Music Signs and Bulletin Boards

MUSICAL ALPHABET

I enjoy using items that relate to the core curriculum, so when I stumbled upon this alphabet of music terms, I just HAD to use it! Even though I am on a cart, I colored and laminated each page and I tape one to my cart every week. I decided to take a page from the Sesame Street book and I find 5 minutes in my lesson to say, "This week is brought to you by the letter ___!" Then, I ask for students' prior knowledge on the music term on this letter and I provide a second visual or audio example.

To get the Musical Alphabet Signs, CLICK HERE!

FAMILIES OF THE ORCHESTRA

I found these posters at the local teacher supply store in my first year of teaching and I LOVE THEM! I use these posters with all grade levels as an introduction to the families of the orchestra and the instruments in them. The kids can relate to the instruments in families by the way their sound is created and the fact that they all live in the same "house". This poster set even comes with a poster of the entire orchestra in their seats and a "neighborhood" with all of the families and their houses!

To buy these posters, CLICK HERE!

RECORDER KARATE STUDENT WALL

During my student teaching, my cooperating teacher introduced me to Recorder Karate (you can learn about and buy this system HERE), which I fell in love with and have used for the past few years! My cooperating teacher created her own student progress wall by hanging a thick ribbon on the board, one for each level (white, yellow, orange, ect) and writing each student's names on a clothes pin. She would then let the students clip their name to the highest level belt that they have earned. When I started teaching in my school, I had too many kids for the ribbons to stay on the wall with the weight of all the clothes pins. So I went to Hobby Lobby (conveniently located one block from my school) and got a pack of paper plates for each color ($1.00 for pack of 50 plates). I have one color for every class so it takes up a lot of the wall. 

(pic of recorder wall)

Instead of writing names on clothes pins, I copied the image of the girl and boy recorder players and write the name of the student on that and scotch tape it to the clothes pin, so I can reuse them year after year!

MUSIC NATIONAL STANDARDS!!

I have seen this idea on almost every music teacher website and Pinterest board for the past year or so! As soon as I have a classroom, this is one of the first bulletin boards I am going to put up! There are free printables of all the scoops HERE and you could always cut and print your own scoops to go on the dish. I am also planning on creating a cherry with the name of my school on it (to show the WE are the "cherry on top")!

Favorite Music Websites!!!

I put together a list of my favorite websites to use in my classes and for lesson planning!!!
Enjoy!!! 

Freddie the Frog

This website matches the ever popular Freddie the Frog books. It includes note-naming games that can be used for whole class play on a Smart Board or for individual use at a computer workstation!

Dallas Symphony Orchestra Kids

 This website is brought to you by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and is one of the best resources by any orchestra organization. I like to keep this link on my school website for my kids to explore while they are at home. There are games and activities to help kids with note naming, composer information and music symbol recognition. There are great listening examples of every instrument, every time period, and most composers!!!

Classics for Kids

Musical education for kids should ideally start with a base in the classics. This site could be a jumping point. If you are in the US, you can tune into the radio show or listen to them on the website. But I guess kids will have more fun with the musical games like Compose Your Own Music or Be a Rockin’ Rhythm Master! The site has games, along with lesson plans and teaching aids, like a musical dictionary.

BBC Kids

You can always trust the BBC for some high quality learning help. BBC Orchestras and Singers is an online guide for teaching your kids about what an orchestra is all about. The learning aids are multimedia files supported by descriptions. Then there’s the superbly designed Maestro virtual orchestra game where your child can really get to know what it takes to be a part of an orchestra. Then the other game jumps you from the classics into creating a film score.

Pattern Block Rock!

 

This online musical game seems simple at first but is in fact quite challenging. You have to combine your knowledge of geometric shapes and match it to musical notes and rhythms. Pattern blocks are basically shapes which you have to place and add up to a total of eight to replay the tunes.

Lesson Planbook Evolution!

This is the story of one new teacher's evolution through planbook formats...

When I first started teaching in Fall of 2010, I wrote all my lessons out by hand in a small (cheap) teacher lesson plan book. This was not ideal because there were not enough spaces for all of my classes and I had to write many things many times (times of classes, homeroom teacher's name, ect.) for every week... And to top it all off, I could not expand my lessons and show step by step because there was not enough room in the tiny boxes provided. But hey! I could see the whole week with just two pages open on the desk! (That seemed pretty cool to me!)

I also had, in a separate binder, all of my class lists. The opposite page for each class list was my "Rockstar" list and class star chart (behavior management strategies to be explained later...).  These were awesome to have on hand, but I did not like the idea of having two separate books with my teaching materials-- THAT I HAD TO MAKE SURE WERE BOTH ON MY CART.

CLICK HERE for my handwritten planbook from 2010-2011

When my second year of teaching started, I decided to DIGITALLY create my own lesson plan template to accommodate all 5 days and 22 homerooms. This worked well because I created the template using Microsoft Excel (which seemed to take me forever 'cause I'm picky...) and copied and pasted it onto new tabs at the bottom for each week. Unfortunately, I decided that it would be best if the ENTIRE week fit on ONE horizontal page, printed out from the computer weekly. Because I chose to fit everything on one page, I, again, was unable to expand my lessons in the planbook and I simply used a few key words for each lesson (sometimes hard to remember all the steps for the 45-minute lesson).

Of course, I needed my handy-dandy binder on my cart with me at all times, but I managed to put my weekly plans first before all the class lists. I also added clear sheet protectors to the binder to insert class lists and my "Rockstar" list and star chart on the opposite page. The sheet protectors allowed me to write the students name ON the sheet protector itself with wet-erase marker (used for overhead sheets). This was also perfect to make notes on the class list page about students' behavior, grade marks, ect.

CLICK HERE for my first digital planbook from 2011-2012

I have been thinking A LOT on how to improve my lesson plans for this year and I have come up with a better solution. I am going to label the days of the week on the left side and the class times along the top. Also, this new format is two pages and can be easily accessible in a binder. This allows for more space to expand the lesson to include national and state standards, lesson procedures, lesson materials, ect. needed for that particular lesson. I have found many advantages to having a digital planbook, and do not think I will EVER go back to writing everything out by hand!

CLICK HERE for my new digital planbook for 2012-2013

Please let me know what you think! I am always looking for new ideas and ways to improve!

Welcome and About Me!

Bassoon Ensemble (2006) That's me in the red!

Welcome to Ms. Smiley's Musical Madness! My name is Elizabeth Smiley and I am enjoying my third year of teaching general music to Kindergarten through 6th graders and beginning band and orchestra to 6th graders. I teach in Peoria, Illinois and I LOVE MY JOB, my students and (especially) my wonderful colleagues!

Marching Mizzou- Sousaphone section leader

I spent my college years at the University of Missouri playing in Marching Mizzou and the MU Bassoon Ensemble, all while developing my skills in elementary general music education. Like many college students, I considered switching my major quite a few times, and ultimately, found myself wanting to teach young students the joys of music!

As I continue in my professional development, my ultimate goal is complete collaboration with music teachers, sharing ideas and creating fabulous lesson plans and freebies!!!! I know, we all LOVE freebies! I create a lot of my own materials and I am always willing to share.

Enjoy this blog and collaborate with me!