Module 2 - Perceiving

For this assignment, I will be looking at rhythm for a song towards the beginning of my students' violin education, "May Song."  "May Song" is a difficult song rhythmically, as it is the first song to have a dotted quarter note, and students have had relatively little experience with eighth notes, which this song also has.  To learn this song, my students traditionally listen to the CD and have the sheet music.  Here is a photograph of the sheet music:

Here is what the first line of the piano part looks like:

This offers some information about how the dotted quarter note is played, but not enough.  Even if I showed this to my students, they likely would not gain much from it.

So, to look at it in a different way, I used colored construction paper to create "notes."  Each measure was 18" long, each half note was 9", quarter notes were 4.5", and eighth notes were 2.25".  Dotted quarter notes were 6.75".  I laid out the pieces, with the top row showing the measures, the next row showing the rhythms the students had to play, the third row was half notes, the fourth row was quarter notes, and the bottom row was made from eighth notes:

 

Measure 1:
















Measure 2:

Measure 3:















Measure 4:

(Since the rhythm in the piece during the fourth measure is half notes, I did not include a second row of half notes.)








Using these pieces, students will really be able to experience how a dotted quarter note is equal to 3 eighth notes, and a quarter note is equal to 2.

Reflection:
 

Perception is how you use the five senses to experience the world, and how you process that experience. When I originally perceived the rhythms of “May Song,” I mostly used the senses of sight and hearing. I saw the music, the rhythms, and each of those rhythms means something different to me. Dotted quarter note, eighth note, quarter note, and half note, all mean something different. I also heard the song; heard how long each note is held, and felt the rhythms.

To re-imagine the rhythms of “May Song,” I wanted to provide my students with a way to experience rhythms in a different way. My experience and perception of rhythms is colored by my long experience and association with them. I've been playing for 19 years, so every note has a different meaning to me, amassed over those 19 years. My students don't have that long background experience that I do, but I want to enable a similar experience for them. I used colored strips of paper to represent each note, allowing students to manipulate and work with the rhythms in a physical manner.

By representing rhythms physically with pieces of paper, the time each note takes is translated into physical space each note takes up. This provides a different way for my students to experience rhythms, in a way that enables deeper understanding. Through manipulating the rhythms, students can directly experience that each dotted quarter note gets as much time as three eighth notes, and that having a dotted quarter note and an eighth note is a different rhythm than having two quarter notes, though they take up the same total amount of time.

While I have told my students this many times, they will not internalize it until they discover it for themselves.  By using these sheets of paper to work with the different notes, they should be able to discover this on their own, without me having to tell them.

Module 1: Veja Du

Here's what the pictures were of . . . my 5 string violin that has a pickup - my alternate violin.

About Me

So, I came to teaching in a bit of a round-about manner.  It all started in high school.  See, I was dead-set on becoming a zookeeper.  I was volunteering at the Oregon Zoo, working with one of the roving keepers (we got to work with all the animals in the zoo!), and absolutely LOVING it.  I thought, "Yes, this is what I want to do!"

However, about that same time, my violin teachers asked me to join their Teacher Training class.  And when I say "ask," I mean they said, "Oh, Ashley, you're going to be in our teacher training class.  It's Friday afternoons, when you're here anyway.  Bring a binder."  And, being the obedient child that I was, I did.  I really did NOT want to teach music, but like they said, I was there all Friday afternoon anyway.  Why not learn how to teach?

So, I went through high school, doing my very best to prepare myself to be a zookeeper, while at the same time doing the student teaching thing.  I had a couple violin students in high school; three or four.  Not many, but that was okay with me.  Besides, I didn't want to teach when I grew up, anyway.

In college, I kept up with my track to be a zookeeper.  I got my Bachelor's of Science in Zoology from Colorado State University, and really loved it.  I decided I wanted to work long term with birds.  After college, I ended up with a job at Point Defiance Zoo and Aquarium, in Tacoma, WA.  So, with the help of my parents, I moved to Tacoma, and started working in the zoo world.

For the most part, it was a lot of fun.  I worked in the Wild Wonders Outdoor Theater (ever see a bird show in a zoo?  Yep, this was it, only with all sorts of animals), which was a bit different for me.  I have never considered myself much of a people person, and I had HORRIBLE stage fright.  But, I got over it, and learned a lot.  Only problem was, I had landed a temporary position.  After a year, my hours ran out, and I was forced to look for different work.

Originally, my plan was to move around until I found the perfect dream job, then settle.  But I hadn't planned to fall in love.  Shortly after working at the zoo, I met my now-husband, and found out he never wanted to leave Washington.  Hmm.  I hated the Northwest.  But, love prevails, and here I am still.

So, anyway, after a year, I was left without a job at the zoo.  I couldn't go anywhere else and ask my then-boyfriend to choose between his family, a great job, and the home he loved, and me with my unpredictable future.  So I stayed, and thought, "what else can I do?"

Turns out, I could teach.  I started teaching private violin lessons, and it's really taken off from there.  That was a little over four years ago.  Since I started teaching, I rented a studio to teach out of, and am now working on moving my studio home.  My husband and I bought our house outside of Buckley (small town in western Washington), and I have chickens, ducks, and just got goats.  I also have a number of indoor birds, two fish tanks, and a horse that I board at a nearby stable.  Do I have too much going on?  Most likely.  But I'm loving every minute of it!!

Even though I don't need my MAED (no, I'll never teach in a school setting, and I'll be doing the exact same thing I am now), I really want it.  I'm loving learning so much about how to be a better teacher, and I feel like my students have already benefited.  I've already implemented a bunch of new teaching practices and ideas.  I should be finishing up my MAED at the end of the spring 2013 semester.  I'm really excited to be done and have more time to work on some of the ideas that have been spinning around my head, but I have had to warn my husband that I'll most likely want to go back for my doctorate someday.  Hopefully not for a while.