended; and in the form books and song maps which had became a regular part of almost every class by this time.

The name games used to this point were:
   1) Here we are together, Verse - theres Stacy with Cory and Cory with
   Nadia, Oh here we are together all sitting on the floor.
   2) Skip to my Lou, (Hi_____ I see you, Hi____ I see you, Hi_____I see you
   Skip to my Lou my Darling
   3) Hickety Tickety Bumblebee, will you say/sing your name for me
   4) Farmer in the Dell with the words changed to "O I know Viviana,
   O I know Viviana, Hi Ho the Dairy-o, we all know Viviana". In this
   adaption of the game, Viviana would then be asked who she knew, and
   we would place that persons name in the song, and continue. "O Viviana
   knows Miguel, Viviana knows Miguel, Hi Ho.... and so on around the
   circle.
   5) I'm Thinking of a Friend - A fifth name game which was added by the
   10th intervention and utilized for subsequent sessions. Description below.

In the name games, the students were increasingly given opportunities to identify the syllables in names and words on their song-maps, and to notice the stressed and unstressed parts of each of these names and words. This awareness was extended beginning with the 9th session to notice and include rhyming words in the activities. The 'Tracks for Reading' materials from the Richards Institute facilitated this by using the 'melody track' of certain songs as a kind of cantus firmus to extend the language structures of the song. They did this by incorporating rhymes and art-work with song-maps of the melodies that by this time, the children had become so familiar with.

The reference to 'cantus firmus' is appropriate since it brings to mind 'plain chant' which was used in the church for over a thousand years because of its effectiveness as 'heightened speech'. This aspect of song as 'heightened speech' is much the same as the function of the folk songs in the Song-Experience-Games. The connection between music and language is fundamental and integral as well as being the subject of state-of-the-art studies in brain development. As can be seen by the above example, patterns, phrases, and structure (both musical and verbal) become apparent in the song-maps created by the students. The musical form AABA is even visible in a rudimentary way in the above example, as are the linguistic phrases (chunks) in the song. The students were also made aware of the anacrusis, or 'pick-up' notes in many songs by noticing the stressed and unstressed sounds of the initial notes of a song. ('The' in the Farmer in the Dell, 'O' in O Here we are together, 'I'm' in I'm thinking of a friend). By this time also, students were readily identifying rhythmic and metrical patterns from the songs that were used in the opening exercises and from the form books.

Below are notes for teaching / learning the SEG "I'm Thinking of a Friend".

I'm Thinking of a friend

I'm thinking of a friend,

I'm thinking of a special friend

whose name sounds like - - -(clap the persons name)

(Have the children test it out after they've made a guess "turn off your voice, and let your hand say it" /"put the name in your hand - and test it out."

An elaboration of this SEG activity after it was initially learned, was to pick the students name NOT in random order, but in some pattern around the circle, and have the students try to identify the pattern ("who do you think is next"?. For instance, every other student, every 5th student, back and forth across the circle, wearing the same color clothes, etc.

Ron Zell

Sally Go Round The Sun - Ritmmap 7 & 8

2011-07-30T05:29:00.000-07:00

For the game of "Sally go round the Sun", the class forms a standing circle. Three individuals are chosen to be the 'Sun', 'Moon', and 'Chimney Pot' and stand inside the circle, spaced far enough apart for the other students to skip around them.
Each person in the standing circle then takes turns being 'Sally'. "Sally" skips into the circle, takes the sun''s hand and swings around, takes the moon's hand and swings around, takes the chimney pot's hand and swings around, landing back in their own spot on the BOOM - which all students say and clap loudly. Then the next 'Sally' takes their turn.

Sally Go Round the Sun 2 by joyfulnote

'Sally Go Round the Sun' was learned and played in the 7th session of the RITMMAP Study. It was then re-visited in the 8th session, and after being played several times, it was used as a mapping activity. I've included the record from that session below:

8th intervention: Warm-up and focus activities again started the session. Name-tags continue to be used. The class played “Sally goes Round the sun” several times, then mapped it. After the maps had been drawn, traced, and exchanged, - the class walked around the circle while singing the song, - observing all the song maps. After returning to their own map, key phrases in the song were located and written on the map as the class continued to expand their reading, writing, and musical skills. For this song, the students checked where the word “sun” occurred on their map. Then the word was spelled out. The next challenge was to find where the word “moon” occurred on each song map. Finally, - students found, marked, and spelled out where “Boom” occurred. Children were asked if anyone noticed a pattern in any of the words that they had spelled on their song-maps. Some of the children noticed that “moon” and “boom” had the same sound, and had the letters “oo” in the middle. Other children noticed from this, that they had misspelled the word “moon” and corrected it.

The process of mapping the song creates an understanding of the song by the student. The song has a beginning and an end, is framed in silence, and has a definite 'song time' or temporal structure. There are points in the song that can be identified by sounds, words, and actions . The song can be graphed, or symbolized by the student, and this becomes a building-block for comprehending the arbitrary symbols of language, both that of music and of reading. By reading other students songmaps, the student begins to open up to the ideas and interpretations of other individuals symbols.

After the Song - Experience - Game is well learned, it may be played and/or sung as a 2 or 3 part canon. It may also be used as a partner song with 'The Farmer in the Dell' and/or "A Hunting We Will Go". As a further musical highlighting activity, students may trace their song maps while singing the song as a two or three-part canon, each new group beginning on the words 'Sun' 'Moon' and 'Chimney Pot'. Canons are a time-tested way of learning / teaching students to sing in harmony. The use of song-maps in conjunction with canons provides the students with a secure way to 'see, feel, and hear' their contribution to a canon,while participating with others. For further discussions of song-maps see 'Mind map to song map to RITMMAP, and Here We are Together, and Appendix B of the RITMMAP Study.

Mindmap to Songmap to RITMMAP

2011-07-22T11:35:00.000-07:00

When I was in college, I became an early advocate of the practice of 'mindmapping', or 'concept drawing' as it is sometimes called. I read Tony Buzans books avidly, and for me, the idea of drawing and connecting concepts and information, using imagination and association, with color and curved lines resonated with me in terms of taking notes, and remembering information.

Because I was a musician also, this somehow made a connection in my mind with music and poetry which also helped me to remember and connect information. This was no doubt the reason that I was struck with the concept of 'song maps' in the Richards Institute approach to music education. Mary Helen Richards, the founder of the method,, was a keen observer of children, and when she saw the light go on in their eyes when she first started experimenting with song maps, the light went on in hers as to the importance they had in helping children to develop 'symbolic' associations in music and in language.

Example of a Song Map

Repeatedly during this 'overview' of the RITMMAP study that I have been engaged in, I have referred to 'song maps' and 'form books'. By way of explanation, song maps are a component of the form books and the 2nd or 3rd step in the progression from 'sound to symbol'. The first step in that progression was music, movement and play (MMP) as the children saw, heard, sang and did the opening activities and the games. In other words, the Song-Experience Games (SEG's) and the hand-signals in the warm-up activities that were 'played' became the foundation for the extensions that were so important in the statistically significant improvement in reading scores that resulted from this study. There is a great deal of instructive information involved in making the song maps, both procedurally, and theoretically. For this reason I will deal with mostly the process of making the song maps in this post. In future posts, I will talk about why and how the song maps were so useful in the development of musicianship as well as that of language and symbolic representation.

The process of making a song-map began with the movement that was experienced by each student in the playing of the games and participating in the warm-up activities. The form and structure of the SEG had been experienced and 're-presented' by the students many times through MMP. Only after the SEG's were well-learned and well-played were they available to be built upon. To introduce the process of making song-maps, students were asked to imagine that their fingers were a 'magic light-writer', and that they were to 'draw' a map on the wall, or the ceiling, or the floor. The next instruction was to draw an X where they planned on starting their map, and to wait for the song to start. Then when the song did start, they were to sing and start drawing - stopping exactly when the song ended. After a few practices, they were given large pieces of paper, and after drawing a couple of more 'imaginary maps' on the paper, they were given scented magic markers (to activate the sense of 'smell' in the learning process) and allowed to draw their map when they were ready. After the maps were drawn, the markers were put down, and they were asked to trace their maps as they sang the song. This was often a moment of insight for many of the students, as they realized that they could not follow the map that they had drawn. Almost always, this would result in a renewed effort on the part of that student to create a drawing that they could follow (a self-motivated symbol). If they wanted to draw their maps again, they were told to turn the papers over, draw an X, and get ready. Then the song was sung again, and they either drew their maps, or mentally practiced a few times until they were ready.

This emphasis on beginning and end of a temporal event (the song) and translating it to a graphical form (the map) is called, as I said, a 'self-motivated symbol'. The students had experienced and internalized the movement, actions, sounds, structure, form, words and phrases of the song. Now they were being called on to 're-present' what they already knew in a graphic way by drawing, a form that was common and familiar to all of them from their own experience. One of the keys to insuring full participation by all of the students, was by emphasizing that there was no way to make a WRONG song-map. If the student could start with the song, follow the song, and end their map with the song, then for that student, it was correct. For more information on the use of 'song maps' see my earlier post for Here we are Together , and future posts.
For Now,

Ron Zell