middle school

The Brain on Music

July 30, 2016 by Dale Duncan Leave a Comment

I’ve taught choral music to public school middle school children since 1989.

In the early years, I couldn’t figure out how to teach my young beginners how to take the notes and symbols off of the page and sing with accurate pitch and rhythm.

One day at a time…

One failure at a time…

Deliberately…

I figured out ways to awaken the brains of my beginners.

I saw it in their eyes.

I will see it in their eyes again as I begin to help my own 342 beginners that I will teach on August 8th in the Atlanta Area Public School when the new school year begins.

So, when I felt my own father disappearing, I knew.

My two siblings and I decided to get him an iPhone for Christmas in 2013. During the winter of 2014, I worked with him to help him learn to use his new phone.

I repeated the same things over and over, and he couldn’t remember.

It soon became clear to me that his brain was going to sleep.

Time passed.

He came to visit in the spring of 2015 to see my middle school children do their spring musical revue.

I felt him disappearing even more, and I became sadder.

Three months later, I mentioned my observations to my two older siblings. It was at that time that our journey together began as we worked to see if the world of medicine could confirm what was happening to our father.

It’s July 2016, and they are still working on an official diagnosis.

…but those of us who are close to our father are clear that his brain has changed.

They can call it Dementia…Frontal Lobe Dementia…Alzheimers….or whatever the latest diagnosis/buzz word is when the brain atrophies and stops functioning as it once did…

…but those of us who are close to him already know.

I watched “I’ll be Me” recently. It’s Glen Campbell’s honest and open documentary of his journey through Alzheimers…one of the many diseases of the brain that people face as they age.

I came away from watching the movie more steadfast in my observation that music awakens.

I’ve known that since I started singing as a child.

It keeps us awake, and it was apparent in this beautiful film about the legendary pop culture figure.

I am not a doctor. I am not a PhD. I don’t research.

Yet I do…each and every day when I face my eager beginners.

When I started teaching, I wanted my young beginners to understand how to take those dots off the page and turn them into music, and I knew it would take kinesthetic, aural and visual means so that is the way I taught them regardless of their background and intellectual ability as assessed by standardized tests.

I research daily as I watch the brains of my young students awaken when I help them take those symbols off of the page and sing correct pitch and rhythm without the one-on-one training that the children who are from the most affluent families can afford.

My own personal belief is that Glen Campbell kept singing and remembering his music despite the atrophy of his brain because he loved it and because he wanted to remember.

…All the rest? He forgot.

And now, as my father’s brain is going to sleep…

I will use the skills I’ve learned with my middle school beginners as I’ve tried to awaken their brains to help my own father keep his own brain awake because, selfishly, I want him here with me as long as I can have him.

Until then, I will go into my classroom and work to awaken the brains of my young singers.

So…You’re replacing a legendary choral director…

July 23, 2016 by Dale Duncan 1 Comment

If you are about to face a group of middle school or high school chorus students in the upcoming school year who have been taught by a teacher they absolutely adored, you may be feeling like you’ve just been hired to replace

Robert Shaw…iconic 20th Century Choral Conductor!

It is so scary.

Can you imagine replacing Robert Shaw?!?

In my very first job, I was hired to replace a beloved teacher, and I remember a student saying out loud in class one day while I was teaching (bombing)… “You need to call Ms. Yokley up and ask her how to do this.”

Ok…In that single moment, after having just completed 6 straight years of higher education, including obtaining a Master’s degree in Music, I knew lots about theory, music history and art song, but I had no idea how to actually teach middle school children, and I’ve just replaced a legend.

Whether it is your first year or your twenty-first year teaching, it is hard to replace a legend.

In this post, I want to share what I learned during the two times I replaced legends in the choral classroom.

Here they are:

1) If possible, form a relationship with the teacher you are replacing.

Schedule a meeting with the teacher before you take over the program. Ask questions about the program, the children, the administration, the counselors, the parents and anything else that you can think of to ask.

Ask the teacher if it is ok to be in touch during the school year to ask more questions via text, email or phone call. You are likely to have many questions once the year gets going that you could not have anticipated, so having continued contact with the teacher you replaced is very helpful.

The children often find out that you and the former teacher have been in touch, and that can really help. It means that you value what went on before you came, and that is very important in terms of helping them accept you in this new position.

2) Either formally or informally, as early in the year as possible, sit down with key upperclassmen to ask questions about what they’ve enjoyed about their time in chorus under the previous leadership.

Listen. Learn.

Taking the time to learn about their experiences goes a long way toward building relationships that will help you as you move through the year.

I’ve learned so much from the two legends that I replaced. By following suggestions #1 and #2. I learned new ways to do things, new songs to teach, new classroom management ideas and so much more.

3) Repeat #2 with key parents.

Parents are the backbone of my program. I couldn’t teach my 342 children without their support. Show that you value them by taking the time to create channels of communication. I reach out to them early in the year via email and using Remind.com to share what is going on in our classroom.

I take the time to learn what their areas of expertise are, and I put the willing volunteers to use. From helping with my spring musical to organizing and maintaining my chorus folders and choral library, parents save me enormous amounts of time that allows me to give more time to what I was hired to do: teach.

Building relationships with the parents will help you in your classroom, and it will help build trust as you make the transition as the new teacher in this legendary program.

4) Respect tradition.

Some of the traditions the community has may seem completely silly to you, but in your first year there, respect as many of those traditions as you can while being true to yourself and your own future vision for the program. It can be quite a delicate balancing act. Eventually, you will create your own traditions, but if you walk in and refuse to honor the most important ones, you will lose support.

5) Be humble and don’t take anything personally.

You are going to meet resistance because you are not

Mr. or Ms. _________. You can’t change it, so just accept it during that first year.

Your rehearsal techniques will not be the same. They may rebel against your new ideas. Don’t take it personally.

6) The students in the lowest grade level you teach are yours.

They have no experience with the previous teacher. While some of them may have had siblings who were taught by the previous teacher, essentially, they are yours. Word of mouth is not the same as true experience. So, if you who that you care about the students, and your teaching skills are solid, their daily positive experience in your room will soon wipe away what they are hearing from their older siblings. The youngest students who never had the previous teacher are more pliable. You can treat them as yours from day 1. Enjoy your time with them because, at times, you will be very frustrated with the older children who question you, your techniques and your vision.

7) Believe in yourself and in your long-term goals for the program.

With each year that passes, the program becomes yours.

When you are replacing a legend within a school community, it is going to be difficult, and there is no way around it. Parents, and even faculty and administration may also challenge your ideas. You may lose some students. You may get phone calls.

It is going to take time. Be patient. You will build your own legacy in time.

The second time I replaced a legend, I had been teaching for a long time, so it was quite difficult for me when I met resistance. Each time, I took a deep breath, and I listened with respect. I asked questions. I made sure that I did not reveal what I was thinking…(i.e…..”I know what I’m doing!!! I’ve taught for XX years…Just let me do it!”).

…And in doing so, I was able to slowly gain the support of the people with the biggest concerns.

Your new school community members don’t care what you’ve done before. It means very little to them in their daily experience with you as their current teacher. Mostly, they care about what you are doing now.

Remember: They just want the program to be great! We should be thrilled they care enough to speak up!

Hope that helps some of you who are facing what feels daunting at the moment!

Hang in there!

Dale Duncan

Creator of the S-Cubed Middle School Sight Singing Program for Beginners

Click here to hear my students at adjudication.

Check out my blog!

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 5

July 17, 2016 by Dale Duncan 2 Comments

This is the 5th and final posting in the five-part series called “Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing?”

To start with the first reason, click here!

Reason #5:

We don’t know how to introduce music.

It is possible to turn this age group against a new piece of music in the three minutes of introducing it to them for the first time.

I struggled for years with finding good ways to introduce a new piece in a way that would peak their interest and excite them to want to dig into the song and make it great.

During my first years in the classroom, I kept hearing the voices of my college professors in my head: “Don’t teach by rote! Make them literate!”

I couldn’t figure out the balance of teaching “by rote” and teaching literacy when I was introducing a new song to beginners.

Ultimately, the guiding force for me became the energy in the room.

Like comedians in a comedy club, we can tell when we are bombing. Kids this age are transparent, and it is not easy for them to hide how they feel when we are failing while we teach.

If you feel boredom and frustration from your students when you teach a new song, it’s probably time to try a new approach to the introduction of your new music.

In the early days of my career, when I introduced a new song to my students, my teaching process was way too slow. I constantly demanded that they figure things out on their own yet I had not systematically taught them the tools they needed to do it. I failed to see that there were ways to teach new music that were much quicker and more fun and included developing their ears using techniques that some might call “teaching by rote”.

I was teaching sight singing regularly to my students, but I failed to realize how long it takes for their sight singing abilities to catch up to their ability to sing a song that may be quite difficult.

My students just wanted to sing, and all I was doing was stopping to talk, or to complain about how they missed something in the music or explain things they simply were not ready or interested in learning yet. I tried to teach everything about the application of sight singing techniques at once as they learned a new piece, and as a result, they were actually learning very little about sight singing.

..and I talked…and talked…and talked.

I finally asked myself, “What exactly is ‘teaching by rote’? And who defines it? And how can I actually USE “rote teaching” to give me opportunities to vary my teaching techniques while helping them become better musicians as they learn to use their ears better and learn to recognize form?

I had to let go of some of those voices in my head from my college professors. I had to focus on finding ways to help my beginning students enjoy the process of learning a new song.

If they journey isn’t an enjoyable and rewarding one, programs shrink.

Most of my students had never taken a private piano lesson, so I had to work to find ways to keep them engaged during the learning of a new piece while instilling, unveiling and building the important skill sets they needed for sight singing. Literacy is key to their continued growth and involvement as choral music singers, but finding the proper balance wasn’t easy for me.

Now, I take about 10-15 minutes per day to focus specifically on theory and sight singing, and I use the rest of the time while I am teaching repertoire using rote techniques mixed with literacy teaching. If there is an opportunity to connect some dots from the sight singing lesson of that day, I do it.

I started allowing my beginners to listen to recordings on the first day of learning a new piece, and I turned it into a fun form exercise to help them develop their ears. When working on form with my beginners, however, I learned that I needed to avoid turning it into a sophomore college theory class exercise that uses terms like “ABA” form etc. When I tried that, the eyes of my beginners glazed over. Instead, I worked to find ways to teach form that were engaging for beginners in this age group.

Here is a form exercise I often do with my beginners:

While they are listening to a piece of music for the first time, I ask them to draw pictures to represent new musical ideas when they hear them. I encourage them to be as crazy and creative with their pictures as they want as long as they indicate the shape and form of the song. If the chorus happens twice, but the second chorus has a different ending than the first, for example, their pictures should indicate the difference. If they drew a smiley face for the first chorus, then they might draw a smiley face and add hair to the drawing when they hear the chorus that has a slightly different ending.

It is hilarious to see some of the drawings that they create. When I call them up to share their drawings on the Smart Board in front of the class, there is lots of laughter! The best part is that they get to listen to the song multiple times while they are creating the pictures. We can teach many good listening skills during an exercise like this one when we teach them to listen to the smallest differences in various phrases and to indicate those differences in their pictures.

Creating excitement over a new piece of music is critical. If the students “check out” on a piece because we’ve introduced it poorly, it’s really difficult to get them to give the song a chance. The last thing we can be with our middle school students is boring. It’s a nail in the coffin of our programs. We must be open to varied teaching techniques, and we must constantly work to find ways to help them stay engaged and excited as we ease them into the learning of a new song.

Check out my blog!

Dale Duncan is the creator of the S-Cubed Middle School Sight Singing Program for Beginners

Click here to see what people are saying about S-Cubed!

Click here to go to my YouTube Channel with free teaching tips and ideas.

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 4

July 9, 2016 by Dale Duncan 2 Comments

This is part 4 of the series “Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing?”

Click here to see the first post in the series!

Reason #4:

We focus too much on technique and not enough on developing their true artistry.

In my 24 years of teaching this age group, I’ve seen lots of middle school choirs who sing proficiently. By that, I mean, it is evident the teacher taught diction, phrasing, dynamics, etc.

…the basics.

Most of us spend a lot of time on the technical side of music because our middle school beginners NEED it!

However, we can suck the oxygen out of our singers if we relentlessly seek technical perfection.

Working toward it nonstop can become boring to them really quickly.

Why do people love watching Cirque de Soleil?

It’s not just the incredible athleticism that is displayed which took countless hours of training and technical work to develop. It’s the unforgettable way our spirits are moved when the athleticism is combined so beautifully with music and lighting and costuming.

If we want athleticism alone, we can simply watch track and field or men’s gymnastics.

In our middle school classrooms, we have to inject more “Cirque de Soleil”.

When I watch the choirs of teachers who have focused entirely on technique, it feels like eating cake that has no butter and sugar.

To quote the famous movie “Sixth Sense”… When I see and hear a technically proficient performance in which it is clear the students are well trained but have no idea about what they are singing, “I see dead people.”

I feel nothing.

The performance is utterly unmoving.

That is not what music is.

Teachers often ask, “How do I get them to who facial expression? Raise their eyebrows? Smile?”

My answer: From the inside out.

Here is how you DON’T do it.

Don’t say “Raise your eyebrows! Smile! Sing with facial expression”. With this age group, it doesn’t work.

Regardless of the obscurity of the meaning of the song and how it seems to have absolutely no meaning to them in their young lives, we must find a way to help them emotionally connect to a song. Just talking about the meaning of the song or giving historical context will NOT do it.

We have to be willing to make them think. We have to help them connect the dots to their own lives in some way.

As part of our teaching priorities, we have to indicate to our singers the importance of singing honestly and serving the music.

I tell my own students that, as choir singers, they are also actors. Actors must put their personal stuff aside and act the part.

Then, we, the teachers, must guide them through the treasure trove of their life experiences to find a meaning that they can sing for that particular song. Believe it or not, they notice the fact that WE value their own life experiences enough to ask them to inject them and use them as they sing because, so often in their young lives, their pain and their life experiences are dismissed.

When I’m teaching “Sleigh Bells”, and they are singing with absolutely no energy at all because it is a Wednesday and not a Friday and they are hating school and their boyfriends just broke up with them and they have two projects due….blah, blah, blah…I stop the music, and I say: “Do you like snow days?” They usually scream “YES!” Then, I say, “Pretend that you just found out tomorrow is a snow day and then sing it!”

It changes everything.

When I am able to successfully take them to some sort of internal emotional moment to which they can relate for a particular song, everything changes. Many of the technical issues we’ve labored over correct themselves. They breathe bigger. They sing with truth. Their faces come to life. Their tone has energy.

The results must come from inside their hearts. When you are able to help them find it and deliver it in a performance, the energy of the audience is palpable as they receive this truly artistic moment.

…you will get goose bumps…

…and so will your students.

Sharing a “goose bump moment” has major positive impacts on your program. It’s worth the work to help them get to that emotional place in rehearsal and then to deliver it in performance.

Honestly…I enjoy that part the most!

Click here to go to my YouTube Channel and see “To Do’s and NOT to Do’s of Middle School Chorus!”

To learn more about Mr D’s S-Cubed Middle School Sight Singing Program, click here!
Click here to purchase the S-Cubed Middle School Sight Singing Bundle.

Dale

Check out my blog!

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 3

July 2, 2016 by Dale Duncan Leave a Comment

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing? Part 3

This is the third post in a five-part series from “In the Middle With Mr D” called “Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing?”

Link to Reason #1 of “Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing?”

Here is Reason #3

We don’t publicly celebrate and recognize the positive things our students are doing.

All it takes is a couple of seconds to acknowledge our singers. They just want to be noticed, and when you do notice them, all of the children around them work harder so they, too, might be recognized.

1) “I love your posture Charley. Everyone turn to page 3, measure 24.”

2) “Sara! Your mouth position on that ‘ah’ vowel is nice and tall! Everyone, pull out the next song on the repertoire list for today.”

3) “Row three sopranos, you are creating overtones back there! It’s stunning! Everyone go back to measure 12 and sing it staccato to correct the rhythm.”

It’s not about playing favorites. It’s about quick, positive acknowledgement that lets the kids know that you notice how hard they are working.

The minute I make comments like these to my students, the children I acknowledge feel great, and they kids around them start working on the item I’ve just acknowledged in their peer.

It must be quick and clear. We must make sure every student hears it. We must keep the lesson moving.

Fewer words = More effective results.

That rule applies whether we are praising or correcting our middle school students. Nothing sucks the life force out of a middle school classroom and makes our students want to sing LESS than a long “lecture” and/or negative feedback on what the children should be doing.

“2nd period was able to master this content in 10 minutes. Why is it taking you 20 minutes?”

The students don’t care that it’s taking them longer than the previous class. If it’s taking longer, it’s our fault. It could mean that we haven’t realized how to reach this specific group of children as well. It is also highly possible that one particular group isn’t as capable as the other. That’s ok too. Whatever the reason is that these children are learning at a slower pace, it doesn’t make a middle school beginner want to sing if we are comparing them negatively to another group or criticizing them in some other way.

It’s our job to take each group of our singers as far as they can go, and to keep the journey as positive as we can.

When we praise what our choir students are doing well, the energy snowballs.

Singing comes from deep inside the souls. We’ve got to do everything we can to keep our little middle school beginner’s spirits filled with light.

Click here to see a fun video called “To Do’s and NOT to Do’s of Chorus”.

All of the philosophies that have worked for me are reflected in the program I created called S-Cubed: Successful Sight Singing for Middle School Teachers and Their Students.

Click here to see what teachers are saying about S-Cubed.

Click here to see a video description of S-Cubed!

Next Saturday, I’ll post Reason #4 right here!

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing? Part 1

June 18, 2016 by Dale Duncan 3 Comments

“Why won’t my middle school choir sing?”

I saw the above comment a while back on a Facebook Music Group, and it reminded me of my early years of teaching this very unique age group.

It’s frustrating, and I believe it’s quite commonly experienced in middle school choral classrooms across America.

You ask yourself, “Why are these kids in choir if they don’t want to sing?!”

They are sitting in your room taking up the air space, but contributing nothing. It’s a terrible feeling to try to teach singing to children who won’t sing.

What do you do about it? How do you fix it? Should you threaten to lower their grade? Should you call their parents?

Before I share how and why I think some middle school teachers face this scenario, you need to be prepared! The answers aren’t easy to hear.

After having faced this scenario in my own middle school classroom, I had to do some deep soul searching that included all of the items I share in this article. I’ve been through this, and I survived! So can you!

The good news is that there ARE solutions to this scenario and many of those ideas will help grow your middle school program in many ways in addition to helping you get your children to sing! The changes will take time, but we can cause positive change to occur and begin working toward having a classroom of motivated students who want to sing and who enjoy the process of learning.

So, here is what I believe is the answer to why the children won’t sing.

It’s our fault.

Ouch.

It’s difficult to hear, but when I, myself, decided to take responsibility for the lip-syncing, unmotivated middle school children who were sitting in front of me each day, everything began to change, and it is the reason that I am still teaching today.

Ok…now that’s over.

What are some ideas that will help us make this experience a thing of the past?

During my 23 years teaching, I’ve heard all sorts of reasons for why middle school choir programs often struggle. In this article, I’m going to share some of those common reasons in hopes that I might help other choir teachers work toward solutions so they can create a positive learning environment in which your children not only WANT to sing, but can’t WAIT to sing.

Reason #1:

They don’t understand the information.

It took me a while to realize how little my middle school students knew when they walked into my door at the beginning of the year. Most of my students come from strong elementary feeder programs, but most have had music only two times a week for 30 minutes during that time. It is not possible to teach the details that I was expecting of my students in that amount of time.

I needed to change my expectations and meet them where they were when they arrived. I needed to work to find fun, interesting ways to deliver the material to that they not only learned it, but enjoy the process of learning it.

In the early days of my career, I’d hand them a piece of music and they would look at the page with complete puzzlement. I failed to recognize it, and I’d get frustrated with them and say “Why isn’t anyone singing?!? If you don’t sing, I’m going to go down the line and make you sing by yourself!”

Well, I quickly learned that certainly doesn’t inspire anyone to want to sing.

I realized that most of them didn’t have any idea what a staff or system or measure is. Sing alto? What’s that? Sing forte? What is that and how am I supposed to know when or how to do it without singing out of tune?! It became clear that most of them were simply following the words, and even THAT didn’t make sense because, when they were looking at a 2-part or 3-part piece, they didn’t understand where to go when they reached the last measure of a system. …Not to mention the fact that many 6th graders not only don’t understand how to follow a score, but also, many of them still struggle with basic reading skills. They can’t even read most of the words! …Especially when the words are written like this:

To-mor-row is go- ing to be a bea- ti- ful day.

And I had the audacity to ask why no one was singing?

Recognizing and empathizing with what our beginning middle school students don’t know is so very important. Here is an analogy: When they look at a 2 or 3 part piece of music that includes dots, curved lines, fractions, grids and symbols they don’t recognize, they feel the same we would feel if someone asked us to read aloud a book that is written in Arabic.

It’s a vicious cycle, and the only way to break it is to teach them one concept at a time steadily, creatively and deliberately each and every day and to do it in a way that they thrive and enjoy the process of learning.

Does that mean you might teach from rote sometimes? Sure! We must. Four year old children can speak and use words that they cannot possibly write or define. It’s the same for beginning singers.

Next Saturday, I’ll post reason #2!

Dale Duncan

From the creator of S-Cubed Middle School Sight Singing Program for Beginners

Click here to go to my YouTube channel!

The Brain on Music

So…You’re replacing a legendary choral director…

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 5

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 4

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing Part 3

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing? Part 3

Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing? Part 1

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Why Won’t My Middle School Choir Sing? Part 3

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