Teaching when Half the Class is Missing
When students are out of class, it can be tricky to know how to plan lessons. How can we serve the students in the classroom while leaving space for the musicians who are absent?
If music class is fun - if it feels like child’s play - it’s okay to go back and play games again. You feel tired of these songs faster than students do - good to keep in mind they need more exposure to a song to internalize it than you do as a trained musician, and they have a full week break between hearing the song, and they probably have more of a week break.
You can repeat lessons.
Camp out and go deeper into a concept instead of skimming the surface of a concept.
This is the time for small group work if that’s feasible given your physical restrictions. This is a time for songs that align with books. This is the time for a review project. This is a time to make videos of kids teaching so you can watch it in the next class. These students teach the class next time.
With the same core lesson:
Warm Up:
Core Lesson:
Sing greetings using the melodic toneset and rhythmic set you’ve picked out
Extend:
Improvise question and answer with the toneset and rhythmic set (teacher vs class)
Students turn to a partner and improvise with the toneset. Switch partners as time allows.
High Concentration and Secondary Concentration
Core Lesson:
Sing and play game
Do the core learning activity
Extend:
Review the previous class by having students turn to their shoulder partner and discuss what they did last time
Review the previous class by having a few students come to the front and give the presentation lesson
More time playing instruments
Add a bordun or play a different bordun
Play the melody or a portion of the melody by ear
Play an ostinato on unpitched percussion
With pop music playing, echo four or eight-beat rhythms on unpitched percussion using the target rhythmic element
Melodic and rhythmic dictation
In graphic notation
In standard western notation
Using manipulatives
Song connections to picture books
Improvise and arrange:
Keep the same rhythm but create a new melody with a partner at a barred instrument
Create an ostinato using thematic words from the song
In a small group, create a new version of a passing game
Assign a different unpitched percussion instrument to each line of the song
Improvise a new ending or fill in missing measures
Change of Pace
Learn a new dance
Move to pop music
Students choose a known game from a list on the board. Use the second class choice as a closing activity
Closing
Students choose the closing song
Review
Review and explain to a shoulder partner
Review and video a student explaining the key concepts of the lesson to show next class or put on Seesaw
Program Advocacy and Quality Time
Seesaw videos for students to watch at home
Part of the informance preparation process, but also makes for a convenient advocacy piece and a review opportunity
Small class sizes are a blessing. When I was in early elementary school, one of my aunts would take all the cousins on individual dates. As someone whose love language is quality time, this was a huge win for me, especially because I’m from a big family and quality time with adults was pretty rare.
So what if this is quality time with a smaller group of students than we normally see?
