Twitter for Teachers!! :) #musedchat

Those who know me are largely unaware of my twitter obsession.  Until I ventured into the music education side of twitter over the weekend.  Oh how fun it was to scroll through people who are teaching music all over the countries, and be inspired all over again by some of the things they are doing, and sharing links about.

Imagine my surprise on Monday evening, just trying to find more people to follow, when I stumble upon a Music Education twitter chat!!  It was so cool to connect with other music teachers.
I received app recommendations for my playing assessments, and great ideas for storing the information  in an organized way. All because of the little #musedchat hashtag.  :)

It has been very fun!

On twitter I am @HiTechBandTeach, and I have made excellent connections with other music teachers. I have read incredible articles, learned of excellent projects for general music or band classes, and I have made the really big world just a little bit smaller.


This link is an excellent resource that explains how to use #hashtags, and has a comprehensive list of hashtag suggestions. There are so many different hashtags that people are using to connect with other educators.

But first-- is twitter overwhelming? Does the term "tweet" embarrass you? Let me try to demystify the whole scenario for you. Twitter 

Using Screen-cast-o-matic to make tutorials!

We have a really cool professional development sessions based around technology every month in our district.  Last month I signed up for a session on "Flipping the Classroom" which is essentially creating videos or other types of instruction for students to view individually, so that class time no longer needs to be used for things that can be done at home.

Using screen-cast-o-matic I was able to create two video tutorials for my students. It was awesome!

What is unique about Screen-cast-o-matic (dang, typing those hyphens is aggravating.) is that it can capture a video of you while also capturing what is going on your screen.


Here is a video that I made for my high school students, showing them a couple different apps that I wanted them to download and become comfortable with.





apps for music 1


Then, when I was preparing for a substitute for my 7th grade music class, I made a video explaining the basics about GarageBand.  On this video, I forgot to turn the video camera on, and actually made a second version with the camera.  It was scary.  So I kept the one without my face in the corner.  I think it was a good decision. :)



Garageband tutorial (7th grade music)

It was really fun, and I will definitely be doing more with this in the future!!

iPad for Playing Assessment

What an amazing week!

Last weekend-- Friday afternoon and Saturday all day -- I attended a class on assessment in the music classroom.  I came away so excited about everything that I had learned, with renewed enthusiasm and vigor for assessments and standards based teaching.

While talking with the other teachers at the class, I was inspired by some of the things they do with their classes.   Now that our high school is 1 to 1 with iPads, it was time to leverage this amazing technology!

Using the iTalk Recorder app (the free version), the students set the ipad up on their music stand, with the 40 measure selection we had determined to record beside it.  They started the recording, and we all played the section of the piece together, and then they emailed their recordings to me.

What a wealth of information!
I have a much greater picture of where we stand on this song because of this exercise.  Some of recordings were exactly as I expected, while others were such pleasant surprises.  I was able to send students meaningful feedback that without time for small group lessons has otherwise been missing.

We will be doing this frequently!

iPad apps for Music Instruction

To say that I was thrilled to be receiving an iPad to use for school would definitely be an understatement. I received the device last week, and have been studiously researching (playing) apps and methods to use in the classroom.

Here are some things that I have been using daily in class (or out):

Safari - the default web browser is PERFECTLY set up for my needs when I am checking in the students weekly blog posts. I use another browser for my personal web browsing, but for class, Safari works great.

Blogger- This is the google issued blog writing app for the iOS platform. It is barebones, but functional.

Blogsy - a $4.99 blogging app that allows for much more creativity in posts -- bold, italic, colored text, strikethrough, etc. Not necessary for general use, but fun for me.

first-class- The app is so helpful for communication! I love it!

HT Recorder -- this app is AMAZING. And free! (Although I couldn't find the FREE app when I was searching for the link. Very strange.)  I record the band playing songs, and then when I work with the small group that was not able to fit it in the schedule, they can play along with the recording! Also useful for interpretation and analysis - did we achieve the musical style goals we had set?

ProTuner - another free app that is incredibly useful for a musician. It is a tuner! We used to spend $30 - 40 on a quality tuner, and now they are available as free apps. Unbelievable!

Tap Metronome - another incredible free app that replaces devices that would range in cost from $10 - 25. This app helps set the tempo (speed) that you wish to play, in a variety of different ways. Very useful for any musician.

There you have it- a basic list of the ways that I am using the iPad already in classes, and the apps that I use. I will go back and edit with links to the apps, if I can, and I will update the blog as I find more noteworthy apps to use.

Again - this blog post created using the Blogger app, but edited at the website on my MacBook.

Using blogs in the high school band setting

This summer I discovered something that really changed the way that I used my time, and allowed me to accomplish goals that I had set for myself. It is called the "3 in 30 Method."

Since it was so great for me on a personal level, I began to think about how useful it might be to high school students to help them with goal setting, and goal achieving.

I kept thinking about how we could make this work. I called a friend on staff at the high school (initials L.H.) that I knew already used blogs with her students, and I picked her brain about how she managed them in her classes.

Then I lined up the help of some of the tech savvy higher ups and we got all 33 students set up with their own blogs on blogger. We ran in to some interesting problems on the way, but persevered, and now all of the student blogs are up and running, using this "3 in 30" program that I mentioned.

The technology piece is exciting, but the real value of the assignment is watching the students take ownership of their musicianship. It is an exciting thing to watch! :)

Because we are now using the internet as a large part of the expectations in the class, even though we rarely use CLASS TIME to complete the assignments, the integration of 1 to 1 technology could NOT be coming at a better time. I was thrilled to learn that second semester, all of the students will have an internet ready device available to them.