Stephanie Miller March 3, 2012 EDTC 645 Dr.

Blesh

Global Classroom Module Pre-Planning Proposal

Pre-Planning Proposal
Designer Subject Grade Level Summary Goals Through the use of a global network, fourth grade students will collaborate with a classroom in another country to discuss music that is central to their own history and culture. Through the use of a wiki, students will compare music terms and share traditional music as well as popular music in order to showcase the similarities and differences between cultures. Each classroom will also work to create an 8-measure rhythm composition. These compositions will be recorded independently and then later put together to create a collaborative 16measure piece of music. Background Clopper Mill Elementary School is part of Montgomery County Public Schools and is located in Germantown, Maryland. There are 449 students enrolled, approximately 70 of them are in fourth grade. CMES is a Title I school with 292 students eligible for free/reduced lunch. The following table shows the enrollment by race/ethnicity at Clopper Mill:
Enrollment by Race/Ethnicity: Asian/ Amer Ind/ Pacific Alaskan Islander Students 3 35

Stephanie Miller Music Grade 4

Black 176

Hispanic 183

White 52

(WebschoolPro, 2011) Time Frame The project will last nine (9) weeks with students attending music once a week for fifty (50) minutes. Each lesson will take four (4) weeks to fully complete in conjunction with the MCPS required music curriculum. The final week of the marking period will be an opportunity for students to discuss and reflect on what they have learned and present their collaborative compositions to the school or an invited group of audience members.

Proposed Topic and Rationale Music education includes the study of music in light of culture. Through the use of global networks such as Flat Classroom Project or TakingITGlobal students are able to collaborate with classrooms in other parts of the world to help take down the classroom walls and help students become global citizens. Many authors have penned articles that support the need for students to learn to use technology as a tool to increase productivity and creativity (Hawkins, n.d.). Schweisfurth quotes a Canadian Civics textbook calling the technologically connected world a global village (2006) where it is necessary for students to understand their own culture and respect the differing cultures around the world. It is also imperative that they are able to collaborate with their counterparts in other parts of the world because that is becoming a necessary skill. This project will give students an opportunity to work with a classroom in a different country to delve deeper into both their own musical culture as well as a differing culture. They can examine similarities and differences between those cultures which will allow them to utilize their own musical vocabulary. By collaborating on a composition students will be able to work in tandem with people in a different place to create a final product of which all can be proud. By asking students to share what they have learned with their own community, the hope is that other educators and students will become interested in utilizing a global network to enhance their own learning. As Hawkins says In order to more effectively prepare its youth to participate in this Networked World, greater commitments and willingness to share and adopt innovative solutions are needed from all aspects of society[]Schools should be transformed into active learning environments open to their communities (n.d.). Global Network Key Challenges 1) Time Challenge 1: MCPS has a very rigorous curriculum with predetermined summative assessments, this project will need to fit around said curriculum rather than replacing it. Ensure that the project is presented during the marking period where the standards are most similar to those being covered in the Global Network Module so that it is supplementing the topics already being covered. TakingITGlobal.org

Possible Solution:

Challenge 2:

Students will miss classes due to holidays and MSA standardized testing. Collaborate with classroom teachers across grade levels to rearrange the music schedule so that students will have consistent weekly music classes in order to ensure smooth interaction on our end with our collaborating classrooms. Select small groups to be responsible for a weekly post or invite classes affected by schedule issues to meet with me before school.

Possible Solution:

Possible Solution:

2) Experience with Technology Challenge 4: Students have limited interaction with technology and no/very little technology available to them at home.

Possible Solution: Collaborate with classroom teachers to help expose students to the wiki program. Possibly have the classroom teacher ask students to maintain a homeroom wiki for other information so they are utilizing it in more than one class. 3) Available Technology Challenge 5: There is only one desktop computer available in the music classroom and the computer lab is being used as a special while I am teaching my classes during the day.

Possible Solution: Divvy students into small groups and break up the assignment so they are each responsible for a manageable piece. Again collaborate with classroom teachers or media specialist to have students research any vocabulary or music history in their groups outside of music class. Then during music time groups can post information they have researched while their classmates are either editing their posts or working on activities related to the remainder of the pre-determined music curriculum.

Prior Knowledge In order to successfully complete this project, students will need to know how to research the topics they are assigned. They will also need a basic understanding of music vocabulary in order to discuss and describe music from their own culture(s) as well as music from the other country. An understanding of what culture is and what it means to respect other cultures is also necessary prior to beginning this project. In order to complete the composition aspect they will need to understand the composition process. In order to ensure my students meet the research requirement I can check with their homeroom teacher and the media specialist to see what projects they have worked on prior to this one. I can give a music vocabulary test to see if they are familiar with the terms necessary in order to discuss music. The lesson prior to the projects start should include an introduction to culture and discussion of respect. The guidance counselor could also help review this information with students outside of music class. Finally I could have them each practice composing a single measure and then collaborating with three of their peers in the classroom to create a 4-measure composition. If they were capable of successfully doing so, they would be ready for the composition aspect of the Global Network Module.

Standards and Key Concepts

Content Standards The activities in this module will effectively touch on all of the following standards over the course of a marking period. The highlighted objectives are those which will be assessed throughout the course of the unit. National Music Standards: 9. Understanding Music in Relation to History and Culture Maryland Music Standards (Grade 4): 2.0: Historical, Social and Cultural Context Indicator 1: Develop the ability to recognize music as a form of individual and cultural expression through experiencing music as both personal and societal expression. Objectives: 1. Describe how music reflects daily experience in Maryland

2. Listen to, perform and discuss how music is used to celebrate holidays in various world cultures 3. Listen to music examples from various world cultures and describe how rhythm is used 4. Identify and describe roles of musicians in Maryland 6. Compare ways in which creating and performing music bring satisfaction Indicator 2: Become acquainted with the roles of music in the lives of people. Objectives: 1. Listen to and discuss how selected works from standard music literature correspond to specific historical events 2. Perform authentic songs and dances from a variety of historical periods and world cultures, including some connected to general classroom studies 3. Listen to and describe musical examples that represent styles and traditions from historical periods and world cultures Indicator 4: Develop knowledge of a wide variety of styles and genres through the study of music history Objectives: 1. Listen to and identify music from various periods in music history, world cultures and written by exemplary composers 2. Identify specific musical instruments that are used in a variety of musical styles and genres throughout history 3.0: Creative Expression and Production Indicator 2: Develop the ability to compose and arrange music by experimenting with sound and the tools of composition. Objectives: 1. Create simple melodic patterns that show contrast: whole notes and whole rests, half notes and half rests, quarter notes and quarter rests, two eighth notes connected, tied notes (2 measures) (MSDE, 2008)

NETS-S Standards 1. Creativity and Innovation Students demonstrate creative thinking, construct knowledge, and develop innovative products and processes using technology. Students: a. Apply existing knowledge to generate new ideas, products or processes. b. Create original works as a means of personal or group expression. 2. Communication and Collaboration Students use digital media and environments to communicate and work collaborative, including at a distance, to support individual learning and contribute to the learning of others. Students: a. Interact, collaborate, and publish with peers, experts, or others employing a variety of digital environments and media. b. Communicate information and ideas effectively to multiple audiences using a variety of media and formats. c. Develop cultural understanding and global awareness by engaging with learners of other cultures. d. Contribute to project teams to produce original works or solve problems. 3. Research and Information Fluency Students apply digital tools to gather, evaluate, and use information. Students: b. Locate, organize, analyze, evaluate, synthesize, and ethically use information from a variety of sources and media.
c. Evaluate and select information sources. (ISTE, 2007) Global Theme

This lesson aligns with the global skill category Race and Ethnicity: Human Commonality and Diversity (American Forum for Global Education, 2000). Students are

celebrating diversity and avoiding stereotypes by learning about music from another culture. They are looking for similarities and differences between music in Germantown, Maryland and music from another country. Pre-Planning Steps The first thing that needs to happen is finding a global network that will support a project such as this. TakingITGlobal might be a good place to start since it has teachers from all over the world and supports numerous different projects. Once joining a global network, it is imperative to find a teacher who is a good communicator so that the plan for both classes can be determined and discussed. Email and Skype are good methods at getting in touch and talking about options for the project. Prior to starting the project it would be important to ensure that both teachers are aware of the goals of the project. There should also be some basic discussions of the cultures that are taking part in the project so that there is a basic idea of what may come up while teaching. A schedule should also be set for the duration of the module. Background information about the specific classroom that the CMES students will be connecting with is also important during this time period. Knowing how many students are in the class, how often the class meets, the time difference faced by the classrooms, and other basic information will be helpful in the planning of the unit. Technology Use Technologies that will be incorporated into this project include flip cams, wiki spaces, and a Webquest or elementary appropriate web-based or software research programs. Students will be helping to maintain a collaborative wiki with pages sharing musical vocabulary and musical examples. Students class compositions will be recorded utilizing flip cams and uploaded to the class wiki. Students at CMES will be researching musical examples and musical history in Maryland and the United States in order to have information to share with the other classroom. Students will get a chance to work with technology to share their creativity, research, and inform others about music and culture. Essential Questions 1. How is music used to celebrate holidays in the United States? What about holidays in the country with whom we are linked? 2. How do you create a musical composition? 3. How can you collaborate with other people to have a greater understanding of the world around you? 4. How can technology help you become a better global citizen?

Lesson Plans
Summary of Lesson Plan 1: Objective: Students will identify the music vocabulary that can be used to describe songs from three different periods in American History. Materials: YouTube videos/Audio recordings of a traditional American folksong, a song from the 50s and a popular song; vocabulary list; guiding questions worksheet (used to help organize thoughts about listening selections); pencils; clipboards; timer; textbook/songsheet for all songs. Activities: 1. Students enter the classroom with the folk song example playing as they find their seats. 2. When the song ends, ask students about the time period when they imagine the song was written and where they think it came from. Students will raise hands to share responses. Teacher keeps track of responses on the chalkboard/whiteboard/Interactive Whiteboard. 3. Have students use the typical method to determine who is responsible for getting supplies (Odd week girls pick up 2 of everything and deliver one to a boy/Even week boys pick up 2 of everything and deliver one to a girl). 4. Ask students to discuss the vocabulary terms in their own words. Which terms relate to the song they heard coming in? 5. Listen to the song again, singing along. Have students go through the guiding questions worksheet for the folksong, writing the class answers in the space provided. 6. Repeat process for 50s song, but have students break into randomly chosen small groups to fill in the answers on the guiding questions worksheet, then choose a speaker to share answers with the rest of the class. 7. Repeat the process for the popular song with students working individually to fill out the form and then share responses in their groups. 8. Have students save all of their papers in their Module folders to help them keep track of their ideas about future examples. 9. Written ticket out the door: What was a similarity or difference between the songs reviewed today?

10. Note: If mobile laptop cart is available, ask groups to divvy the answers to the guiding questions sheet for each song (recordings and/or videos previously posted by the teacher) and post them to the class wiki. Summary of Lesson Plan 2: Objective: Students will read and notate quarter notes, half notes, eighth notes, whole notes, and rests and tied notes and will make a short video sharing how each is performed. Materials: Flipcam, Posterboard, Markers Activities: 1. Have students enter the room and sit down, make sure all of the note and rest names are posted on the chalkboard/whiteboard/Interactive Whiteboard. 2. Ask individual students to come up and draw each of the notes/rests next to their names, and then how many beats each receives. 3. Divide students into groups of 4 and ask them to take 4 pieces of posterboard. The groups will select 4 random cards from a jar to determine which 4 notes they will be responsible for drawing, naming, explaining, and performing. 4. They will draw the aforementioned notes on the posterboard along with their names and their rhythmic values. 5. Once they have completed their posters, they will determine who is clapping or showing each rhythm for the video. 6. Each group will then take turns recording their rhythms as a lesson for others to watch. 7. Assessment: Did they draw, name, label the rhythmic value, and perform the individual rhythms correctly? Starting Activity: 1) Define Culture/Complete the Features of Culture handout (Coverdale World Wise Schools, n.d.) in small groups. 2) Discuss responses. See if there are students within the class who have differing answers from those chosen. 3) Review relevant 4th grade music vocabulary: tempo, form, rhythm, beat, dynamics, etc. 4) Listen to a piece of music from the culture with which the students will be interacting for the next marking period. 5) Discuss the music in light of the defined music vocabulary.

6) 7) 8) 9)

Play an American Folksong. Discuss the music in light of the defined music vocabulary. Compare and contrast the two songs. Explain the Global Networking Module, introducing the country and classroom with whom students will be interacting. 10) Take-Home Assignment: Have students look at Everyone Has a Culture. Everyone is Different worksheet with their families (Coverdale World Wise Schools, n.d.) Formative Assessment: Monitor student postings about music vocabulary to ensure they are defining terms correctly. Have student groups lead discussion about four examples of the musical selections to ensure they understand the music vocabulary. Verify students compositions are playable by the composer and their classmates.

Summative Assessment: Check students short rhythmic and melodic compositions to verify they are using the correct meter signature, the notes chosen fit into the measure and follow the criteria listed on the summative assessment rubric #1. Ask students to complete a music vocabulary description of musical selections posted to the class wiki and verify their answers follow the criteria listed on the summative assessment rubric #2. Have students present what they have learned to the school, their parents, and the community during a performance during or after school.

Description of Two Major Assignments: 1. Class Composition a. Students will independently write an original 2-measure composition using quarter notes, half notes, eighth notes, and rests. b. Students will break into groups and play through the compositions with names removed to keep critiques from being personal. c. Students will discuss what they liked and disliked in the compositions using music vocabulary (ex. This composition is not as interesting to play on the

d.

e.

f. g. h.

drum because it has three beats of rests in a row and drums are good for maintaining the steady beat.). Each group will edit four 2-measure compositions for content and then determine what order they should be played in to create the most complete sounding 8-measure music composition. The groups will then determine which classroom instruments would be optimal for their group compositions (ex. Half notes are better performed on instruments that ring so the sound continues for the two beats instead of sounding like a quarter note/quarter rest combination). The groups will perform their compositions for the class. The compositions will be layered so that there is a 6-instrument, 8-measure composition to be recorded and shared. Students will listen to and review their composition as a Music Critic utilizing music vocabulary. At that time other edits can be made to the music as necessary before the final product is recorded and posted to the wiki.

2. Class Wiki Clopper Mill Music Vocabulary and Music Selections a. Students will be broken into the same groups that they had for the composition project. b. Each group will be assigned 5 music vocabulary terms to define for the wiki. c. Each week a group will post their vocabulary to be shared with the collaborating class. The collaborating class will do the same. d. Each group will also be assigned a period in American history from which they need to locate music to be posted to the wiki. They will need to be able to explain why this song is the best choice to represent their period. e. On a different week from their vocabulary posting week, the group will post at least 1 and no more than 2 selections of music to be discussed. f. The group will also be responsible for leading a discussion in music about the songs they have chosen, focusing on the music vocabulary that is relevant to each. g. The class will agree on a description to post about the song(s) once our collaborating classroom posts their thoughts about each. h. Note: at the same time the collaborating classroom will be posting their music for discussion. These postings from both classrooms can include recordings of students in the class performing the songs if there are no recordings to be found online or in recordings. All postings should include citations regarding where recordings and songs were located in order to comply with NETS-S.

Differentiated Instruction:
Vision Impaired One of the fourth graders is blind; therefore reading music is not an option for him. He has an amazing ear for music, so the performance option is still there for him because he will be able to learn his part aurally. As far as writing the composition, he can be paired up with another student who has a good grasp of rhythm and can dictate his composition to them in order to have it notated for other students to read. Simultaneously this is a good opportunity for a student who is extremely successful at notation to improve their ear for rhythmic dictation. When it comes to postings, this student could still participate thanks to screen reading software and the ability to speak text into a word processing document if not directly onto the wiki. Students with IEPs Regarding Written Responses As students are writing the music, some students will need a paper with the beats prewritten in order to fill in the blanks rather than being handed a sheet of paper without the independent beats drawn. Similarly, if they have trouble organizing their thoughts, they could develop a podcast or audio recording of their thoughts about a particular piece of music as Music Reporters. Students with Limited Technology Use These students could work with myself or the media specialist outside of class time to participate in the technology-heavy aspects of the module. They can also use paper/pencil to prepare their thoughts so that they do not have to figure out what they are saying while they sit in front of the computer. This may keep them from getting frustrated with the technology or the writing since it is broken down into two independent processes.

American Forum for Global Education. (2000). Guidelines for global and international studies education. Retrieved from http://www.globaled.org/guidelines/whatstudy.html#eight Coverdale World Wise Schools. (n.d.). Building bridges. Retrieved from http://www.peacecorps.gov/wws/publications/bridges/pdf/BuildingBridges.pdf

ISTE. (2007). NETS student standards 2007. Retrieved from http://www.iste.org/standards/nets-for-students/nets-student-standards-2007.aspx MSDE. (2008). Using the state curriculum: music grade 4. Retrieved from http://mdk12.org/instruction/curriculum/music/standard1/grade4.html
NAFME. (2012). National standards for music education. Retrieved from http://www.menc.org/resources/view/national-standards-for-music-education WebschoolPro. (2011). Clopper Mill Elementary School. Retrieved from http://maryland.webschoolpro.com/clopper-mill-elementaryschool_MD031150100/school-characteristics.html