On November 17, 2017, I attended the Virginia Music Educators Association Professional Development Conference. I got listen to different sessions about areas of music education that we do not always have the time to cover in classes at JMU. Some of the onnes I went to were: “Creating Lifelong Patrons of the Arts In Our Classrooms” with Jeff Lehman, “I’m Sorry I Thought You Were a Student” with John Rine Zanabal”, and “Classroom Instruction to Improve the Lives and Education Of Our Students” with Sandy Goldie. My favorite session that I attended was “Instrumentos Arriba! Engaging English Language Learners” with Angela Ammerman. Angela teaches orchestra at Annandale High School and has found a way to include English Language Learners in her classroom. She does this by using hand motions in conjunction with simple one or two word directions so that it is easier to understand what she is asking. She even arranged simpler parts of her pieces so that these students could perform at assessments and be proud of the work they have accomplished.
I also got to present “Tinkering with Music through Technology” with Cassie Coss, Sarah Dodge, Julia Picchiottino, Erica Unroe, and our professor, Jesse Rathgeber. We began by allowing the audience to tinker with the different Makey-Makey projects we had developed last year in our MUS 150 class. Then we discussed the different pedagogical concepts behind our tinkering with technology such as project based learning and constructivism. At the end, we invited everyone to come tinker and design their own musical projects. Attending and presenting at the VMEA Conference was an amazing experience for me. To be honest, I was extremely overwhelmed at first; being surrounded by so many knowledgeable, capable music educators was nerve-wracking. There were a lot of personal identity questions like, “How on earth am I supposed to become a great teacher like all these people?” and “Am I really supposed to be here and doing this?”. Thankfully, I was surrounded by several JMU NAFMEc members and one of my best friends, Erica Unroe, who gave me support and friendship along the way. Here’s a link to our website and presentation, as well as a picture of us there!
Our experience will be for Kindergartners and we hope to help them understand what emotions they feel when they see different images and hear different sounds. We have five pictures, each having three buttons that contain a different sound clip. The kids will look at the picture and be prompted to say what they feel when they see the picture. Then they will click whatever button they want and say if the music fits the emotion they described and why they think it fits. There is a handout and video below that explain and demonstrate the experience in further detail!
|
Davina MiawHere I will share experiences of my engagement in community. Archives
December 2019
Categories |