A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments

Ashley Wolfe

TESL 221 with Dr. Stallions

Table of Contents

 Introduction A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments

o An outline of the guide and its benefits

o Page 3

 ELL Learning Outcomes

o Reading, writing, and auditory objectives and activities

o Pages 4-5

 Instructional Strategies

o ELL support strategies

o Pages 6-7

 Work Samples

o Students at different language levels differentiate a writing activity

o Pages 8-11

 Annotated Bibliography

o Sources and additional resources for teachers

o Pages 12-14

 Summary Reflection

o What was learned from assignment

o Page 15

2 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments

Introduction

This guide was designed to educate a variety of students in the world of music. I will take you through a series of strategies and lessons to use when teaching in a fourth grade classroom.

The students will be educated on what ten instruments look and sound like and by the end all of the students will be able to complete the tasks with minimal differentiation. This guide will include a variety of visual aids, including scenes from a movie that has no words in it which will enable students in the silent stage of English production to feel like a member of the classroom.

The teacher will also be able to build off of prior knowledge and engage students who may be new to different types of music but will be able to educate the class on his or her own culture.

The final support system in place will occur within activity grouping where students will be placed together based on skill sets and language proficiency.

No matter the class size or the class skill level this lesson will guide anyone through ways of differentiating to provide the best experience for the best students. Activities will be heavily based on visuals of actual instruments or photos of them, and the sounds they make. Not only will this engage the students in the English proficiency levels and the native speakers, but the silent period and pre-production students will also be able to fully engage. All of these teaching strategies and activities will be outlined in the third and fourth sections of this guide and should be applicable to many classrooms where music is not necessarily a part of the curriculum, but

3 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments certainly an important part of our culture and an excellent means of connecting all of the students together regardless of language boundaries.

ELL Learning Outcomes

The student will write a 3-4 sentence paragraph giving a visual and auditory description for Writing three of the ten instruments we discuss in class and will use pictures to complement each description. The student will discuss for one minute at his Oral or her table of four what he or she heard or liked best when watching the movie Fantasia. The students will listen to a song as a class and work in pairs to place pictures of 5 instruments Auditory on the board in the chronological order that they appear in the song.

These learning outcomes will cover a variety of learners with a variety of interests. In the writing component students will need to have a fairly comprehensive understanding of the

English language in written form in order to compose three-four sentence paragraphs. However, the use of pictures in their descriptions and the vocabulary list that we will have discussed in class will enable them to have more previous knowledge. This objective will be most feasible for native language users and students in the intermediate/advanced fluency stages. This objective could be differentiated for students in the earlier stages that may only be able to write one or two sentences for each of the three instruments.

The oral outcome is less emphasized in order to reduce stress and anxiety for the ELL students. The movie Fantasia contains no dialogue, only music and visuals, which will be comforting for all of the ELL students. Before the movie begins the teacher will tell the students that they will be having a one minute discussion after the movie which will allow for all of the students to think about what they want to say while they watch. The flexibility of this assignment will also allow the ELL students to use vocabulary that they are most comfortable with and work in groups where they know the students.

The auditory component of this lesson will be a great resource for all of the students especially those in the silent period stage, because no talking, and very little comprehension is required. The teacher will play a song and the student will have pictures of 5 instruments. As the instruments appear in the song the student will place that picture up on the board to form a

“timeline” of when the instruments are featured. This activity will be done in pairs and can either take place on the classroom board or the students can put their pictures on pieces of paper at their desk. This will also serve as a form of assessment for all of the students.

Instructional Strategies

One teaching strategy that truly supports ELL instruction is visual aids. The ability for a student to connect the words her or she is saying or reading with pictures is a very useful reinforce. Not only does it make the words easier to comprehend but it makes use of different learning styles that students who are native speakers will also benefit from. Visual aids can be used as a supplement for students in the upper level fluency stages of language acquisition or in the form of straight picture matching (no words) for student in the first stages. This strategy will be used in this guide in the form of pictures and in actual instruments that are manageable and accessible enough to use in a classroom.

The items that can be brought into the classroom will also serve as a form of total physical response. Tangible items allow students to actually see and touch what they have read about or described. This serves as an equal reinforcement to only hearing or seeing photos of an item. In this guide the teacher will bring in three instruments from the school’s music classroom: a keyboard, a violin, and a trumpet. The students will be encouraged to touch the items and experiment with their keys, buttons, and noises. If a student is from another country, or is native, they may have never had the opportunity to connect the sound an instrument makes to what it looks like, so this activity will provide a great schema for future education when the class discusses the history and uses of these instruments.

Total physical response also includes hitting all, or a majority, of the learning styles. For example, an activity would include visual cues, auditory components, kinesthetic portions, and verbal modules. The auditory objective from the previous section could be adjusted to include many of these pieces. The students’ schema would be built earlier in the lesson by watching the movie Fantasia and familiarizing the students with what 6 or 7 instruments sound and look like.

Then the students would work to recognize these specific instruments in a piece of music. Not only is this an educational lesson but it is also culturally significant because it exposes the class to various types of music, including classical which can often be left behind. The students will then listen to a piece of the music, which engages the auditory component. Then, using picture cards of instruments, the visual link, the students will cut out the pictures and walk up to the board and place the pictures on the board in the order that the instruments appear in the song.

When the students have to cut out the pictures and physically put them in order they will be engaging in the kinesthetic style.

Activities like these will ensure that all of the students in the class are engaged and when the activity requires more listening than talking it is easier for the ELL students to feel more comfortable in participating. One final strategy for a classroom teacher is to emphasis new material. If an ELL student knows that the material is new to everyone in the class then he or she may feel more comfortable asking questions or being confused. Students do not want to feel like outcasts and many of the students who do not speak the language fluently may already feel this way, so anything the teacher can do to level the playing field would be effective.

Strategies should not only emphasis a comfortable environment but they should also induce a love of learning and a desire to know more. The easier the teacher can make learning in the English language the more the students will love school and the more engrossed they will

7 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments become in the material. Strategies like using visual cues, including many of the learning styles, and relying on total physical response will make the classroom a more unique space to educate all of the students regardless of their backgrounds or barriers.

Work Samples

The instructional activity that would be most well modified and suited for a student in the silent period of language acquisition would be the “Picture-Sound Match” game outlined previously and in the auditory objective line. As previously stated students who are new to the language or are shy to try the language skills they have recently gained are most benefited when they have supplemental material to rely on, such as pictures. However, there are also other activities that can be modified for students in the silent period. One of those activities would be the writing prompt. This activity serves as reinforcement of the lesson and as a form of assessment for all of the students. It is also very beneficial for the teacher to see whether or not the ELL students have been grasping the rest of the lesson. For example, if a student in the silent period has been going through the lesson all day not reading or writing the teacher will have no idea whether or not the student has comprehended the material. Therefore he or she needs to modify the other class activities so that all students can participate.

The writing activity is designed as a wrap up activity where students can choose 3 instruments from any of the ones discussed and write a little summary in 3-4 sentences of what the instrument looks or sounds like. Next to this summary they will also draw a picture of the instrument. The native speakers in a fourth grade classroom should have no trouble writing 9 sentences and using descriptive words, but a student who is in the silent period may not yet have the vocabulary to develop these sentences. Therefore, there must be adjustments. For the students

8 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments in the silent period the teacher will allow them to choose their three instruments just like the rest of the class but instead of writing long summaries they will list 3 or 4 words that could be associated with the instrument. These words can be descriptions of the instrument’s appearance or emotions that they feel when they hear that type of music, anything. ELL students will be much more comfortable and experienced in writing a few adjectives and nouns versus having to focus on the grammatical aspects of whole sentences.

From there the ELL student will be encouraged, just like the rest of the class, to draw a picture of the instrument to reinforce what he or she has just described. ELL students may also find themselves wanting to relate these instruments to their own culture by maybe writing one or two words like “Dad plays” next to the picture of the piano. They could also describe memories next to their pictures which could provide partial insight for the teacher to use about the student’s culture or for future prompting questions to engage the student. There is a lot more flexibility on the part of the teacher when the ELL student is very shy and unable to communicate in the

English language because of all of the vocabulary restrictions. The teacher must encourage the

ELL student to write down anything that comes to mind when he or she thinks about a piano.

Any reading or writing that an ELL student does in the first two years is very crucial and can be very encouraging to get the student to continue to want to read and write in English.

In the following student examples this guide will demonstrate what a native student’s work would look like, what a student in the fourth stage of acquisition would look like, and then a student in the silent stage. For the purpose of this guide, the hand drawn pictures will be omitted.

Native Speaker:

Piano- The piano is one of my favorite instruments. It has black and white keys that all

make different noises and there are two pedals for your feet. You can play the piano fast

or slow, but I like it faster.

Violin- The violin is a really weird instrument that has a lot of long strings. You use a

bow to play the strings back and forth. You can take violin lessons at school and be in the

orcehstra.

Drums- The drums are the coolest and loudest. You play them with two drum sticks.

Drums come in big sets and you have to sit down to play them.

*The native speaker has done a nice job of describing each instruments look and sounds and has even incorporated some vocabulary and previous knowledge.

Partial Fluency ELL Student:

Guitar- The guitar has strings. You play with fingers or pick. Have to hold in arms.

Piano- Has black and white keys. Play with fingers. Sit on bench to play.

Trumpet- Can be loud or soft. Blow with your mouth to make noise. The trumpet is small

and gold.

*This student would probably be in the fourth stage of language acquisition. The grammar of the sentences is mostly correct even though the sentences are very short. The student has a good grasp on the instrument content though.

Silent Period ELL Student:

Violin- Is wood. Hands. Pretty.

Drums- Loud. Big. I want.

Trumpet- Yellow. Fingers. Different.

*It is evident that this student has a very limited vocabulary but is giving the best attempt at describing what he or she sees. Most of what the student writes is not complete sentences but just one or two words put together.

From the sample works above there are clear differences between the works of all of the students, but overall a teacher would be able to see that each of the students does have a partial grasp on the material. It is also possible that the ELL students know a great deal about a certain instrument but may not be able to express this due to the limited vocabulary. If the resources are available it might be best in this case to allow the silent period student to write a small description in his or her own language as long as someone is available to translate the work. This activity would be a perfect example of how one assignment can be easily modified to accommodate all students’ needs.

Annotated Bibliography

1. Campbell, Murray. (2004). Musical instruments : history,technology, and performance of instruments of western music / Murray Campbell, Clive Greated, and Arnold Myers. Oxford,

New York : Oxford University Press.

This book will provide educators with a resource to use to educate themselves. As an educator you need to be knowledgeable on what exactly you are teaching so that you can become a second resource for your students to ask questions and pursue further knowledge. This book categorizes various instruments into their musical families and includes photos to compliment the descriptions of every instrument. This is a book that would be too advanced to directly hand to a fourth grade class, but it would be a great tool for a teacher and the photos would also be useful and fun for students to flip through and explore.

2. Diamant-Cohen, B., Prendergast, T., Estrovitz, C., Banks, C., & Van der Veen, K.

(2012). We Play Here! Children & Libraries: The Journal of the Association for Library Service to Children, 10(1), 3-52.

This article is not as relative to my topic but is a very interesting read for anyone who has a passion for children’s literature and libraries. This article goes into detail about how libraries can include more ‘play’ time for children and what should now be included in this time. What caught my eye was when the author suggested that musical instruments should be incorporated into this new play program. It is wonderful to see articles like these encouraging public libraries to go

12 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments forward and push music especially now that many schools have cut music programs. This is another reason for educators to push lessons on musical instruments. Many ELL students would likely feel very overwhelmed in libraries that contain shelves of books with big words that they cannot yet pronounce or understand, but if libraries had musical instruments then that would be a safe haven for a child in the process of learning English.

3. Engh, D. (2013). Why Use Music in English Language Learning? A Survey of the

Literature. English Language Teaching, 6(2), 113-127.

This article places more of an emphasis on the history of using music in an education setting to assist second language learners. I find this to be an interesting and useful topic. From the 1950s-

1970s music was used in ELL rooms to relieve boredom from repetitive drills! The history of musical instruments and music education would be an interesting lesson to students in the higher primary grades and would allow them to relate to the students in the 20th century and see how they used music to learn. The other great point that this article brings up is that music evokes a sense of community among students/musicians. As an educator you could give each student a simple, homemade instrument and they could come together to make a song, with no lyrics. This would allow ELL students to participate without fear of language barriers.

4. Paquette, K., & Rieg, S. (2008). Using Music to Support the Literacy Development of

Young English Language Learners. Early Childhood Education Journal, 36(3), 227-232.

This article is more descriptive in telling the reader about how he or she can use music and lyrics to aid in students’ fluency development. The author encourages music to be integrated into daily lessons, which is something that could be very useful for ELL students. Rhythm could be used to teach syllables in words or spelling by using instruments. The students will also benefit from

13 A Classroom Introduction to Music and Instruments listening to various orchestral pieces and developing an ear for identifying specific musical instruments which will help them pay closer attention when listening to dialogue and having to identify specific syllables, letters, and pronunciations. Music allows the educator to teach a similar principle but with variety.

Additional Resources:

5. "Instrument Families." Classics for Kids. Cincinnati Public Radio, 2013. Web. 23 Nov. 2013.

6. Thiel, David. "Fantasia: The Film." IMDb. n.d. Web. 23 Nov. 2013.

7. "Words Used to Describe Music or Musical Instruments." Macmillan Dictionary. n.d. Web. 23

Nov. 2013

Summary

When I considered my perfect class in the past I never thought about diversity or students who may need additional help, or those who did not even know where to begin. Now, I see that a class with diversity can add so much. Students from other countries who have been immersed in other cultures have so much to add to a classroom and so many experiences to share. As a future educator I understand it is my responsibility to adapt my lessons and ideas to those of my students and to ensure that they are comfortable and growing continuously. Not all students learn the same, but not all students have the same experience as others. Accommodations must be made for those who simply have not been engaged in the English language long enough.

As a future educator I know consider what adjustments I can make when writing a lesson plan and I consider who I would change things for a student whose English language was limited. The power of flexibility goes unchallenged in the world of teaching because you simply never know who will walk into your classroom and what strengths and weaknesses they will possess. As a teacher it is your job to find those strengths and play off of them to boost self- esteem, but it is also crucial to find those weaknesses and build them up. No child will get left behind in my classroom. Of course they will not all be at the same level, but that does not mean that I won’t try. I make it my mission to challenge and engage every one of my students so that they might find a love of learning and success in their own worlds.