Why should students learn music?

Why should students learn music?  Students do not need to become musical geniuses to participate in a rewarding way in music. We have never had any society since recorded history where music was not an integral part. How can we learn language without music? When we speak we sing and use rhythm. Pitch is married to phonetics and its expression. It is linked to language and language learning and is itself a language. It is physical, yet it can be seen as abstract and mathematical, represented by symbols. Pitches or tones are real and measurable and when heard make pictures in the brain as tangible as geometric shapes or colors. We have over the last 5000 years found numerous ways of dividing the octave. In the western world we have settled on 12 notes but other cultures see many variations and possibilities. Mandarin Chinese could not be spoken without pitch, hence the term tonal language. Music is used in propaganda, religion, marketing and story telling. From the time of ancient Greece modes and songs have been outlawed because of their power. Music is everywhere. When a child learns how to sing and play music their language expands.

">

yodio

This is my yodio for ed. tech. I went to a conference on using technology to help children with disabilities. It was very educational as far as recognizing what the kids and the instructors have to face on a daily bases. I work with some kids who have disabilities but it is in the context of music which is very different from what they are experiencing in the classroom and in their daily lives. Most of the tools demonstrated were intended for children with "extreme" communication disabilities. It was remarkable to see the level of patients and thoughtfulness that was put into this tools. Technology I believe has given children with these disadvantages a huge assistance. Children who have no ability to communicate with their voices, or even the majority of their body can form complete sentences and ideas with these tools. It is remarkable and hopeful. One web sight worth checking out is intellitools this is for primary children and children with disabilities. Just google intellitools and it takes you straight to their web sight. Intellitools is mostly used for teaching and assessment. It is not used for communication only.

">yodio

Analyzing Student Data in a Spreadsheet

I had a lot of trouble getting the cells to highlight in the same way that you demonstrated on the tutorial. I do not understand why but it did not work the same way on my computer. I did two separate sheets and a chart. One with all the students and all the tests and the other with just tests 6-10 and the students who fill below the average.
Analyze (discuss) your final data and chart in terms of student growth, exceptions, and what you might do as a classroom instructor as a result of these scores?


The average score for all the students tests 6-10 was 191.92. There were 12 students who fell below this average. When graphing their testing trends it became clear that all the students showed some level of growth. 8 out the 12 had risen above the class average by test 10. The one exception to this was Katherine who, although by test 10 had improved, did not follow the over all class trend. There was an extreme drop for Katherine on test 8.

My Favorite Web2.0 tools.

web 2.0 is a large umbrella for many different interactive user generated content sites like blogs and social networking sites. This includes video and audio files that can be shared in a variety of creative ways.

screenr

This is an amazing tool. It recorders your computer screen in real time along with your voice or any audio over the materials you choose to present. You can stop and start as you go along. This would allow a teacher to put together an entire presentation in a much more convenient way. Since all the materials from power points, youtube videos, web images etc.. could be easily accessed and recorded as you went along.

4shared

4shared allows members to search the web for any video, audio, picture or book that they might want to download. If the member chooses then they can either download the file or stream it directly from the source without actually having to store it. I was given an account simply by using my email and a password and I have 10 gigs of storage space to download materials. It would be an excellent source for storing materials to reinforce lesson plans.

ED Tech 520: Google presentations

• Google presentations is an application built into gmail accounts that could be used to do presentations in a similar fashion as power point.
• How it might improve productivity in the classroom is similar to power point with the added feature of students being able to work in the editing of a project together from one or more computers at the same time.  
• I knew nothing about google presentations before working on this project.  It seemed very user friendly.
• I contributed with both the reflections and with the 3rd slide "How this tool could be used to improve productivity."

https://docs.google.com/present/edit?id=0Acw2IXF5LRPAZGNkOWQzeDlfNWY4azdkZnZj&hl=en

ED. Weekly Reflection: Rhee Reflective In Aftershock of D.C. Primary

Michelle Rhee, as chancellor of the D.C. school district, is credited with some of the improvements that have happened over the last 3 years in the D.C. area schools. However, even though there are clear improvements she is still considered a polarizing figure. In her reflection she noted that the way in which these improvements were communicated was poorly done. This was partly her own fault in spending to much energy talking about ineffective teachers and test scores, but also the media focus tended to exacerbate the conflicts. She said that "we weren't proactive enough about communication and thinking about how do we get out there and talk about the great things that are happening."
Rhee is unsure as to whether or not she will stay on as chancellor in the light of the results from the new mayoral elections.