Reflection - Week 5

       When it comes to instruction, I've always stood by the old saying, "The ends justify the means."  With the end always in mind, I try my absolute best to construct lessons that work toward those end goals.  I suppose I'm a fan of backward instructional design, but it is challenging when teachers must make changes to their lessons in order to adapt to any obstacles that sometimes come up.  Effective teachers must always have a back-up plan to make up for lost practice time, rehearsals, or class time.  Even now in my 10th year of teaching, I feel pressured at times when there are field trips scheduled right before concert dates.  I've found that the best way to make the most out of the time I have with my students is to develop a foundation of assessment tools that are both fast and efficient.

       Assessment is one of those realms in education that can be approached a number of ways.  The more traditional approach would be to use pencil-and-paper worksheets or exams.  As music educators, we know that a student's progress on an instrument cannot always be measured this way.  Student knowledge of music theory can sometimes be assessed through written work or tests but often times in a music classroom, students display what they know through doing.  Being a hands-on learner is probably why music appeals to me.  Of course, I still use assessment tools like rubrics and grade sheets, especially when I hold auditions for jazz band and section leader chairs.  But I usually try to provide feedback to my students through some form of listening or discussion.  One example would be when my students perform at their winter and spring concerts.  The day after their concert, we listen to their performance and the entire lesson is built around reflection, both from an individual standpoint and an ensemble standpoint.  Students can either share their thoughts through discussion, or they can write down their reflection and hand it in.  This type of self-assessment can be used after the concert when there is time to spare, but in the weeks leading up to the concert, assessment needs to be done quickly.

       During our combined 8th grade band rehearsals this year, I started doing an activity that I learned when observing a conductor working with some of my students at Eastern Regionals.  They had just played through an entire piece and afterwards, she told the students "Ok, very good.  Now, take 30 seconds to a minute, turn to your neighbor, and talk about one thing that you did VERY well!  After that, discuss one thing that you would like to do better."  I took it one step further in my rehearsals by asking my students who would like to share their brief discussion.  This struck me as a fun, fast, and effective way for students to assess themselves as individuals.  Teachers can modify this activity so that students would discuss how they did as an ensemble.  Sometimes students are a bit shy to talk about themselves but they are more likely to share their opinions if they are referring to the collective whole.  One more change I made towards the end of last year was to record their combined rehearsals so that they could listen to their performance without playing.  It's amazing what students hear when they are not concentrating on playing their instruments!

       Using more technology for assessment and instructional design is something I'd like to do more of.  My students and I use our Chromebooks a lot, from recording practice sessions to completing work and submitting via Google docs.  They also use them to complete projects, echoing the project-based-learning approach from the text.  However, I would like to implement either SmartMusic or MakeMusic next year.  SmartMusic will supposedly be compatible with Chromebooks for the 2016-2017 school year as a web-based platform.  You can read more about this here:

http://www.smartmusic.com/blog/makemusic-acquires-weezic/

       So far, I've used the technology available to me in my school district and even though we just became a Google school last year, I am confident that we will find new and interesting ways to teach music with Chromebooks in the classroom.