by Dr. Missy Strong
A technique for Unit 3, Step 6 (Read – Rote) at a Distance
Some of my best ideas come to me spontaneously and are, to be honest, quite simple. This past week was my first teaching in person in over six months. I tried to make a simple lesson for my third-graders. I’m not yet pushing forward with CS, but wanted to do some review. I was just going to have them do some reading from the ActivBoard©️ but decided at the last minute that it would be possible to have them move around the room in order to bolster their success with the unit three rhythms.
At the last second, I decided to have them stand up, gallup around the room in scattered position, and when I stopped drumming, freeze and look up at the patterns on the board as they echoed me. This was all very basic, and since it was our first class back, I just did it at the Step 6 level so it was all by rote. It served a few different purposes, not the least of which was giving them an opportunity to move since they are not able to do that a lot during the school day.
With another class, I took them outside, and they enjoyed it even more because they had so much room to move without being worried about being close to each other. I even did it with my virtual classes, asking them first to have their Neat Buddy (small stuffed animal) “skip” on the table or desk in front of them, and then asking them to skip around the room, wherever they were, and then return and do several patterns in a row while that movement was still in their immediate muscle memory
I hope this will help give you a quick idea for the CS part of your lesson, or inspire you to do something more creative!
Dr. Missy Strong is a frequent clinician, author, podcaster, curriculum trainer and Past President of FAME. She teaches general and vocal music in Mount Laurel, NJ..