Jaques-Dalcroze
Teaching Style
-As a general rule, teachers of Eurhythmics are trained to talk very little and to use valuable class time for music listening and performance. Directions are often given by gestures rather than words. Teachers use speech-melody to give commands to students. Commands may also be given by flash cards, chalkboard graphics, or physical signals (nod of the head or other gestures). Purely musical commands are given from the keyboard or by percussion or voice: a chord, a trill, a particular tone, accent, subdivision, playing in bass or treble clef, harmonic progression, or melody fragment may be used to alert the students to change to a different movement.
-The Jaques-Dalcroze manner of using group dynamics emphasized freedom of exploration and the many possibilities of individual solutions to rhythmic problems. The greatest value is placed on the student’s discovery of interesting and unusual solutions rather than on imitating the teacher’s solutions. Students are viewed as young artists and are expected to develop their own thoughtful and personal artistic responses to the teacher’s rhythmic stimuli. The problem of balancing technique with expressive feeling is basic to all artists and is central to the Jaques-Dalcroze method.
-Since the goal of lessons is to produce personal responses to the musical challenges, students from many different levels of musical sophistication can work together.
Space, equipment, and costume
-Comfort, hygiene and safety are primary concerns to the Eurhythmics teacher. Lessons require a spacious, well-ventilated classroom with an immaculate lately clean wooden floor. Students should wear comfortable, washable clothing and should wear either soft gym or dancing shoes or go barefoot. A well-tuned piano, simple percussion instruments, chalkboard, balls, ropes, and hoops are the ideal equipment.
-North American teachers are forced to modify the original plans and procedures and some have moved classes to the gym, hallways, libraries, or cafeterias.
-Physical safety is realized by special exercises in spatial awareness, energy matching, energy discipline, ensemble, and social integration. Students learn to deal quickly and efficiently with spatial formations; these exercises are extended to help students learn to handle traffic problems involving bumping, pushing, following, and leading. Classes that are too large may be divided up into group formations; (Concentric circles or particular combinations, such as movers, clappers, or movers, clappers, and singers.).
Musical Materials
-Music and rhythms can be presented in various ways and turn into various objectives, music from all styles and time periods are appropriate. The more creative the better!
Lesson Planning
-All lessons are based upon one or more of Jaques-Dalcroze’s 34 elements of rhythms. The first step in designing a lesson is to think deeply and broadly about the element or elements to be taught, in a way that connects that rhythmic element or elements with the students’ physical, emotional, mental, and musical life.
-The process of eurhythmics requires small steps, repetition, improvisation, awareness of student’s body language, use of correct tempo and dynamics appropriate to the learning objective, demonstration, and spatial awareness. Teachers are held accountable for students learning. There is no reason a child can’t learn.
Exercise and Game plan
-In planning lessons, five basic exercises and game plans are used, at varying levels of complexity.
1) the quick reaction- this is the opening game of the classic J-D lesson plan. In this exercise the students listen to the musical stimulus and decide which of two or more rhythmic ideas is being presented, then quickly select the appropriate movement responses. Its purpose is to induce attention, concentration, and analysis.
2) the follow- calls for accurate response to constant changes of tempo, accent, dynamics, phrasing, and articulation. It forces the student to respond to the slightest nuance of the teacher’s performance or conducting by appropriate movement changes. It is useful in producing flexibility in a given rhythmic behavior.
3) the replacement- a game in which one item is replaced in a rhythmic pattern which is already learned. The new pattern demands a new physicality. This exercise is often converted into a memory-training study, by choosing a series of patterns and performing them in any random order commanded by the teacher.
4) the interrupted cannon- the “echo cannon” It is used to develop fast memory for a pattern without much attention to analysis. The teacher claps or otherwise performs a rhythmic pattern and is immediately echoed by the class. The teacher continues with a new pattern. This brings hearing memory and performing memory together and aids the development of extended memory.
5) the continuous cannon- is more difficult because memory past becomes performance present. The teacher will perform a rhythmic pattern of movements or sounds or both and the students are directed to follow after a certain number of beats or measures. The study of cannon is often placed at the end of a lesson, as a summation of the skills and knowledge gained in the lesson.
Kodaly
The ingredients necessary for a Kodaly program are a good musician well trained in the Kodaly teaching techniques, children, a carefully chosen core of folk songs and art music, and sufficient time to teach and learn music. A traditional classroom is fine to teach Kodaly. Piano is not necessity for a Kodaly teacher. No accompanying instruments are used until in-tune singing is secure and part singing is established. It is the belief of Kodaly practitioners that secure intonation and accurate vocal intervallic performance are best developed using vocal models. The A-440 tuning fork, always in hand, has become the badge of the Kodaly teacher. The teaching style of a well-trained Kodaly teacher involves very little speaking and no “telling” or “explaining”. The teacher may sing a phrase of a song, indicating with a conducting gesture where children are to begin. When the teacher does speak it is to ask a question designed to guide analysis, to offer support and help to a child experiencing difficulty, or to give simple directions. Nothing is ever told in a Kodaly class if it can instead be demonstrated by the teacher or inferred and derived by the students.
Lesson Planning
- The teacher moves from 1) demonstrations by the class as a whole to 2) demonstrations by smaller groups, and finally to 3) demonstrations by individual students. Assessment of skill learning can only take place at level three, the individual, level of performance.
- It is vitally important that the teacher be sure that one concept has been acquired, that one skill level has been mastered, before expecting students to move on to another, more involved concept level, to yet another higher skill level.
Pedagogical Process
-The teaching process is:
Prepare----make conscious----reinforce----assess
-The learning process is:
Hear/perform---infer/derive---hear/construct/notate---read---create
Musical Materials
-The quality of the songs and listening examples to be used in teaching is of vital importance to the Kodaly teacher. They must either be authentic folk songs or art music of unquestionable quality. He believed deeply that the inculcation of musical taste must be a primary goal of music education and that children would learn to love good music only is they were taught through good music. Music must be age and learning appropriate always.
Orff
-An Orff class demands from the teacher flexibility and energy. There is a constant exchange or ideas between student and teacher. Students are never told or explained to but rather left to learn and discover for themselves. Questions are open ended. Guided in the right direction, students will learn for themselves new rhythmic and melodic ideals. This process demands careful and detailed planning by the teacher.
Lesson Planning
-The major goals of all Orff practice are:
1) sense of community
2) understanding of the organization of music
3) comprehension of music as an art
4) musical independence
5) personal musical growth
6) performance ability
7) self-esteem
-The success of the Orff process is evident when students can transfer the concepts and skills acquired in one experience to another new experience, and adapt what they have learned to new situations and new materials.
Musical Materials
- Materials for teaching may be chosen both from the culture of the children and from other cultures around the world. The teacher must choose carefully, keeping the children who will use the material in mind. Folk songs and games comprise a large part of the teaching repertory, with the addition of arranged and composed songs from the five volumes of Music for Children and its many supplements. Each teacher must design programs directed at the children served. The music in an Orff class should be live when possible. Learning to respond to musical cues and live stimuli is paramount in the Schulwerk.
Physical Setting
-The ideal Orff classroom is an open space with a floor designed for movement in bare feet. If Orff instruments are available, an area in the room should be set aside large enough to have them arranged in a wide semicircle. Most activities are done in a semi or full circle so that all participants can see and hear one another. The piano may be used in the Schulwerk but is limited. Acappella singing is considered most desirable. Ensemble is the key element in the Schulwerk: ensemble in speaking, singing, dancing, and playing.
Comprehensive Musicianship (CM)
CM is a flexible philosophy which does not dictate a particular technique or learning approach. Rather, is suggests learning roles and teaching roles within any methodological context. The structural elements of music are presented to the students by many avenues and are guided by experiences in composition, analysis, and performance. The goal of CM is to help students gain insights into the nature of music, its variety of styles, and the many uses it has in the lives of people.
Role of the Teacher
-The CM teacher must develop pedagogical techniques for integrating the various aspects of the art of music in every teaching situation. The teacher must synthesize the common elements of music during a learning experience and must guide the students into the important roles of listener, performer, and composer, based on the students’ individual comprehension levels, abilities, and interests.
Planning for Musical Learning
-A CM program in the elementary school emphasizes an integrated approach to music study and strives to reduce fragmented teaching and learning by providing opportunities for students to see relationships in music.
-The learning contract- used in the Cm setting is a written agreement, drawn up by the student with guidance from the teacher and signed by the student, that obligates the student to complete a specified number of tasks leading to a terminal goal or musical project.
-The learning activity package- provides a clear set of directions and instruction for the student to use at his or her own pace in order to develop a conceptual understanding of a specific idea or set of ideas in music or to develop specific musical skills.
-The learning center- units or modules which are constructed in various areas of the classroom or the school. Students experience the activities and the tasks of the unites and modules as their personal schedules dictate and at their own learning rates.
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