Activity 2

Who: This activity is for tween and young adolescents who plan to expand their musical knowledge and intend to continue their musical careers into high school and beyond.

The Need: There are a handful of 8th grade band students that are performing beyond their grade level in this area. Because they are seen as gifted, they are not being provided with extra lessons to expand and improve their abilities. This activity focuses on teaching these students the musical scales that they will be required to know by memory if they choose to continue with band into high school. This activity also allows these students to be challenge by new material that has not been covered in class yet, as well as expand their knowledge and abilities on their individual instruments.

What: In this activity, students were asked to perform previously memorized scales (Concert F, B-flat, E-flat, and A-flat) using newly learned dotted 16th note rhythms are whatever speed was most comfortable for them. The activity began by having each student sight read various dotted 16th note rhythms on a concert F pitch. During this process, I guided the students by having them clap the rhythms with me as well as sing the rhythms by themselves. I then had the students play each measure with a different note from the selected scales. First, we would play each measure with a different note from the concert F scale, then B-flat, and so on. Once this process was done successfully 3 times in a row, I then had the students slowly play the rhythms with each note of the scale rather than each measure being a different note (I have provided an example of this below). To demonstrate understanding and retention, each student was asked to either record themselves playing these rhythms by memory or perform them for me via zoom in the following lesson before we began working on other rhythms and scales. Each student was successful in being able to retain the information they had previously learned with few to no minor setbacks.

UDL and SEL: For this activity I

incorporated UDL by allowing my students to have multiple means of expression

when it came to performing the scales by memory in the following lesson. To do

so, I allowed students to either perform in person, through video recording, or

through audio recording. These options were determined by asking each student

how they would prefer to be tested on the subject.

For this activity I

incorporated SEL by promoting responsible decision-making. During each lesson,

I had the students help me troubleshoot by asking them why they think they may

be struggling to remember the scales. 3 of the students answered this question

by stating that they did not practice as much as they should have. I followed

this answer by having them think about whether that was a strong choice and if

they believed that choice helped them.

How:

1.  Provide each student with the desired dotted 16th note rhythms that will be used throughout the lesson

2.  Have each student sight read the rhythms using a singular pitch such as concert F or B-flat.

3.  Instruct the student to clap and sing the rhythm with you to ensure they are playing the rhythms correctly.

4.  Have the student attempt to play each measure with a different note from the assigned scale.

a.   Ex. Measure 1 = F, Measure 2 = G, MM. 3= A and so on.

5.  Ensure that the student is able to do this successfully.

6.  Have the student play the rhythm with different notes from the scale (ex. Provided below)

7.  Have the student repeat step 6, but with ascending and descending notes.

a.   Play up the scale with dotted 16th note pattern and then down the scale with the same pattern.

8.  Once all steps are successful, attempt to have the student continue to increase the speed of their performance and begin to work on sound quality and memorization of pattern.

Materials:

·         Printable document of all 12 major scales for each instrument

·         Printable document of dotted 16th note rhythms handout/worksheet

·         Proper sound/audio equipment if doing virtual lessons

·         (optional) Instruments to demonstrate

Example: