Smart Music

In 2014, the Wautoma Area School District awarded the Parkside Band Program with a grant to receive resources for SmartMusic in our classroom. We now have 5 iPads, wall mounts, headphones, 5 practice room subscriptions and a teacher subscription! What is SmartMusic??

Please check out http://www.smartmusic.com/

(check out some of the videos on the website!)

This program is essentially an educational version of Guitar Hero or Rock Band in that the students can look up music (including music we work on in class and lessons), and it pops up on the screen for them to view. If you’re using an iPad, the built in microphone picks up the student and records them (you need to purchase a microphone for desktops). The students can then play it back and the program will show the student what notes they played correct in green and what notes they need to check for an error in red. They can adjust the speed, select only a couple of tricky measures, and have endless music to search from and play right on their computer without purchasing more sheet music.

This program would help encourage your students to be successful in their home practicing, make practicing more fun, and it’s almost like having a teacher in the room with them. It will even show the student correct fingerings when mistakes are made!

Our school band room now has 5 practice rooms with an iPad in each one that the students will be encouraged to use during band study hall time, before school and during recess.

In the future, we would be looking at having students complete assignments via the program that they could complete at school, but we wanted families to be aware that this can be purchased for the home as well. A home subscription of SmartMusic runs $40 per year. This can be used on any device in your household. Once a subscription is purchased, you sync this with an email and you can log in on any device with SmartMusic downloaded. You can use one subscription for your family whole family.

At this time, we are using SmartMusic as a practice tool but would be looking at using it for assignments in the future.

Below are directions on how to complete actions when using an iPad. Much of this is similar when using a desktop.