Warm Up Zone - a new book for beginning and intermediate players

I am so excited about this warm-up book!  I've been needing a warm-up book to use with my year 2 players.  I tend to find myself repeating the same scales the same ways, only to find that my orchestra struggled to play in tune once the notes were all mixed up in the concert music. 

This warm up book is perfect for many skill levels. There are ways to differentiate each exercise so all students can succeed as they master scales, fingerings, intonation, bowing, time signatures, and key signatures from 2 sharps to 2 flats. 

Check out the many ways to utilize this book as your daily warm-up:

1.  Help students learn the scales by having them play ONLY the first note in each measure. You can have them hold the first note as a whole note, or have them play the rhythm of each measure on the scale pitch (first note). If you have students who struggle, you might allow them to play only the first note of each measure while the class plays the other notes.

2.  Divide the orchestra into 2 groups. You can group students a few different ways:

       -By section - violins in one group and viola, cello, bass in another.

       -By row - alternate rows for each group.

 

       -By stand partner - one person in group 1 and one person in group 2.

Once students are groups, assign various ways to practice the sequence:

       -Group 1 plays only the first note, group 2 plays as written

       -Group 1 plays measure 1 as written, then group 2 echos measure 1, etc.

       -Group 1 plays measure 1, group 2 measure 2, etc.

3. Add challenge and difficulty by asking students to practice the bowing suggestions. You might have more advanced students play challenging bowings while others play the sequence as written. When experimenting with bowing, you can experiment with starting down bow or up bow. Add bow lifts as desired.

4. There are rhythm variations to help students get the feel of the sequence in different time signatures. Once students have mastered the rhythms, you could have students create bowings for those variations. You could also use the rhythm variation stems for students to create a composition or develop improv skills by coming up with ideas as to what could come next. If students struggle because the rhythms stems do not show the entire variation, have them write it out. It’s great practice!

5. After each sequence, there is a challenge activity for students to create their own variation or experiment with technique. By completing the challenges, students develop their creativity, composition, and improv skills

149 pages total includes score and parts for violin, viola, and cello/bass. Each student book is 33 pages.  Purchase at TPT or my website!

 

The secret to note reading

 

To me, teaching note reading is a huge deal.  If students don't learn to read notes in my beginning orchestra class I know they were struggle at the next level and perhaps not be able to continue playing.  Some students get very creative in their avoidance of note reading.  They guess, watch the teachers fingers, watch their stand partner's fingers, or even get really good at memorizing and playing by ear.  To help my students to learn to really read the notes, I tell them the secret to reading notes.  It may sound simplistic...but it's a real strategy!  'YOU HAVE TO READ THE NOTES!'  That's the secret.  You can't try to get around it.  You keep your eyes on the notes and play without looking away.  There will be a temptation to stop when you make a mistake or look at your fingers.  You have to keep looking at the notes, follow along with the tempo, letting your brain tell what fingers should move.

Students need a LOT of note reading practice.  There is no way for a method book to provide enough practice excerpts.  I decided to create a resource which gradually increases in difficulty with a ton of examples for students to really practice reading notes. There are 15 levels and over 300 slides for students to really practice note reading mastery. 

This resource was made in google slides, so the download is EDITABLE!  That means there are so many ways to use this with your students.  Here are some ideas as listed in the slides:

It's organized so all students can read the notes on the same screen:

Purchase at TPT or OrchestraClassroom.com!

Revenge of the FIFTH (Sith)

 Themed lesson plans are so much fun!  I just put together one for May 5th - REVENGE OF THE FIFTH!  You can access and edit your own version HERE!  

Preview my version HERE.

Hope you enjoy!

The first steps to improving intonation

 

My students are doing so well with their concert music!  We have just over 2 weeks left of rehearsal and my final steps are cleaning up intonation in a few passages and adding emotion/dynamics.  I love hearing students fix intonation and hearing them sound better and better.  Even my classroom tech has been commenting about how amazing my students have been sounded. 

Here are my 'FIRST STEPS' to improving intonation.  There are so many strategies to work on intonation...there's no way I can share everything in one post.  But here's how I start and I feel these strategies make a huge difference!

I have purchased a class set of clip-on D'addario tuners (and a ton of extra batteries). There is one tuner clipped to every music stand and all of my students (even beginners) tune themselves.  If a student is struggling, they bring me their instrument and I help.  Let's face it...some instruments are much harder to tune than others.  

Since I teach full classes of beginners and year 2 students, I find myself reinforcing left hand placement a lot!  We all know how important this skill is for students to thrive on their instruments.  I was thinking the other day about how sloppy left hand placement actually make playing HARDER.  To help students understand this, I brought up my school district's 'DARE' program.   When students are in 5th grade, a police officer visits each classroom to talk about substance abuse and impairment.  Each student gets to try on 'Drunk Glasses' and attempt to complete basic skills.  There are some sample videos on YouTube you can use if you like.  

All of my students remember the experience of trying to walk with drunk glasses on...and they agreed that the glasses made it harder to complete basic tasks.  We then talked about habits in posture/hand placement that can make playing instruments more difficult.  As we went through warm-ups and concert music, students were very conscientious about playing with great position.

Sometimes I also use a tracker to help students remember to check their posture/hand placement throughout a rehearsal:

So often, students forget to listen to each other.  Give students a pitch to play in unison.  Ask them to balance the sound...if they can't hear their stand partner, play softer.  If they can't hear themselves, play louder.  Keep stretching their listening awareness by having them listen for other sections of the orchestra.  I am always amazed how quickly students can unify their pitch when they are asked to listen more.

Refining Intonation Rehearsal Activity

 

My students are to the point where they can play all of our concert music, but there are still a few spots which scary intonation.  We drill these areas almost every day, but sometimes students need the time/space to work through those areas more slowly and intentionally.  I like do make intonation activities to do in class.  I use google slides to make the worksheets (along with flat.io to add the notation).  I often change the rhythm from the concert music to mostly quarter notes for students to focus all of their attention on the fingering/intonation.

Here are some samples:

Piece:  Viking Ships of Old by Susan Day

Access a copy HERE!

Piece:  Furiant by Del Borgo

Access a copy HERE

Want to learn how to make your own intonation activities?  I can teach you!  Check it out!  

Free Templates

 

I posted some of my resent rehearsal assessments/activities on instagram (@orchestra.teacher.life) and a few people wanted an editable template.  I created them using Canva, so you would need an account there, but there are some templates for you!

MASTERY CHECKLIST

ORCHESTRA STARS - Rehearsal Game/Activity

Celebrate the Super Bowl football season with ORCHESTRA FOOTBALL rehearsal game

 

First of all, let me be clarify that the game play for Orchestra Football is not exactly like the game play of real football.  Truthfully, I don't even know all of the rules of actual football.  Like is a football-like game meant for orchestra rehearsal to increase effort and engagement for your students.  

In my beginning class, we are just starting to work on a piece with F and C naturals.  My students learned those notes at the beginning of the year, but we haven't spent much time on them since then.  The first part of this game reviews those notes.  The second part of the game gives the teacher discretion on what measures to choose for students for them to move forward in the game.

Play this game for free using THIS LINK!

Want to make changes?  You can, but you'll need a Canva professional account. If you have an account, you can make access the template HERE.

How I use Flat for Education in my orchestra classes

 

Get FLAT for EDUCATION accounts for you and your students HERE!

I love Flat for Education.  There are so many ways to use it as teacher!  I can't imagine not having it.  I've been purchasing student accounts for each one of my students every year for the past 3 years.  At first, I had students login occasionally to play around with notation, composition, or complete a rhythm assignment.  The more I use Flat, the more uses I find for my students.  This year when I announced to my students that I purchased them Flat accounts, they cheered and thanked me!  Flat has helped me inspire students to create, explore notation, enter composition contests, and practice more.  And student accounts are a great price...only $4 for an entire year.

How do I have time to use this in my beginning and year 2 classes?  Well, every Thursday, I use 20 minutes of class as 'FLEX TIME.'  That is when I pass out missing work to help students raise their grades and give some students extra help when needed.  Most students do not have missing assignments, so I want to give them worthwhile things to do during that 20 minutes.  It is the perfect time for students to use Flat....for creating. learning, OR practicing!

Here is how I have used Flat for Education with my students so far this year:

1. Have students explore music composition (and develop music notation/note reading skills) by experimenting with various instruments and sounds.

In my school district, we use Canvas and Flat.io integrates wonderfully with Canvas (and Google Classroom if you use that).  Students simply click on assignments I create in Canvas and it automatically connects to the accounts I purchased for them.

For their first assignment, I showed students a simple composition I wrote using Flat (where I used some Star Wars sound effects...it's one of the instrument choices!).  I demonstrated a few basics...like how to choose instruments and add notes to the score.  Then I turned students loose and let them explore and create without any strict composition rules.  This is how students were able to become familiar with the program.  It's quite intuitive, so even my beginners picked it up very quickly.  When I introduced this program to my beginners this year, they hadn't learned to read notes, yet.  That did not hold them back at all!  They explored how the staff worked...how to make notes higher and lower using the arrow keys.  They played around with various rhythms and they were able to listen to their creations to hear how changes in notes/rhythms/articulations symbols work.  They were SO proud of their compositions and wanted me to hear each one!  They wanted to create for an entire class period, so I let them.  ;)

Here's a sample from a student:

Students were so excited about their composition they wanted to do more!  Many have spent time on Flat home because they enjoy it so much.  I noticed many of their compositions were pretty random...with no real melodic elements.  So...that gave me an idea for our next assignment...

2.  Students were required to write a piece of music THEY could play on their instruments.  I gave them specific parameters for their compositions.  They had to write music for the instruments they play in my class.  They had to make their composition at least 8 measures.  They had to change the key signature to 2 sharps (I showed them how and helped them set up their score).  They had to begin and end their piece with the pitch D and could only use 4 rests total.  They had to only use quarter notes or half notes (rhythms they could play).

The result?  Students made melodies. They created something they could play right then on their instruments.  They put on headphones and played along.  If they couldn't play it fast enough, they adjusted the tempo.  What a way to have students work on notes and intonation!  Since my beginners don't really know notes, yet, I have taught them how to have Flat put the note names in the note heads.

Here's a sample of student work from this assignment:

3. Students put music into flat as a tool to learn notes and practice/play along

Since we did the previous assignments, some students have found melodies/songs they want to learn to play and put the notes into flat.  They change the note heads to include note names and they have been motivated to practice all sorts of music!

Some of my 'advanced' beginners have been learning a challenging version of Twinkle Twinkle.  Some of my new beginners put the notation of the advanced part into Flat to see the note names...and have learned the advanced part.  They adjust the tempo and play along.

My beginners are performing 2 pieces I wrote using Flat for our next concert:  Spooky Night and Tip Toe in the Dark.  I shared the scores with my students using Flat and they can view their part and play along with the recordings.  They love practicing that way...and it helps them practice maintaining a steady tempo.  Sometimes we play along with the audio in class, too!  My students have learned how to show just their own instrument in the score so they can focus on their own part.  Also, they can adjust the volume options to isolate their part as needed.

4. Students build triads and write a melody using notes from the triads.

A couple years ago, Christian Howes visited my program and had students work with 'chord stacks' to play variations of a familiar tune.  Students chose what notes to play by looking at the chord stacks.  This inspired me to create a composition activity for my year 2 players.  First, I made a simple chord progression (the same from Canon in D).  I used whole notes and built only the root of each chord.  I then taught students how to build triads (I called them snowmen at first..haha) on top of the root.  After they built the triads, I taught students how to add an instrument to their score and write a simple melody using only the notes from the triad.  My students were AMAZED that this worked to help them create music that sounded good!  Previously, they had explored writing music with Flat, but they had a hard time creating parts for more than one instrument that sounded harmonious.   Their compositions sounded awesome.  Several students came up to me after class and said, "Thank you SO much for teaching us triads!  I am so excited to write more music!"

Here's a sample of student work:

My school has a Reflections contests sponsored by the PTA (as many districts do across the country).  Students are allowed to submit a music composition.  These few lessons we did in class inspired students to enter that contest.  Many students are working on creating music to play with friends. They are thinking more about chords and harmonic structure. 

After these few assignments, students have a better understand of how the staff works.  I can keep teaching elements of composition and form to help them continue their learning of the language of music.

Get accounts for you and your students HERE!

Halloween inspired rehearsal game

 

I found this cool Halloween decoration for my home...and I've been looking at it thinking I'd like to use it in class one day for a rehearsal game...  I bought some eyeball bouncing balls from WalMart and I put one of each color (pink, blue, green, orange) in each caldron.  Students will pick a caldron, then choose an eyeball from a caldron.  The color on the eyeball dictates the challenge we will work on in class.

Here's the link:  SKELETON

Here's the link: EYEBALLS

You don't have to have a prop like that because I made the entire thing in Canva!  It's also customizable so you can change the text to work for the music and skills you are doing in your own classrooms.  Check it out! 

CLICK HERE to play my game (no Canva account required)

CLICK HERE for a template to make your own version (Canva account required)