Creative Musicking
Our objectives are to explore, develop, and honor our musicality.
This means we will be creating music while respecting ourselves and others.
Nonviolent Communication
Problem-solving focused on the problem, not the persons involved.
Observation: What is happening? "You have been playing that drum the whole class. We only have one drum."
Feelings: What are you feeling about the situation? "I feel bad about not getting a turn with the drum."
Needs: What do you need/value? "I love drumming, and I think it is important that everybody gets a chance to play music. I don't like when people are left out, including myself."
Requests: What would resolve the issue for everyone involved? "Can I be your partner?" "Can you give me a turn with the drum, while you play something else?"
Critical Response Process
Honoring creators while giving constructive feedback.
Statements of meaning: listeners state what was meaningful, evocative, interesting, or exciting about what they heard.
Artist as questioner: the artist who made the song asks the audience specific questions about elements of the work-in-progress.
Neutral questions: listeners ask the maker questions about the work-in-progress without revealing their opinions.
Opinion time: listeners tell the artist what they think of the work-in-progress.
Websites
When wearing headphones, make sure your volume isn't too loud. Listening to loud sounds can result in hearing loss.
In many cases, setting your volume to 70% should be good. Feel free to adjust as needed.
Group Guidelines for Sharing Out
Clarity
When sharing your work, keep the room and group in mind. Make sure you are loud enough for all to clearly hear you.
Presence
When listening to someone's creation, there should be no talking or other sounds. Before we can question or comment, we need to hear the creation clearly!
You do not have to look directly at the presenter(s), but try to avoid looking at your screen. Looking at your work will bring your attention away from the presenter(s) and back to what you made, how you want to continue working on it, and so on.
Judgment of Others
Remember that our job as listeners is not to "fix" or "judge" someone else's creation. Simply listening is a powerful act!
Collaborative doodle: What did you learn/do/teach/make/explore/love/hear/share/experience?
National Core Arts Standards
MU:Cr1.1.5a: Improvise rhythmic, melodic, and harmonic ideas, and explain the connection to specific purpose and context (such as social, cultural, and historical).
MU:Cr1.1.5b Generate musical ideas (such as rhythms, melodies, and accompaniment patterns) within specifically related tonalities, meters, and simple chord changes.
MU:Cr2.1.5a: Demonstrate selected and developed musical ideas for improvisations, arrangements, or compositions to express intent, and explain the connection to purpose and context.
MU:Cr2.1.8a: Select, organize, and document personal musical ideas for arrangements, songs, and compositions within expanded forms that demonstrate tension and release, unity and variety, balance, and convey expressive intent.
MU:Cr2.1.8b: Use standard and/or iconic notation and/or audio/video recording to document personal rhythmic phrases, melodic phrases, and harmonic sequences.
MU:Cr3.1.5a: Evaluate, refine, and document revisions to personal music, applying teacher-provided and collaboratively-developed criteria and feedback, and explain the rationale for changes.
MU:Cr3.2.5a: Present the final version of personally created music to others that demonstrates craftsmanship, and explain the connection to expressive intent.
MU:Pr4.1.6a: Apply teacher-provided criteria for selecting music to perform for a specific purpose and/or context, and explain why each was chosen.
MU:Pr5.1.5b: Rehearse to refine technical accuracy and expressive qualities to address challenges, and show improvement over time.
MU:Re7.1.5a: Demonstrate and explain, citing evidence, how selected music connects to and is influenced by specific interests, experiences, purposes, or contexts.
MU:Cn10.0.5a: Demonstrate how interests, knowledge, and skills relate to personal choices and intent when creating, performing, and responding.
MU:Cn11.0.5a: Demonstrate understanding of relationships between music and the other arts, other disciplines, varied contexts, and daily life.
CASEL Core Competencies
Self-awareness, self-management, responsible decision-making, relationship skills, social awareness