It’s Friday afternoon. The Dance Collective is practicing in my classroom and I am reflecting about the week gone by. My thoughts gravitate towards the niceness of my current singers.
I am a manners fanatic. Excuse me, please and thank-you goes a long way with me. I live by the credo that says you should treat others as you would like to be treated. So, I never miss an opportunity to say please or thank-you – especially to my students.
I stand outside my door at the end of class and thank them as they leave. And they say thank you right back!!! Very few, at this point, avert their eyes or look to the floor as they cross the threshold. They seem like they are happy kids. This group is quite academically conscious. They come to the choir room rather than sit in study hall to do homework. I could have fifteen kids in my room during any given lunch period and you could hear a pin drop for the quiet. It’s pretty awesome.
I gave my ensembles a portfolio assignment this week.
CC Audition AS Video Audition Assignment-2014 It’s a video assignment where they need to record all the parts of the Region II Chorus audition for a grade. Because I am able to “speak” to them through my comments on their rubric, I am then able to invite a number of them for whom Region II Chorus would never have been a thought, to audition. Last year I had 25 out of 28 singers make the choir! I am certain the larger numbers were a result of this assignment. I would love to be able to work in a private lesson setting with each of them, but time does not allow. I have found that this assignment is the next best thing.
A colleague in the science department has invited the faculty to join a website called Educanon
https://www.educanon.com/ Apparently, it is an interactive video site where you can record your lessons and ask your students for responses which are somehow recorded for the purpose of grading. When I learn a bit more about it, I’ll share. Anyone use it in the choral world?
The next three weekends will be committed to an ESL certification intensive I am taking at Rutgers. Saturday and Sunday from 9a-6p for three weekends and then an add’l 40 hours online. Languages and working with kids whose first language is not English is interesting to me. I am looking forward to a very different course of study in the next few weeks!
Have a great weekend!
Barbara
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