Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Student Involvement or Teacher Involvement

I am at my worst in teaching when I am the one doing the work in my class. I am teaching elementary music now and I have to constantly examine my lesson plans and monitor who it is that is working in my class, the students or myself. Who spends the most time talking or singing, myself or my students. Yes, it's ok for the students to talk more than the teacher, as long as they are on task and it's a part of the lesson plan. Why should I have to individually ask students fact questions? That is a time waster and the only people that you can guarantee are paying attention are the teacher and the one student who is being addressed.
My class was working on a circle dance and I wanted to check to see if they understood what I meant by clockwise and counterclockwise direction. It's a digital age. Instead of asking one student if they new what an analog clock was, I asked them to tell students around them what an analog clock was. I could hear from their mass conversations that they knew the answer so I just asked the full group to show me with their hands a clockwise circle. The whole process was quicker than asking one or two students individually and had everyone involved. They did the work and not me.

Orff Approach.

I just completed my level one Orff completion. The Orff Approach is great for keeping all students involved. If you're an elementary music teacher and are not using some of Orff and Keetman's approaches to teaching music, you and your students are missing out.

Check out my other website for more information:

www.orffsite.com