Signing in.... Welcome back!!! Its been a while since my last blog post This blog post will outline the process taken to complete my final senior secondary assignment, which includes creating a unit of work for a Music 2 HSC class, focusing on the topic Music of the last 25 years with an Australian Focus. Along with the unit framework, detailed lesson plans must be provided for at least 6 lessons and resources need to be provided (worksheets, scores, audio recordings, digital resources and more). I began working through this assignment about a month ago and have documented my work regularly as follows: Tuesday 1st of May: Today I began working through the repertoire list, using the template (table) given. Friday 4th of May: Today I listened to a selection of repertoire from numerous composers, to sort out a final list to fit within the table. I decided to focus on a few composers, including Nigel Westlake, Paul Stanhope and Elena Kats-Chernin and choose repertoire surrounding their works. Finalised my repertoire list today. Thursday 10th of May: After ‘Senior secondary’ class on Thursday, Jim checked my finalised repertoire list. I decided on choosing Nigel Westlake’s ‘Babe: Pig in the city’ soundtrack as my focus for the Year 12 Music 2 Unit. Friday 11th of May: Began collating some small classroom activities, surrounding the selected piece by Nigel Westlake and documenting them into a unit framework. Wednesday 16th of May: I emailed Rim Shot music, which is Nigel Westlake’s website, asking for access to the “Babe: Pig in the city” score, however I received the following reply. Worked on gathering resources for the unit of work and although I didn’t have the score for Babe, I gathered scores and videos of other music that showcase similar musical ideas and themes to the ones used in the music soundtrack of Babe: pig in the city. I found that these 4 piece were be adapted by Nigel Westlake to use in Babe:
Thursday the 31st of June: CHANGE OF PLANS I went to see James Humberstone regarding the peer teaching assignment. This is where ideas for my Music 2 unit changed. I felt I was lacking resources with my original idea to make a unit on ‘Babe Pig in the city’ as I didn’t even have a score for this work. James informed me of his art song, ‘The Weight of Light’ song cycle and thought this would be a good opportunity to create a unit of work about. James explained the overall idea of the song cycle, the story line it conveyed and the amount of work and dedication put into this work. This session inspired me to want to create a unit of work on this moving piece of work. We organised to have a meeting to conduct an interview and explanation of the work for the 6th of June (the following week). Wednesday the 6th of June: Today at 2.30pm I had my interview with James, here is a brief overview of how the meeting went. We set up cameras and audio recorders to capture James and I in an interview setting, with James explaining the song cycle in detail. I created this visual recording as a teaching resource for the music classroom as shown in my unit of work. This resource will allow the students to understand the work in more depth told by the composer himself. Some Question I asked in the interview:
Tuesday the 12th of June: Today I worked on listening to excerpts from The weight of light while analysing the score myself to create appropriate activities for a music 2 classroom. *The call *Brother O Brother I will need to create documented resources, including melodic dictations and sight singing excerpts. Wednesday the 13th of June: Today I continued working on my unit of work score and audio analysis: *At the Gate *From here The process I used to conduct and create activities for my unit of work was listening and analysing the song while following the score. When I came by an idea or theme I would pause the song and write the idea down, these ideas would turn into activities to incorporate into the classroom to convey a theme e.g extended techniques in At the gate *Today I also edited the unit of work and finished creating resources in Muse Score (e.g. Melodic dictations and sight singing excerpts) Thursday the 14th of June:
I created another resource today, The melodic writing worksheet (Brother o Brother- Week 2 activity) that focuses on the perfect 5th interval and creating a step wise motion melodic line over it. Some things I focused on today; *Began writing the detailed lesson plans *Edited the overall document *Completed the 6 lesson plans *Edited the first recording of the interview on iMovie, that explains The Weight of Light, its plot line and musical aspects. Friday the 15th of June: Today I completed the table of the four hypothetical HSC music 2 students, their instruments and suggested repertoire. Then created a new resources for the week 7 compositional task, just to better scaffold the task giving the students a model or example to compose based off. Saturday the 16th of June: The assignment is due on the 17th of June, so the last two days will be editing and finalising resources before submission. Until next time!!! Signing out...
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Signing in.... Welcome to my final technology post!! Tonight was our technology in music education presentation of learning evening, whereby we had the chance to showcase and present our tech. creative projects. The night began at 6pm, however I arrived at 5pm to set up and prepare. At 6pm guests began to arrive and the evening started with an introduction by James Humberstone (head of music education). Throughout the night stage presentations were scheduled in half an hour time slots with table presentations scheduled between each stage presentation. Felicity and I chose to present our interactive children's book from a table, where we could have one on one time with the guests to explain our children's book and allow them to personally interact with the story. We displayed our children's book and websites on an ipad and our own laptops, we also displayed the original illustrations in a folder. Adrian came to view our project first, we explained the work we both did in the process of creating the ibook in which we received positive and encouraging feedback on. Note about our ibook: The use of including the sheet music for each theme and jingle at the end slides of our ibook, allows music educators to use these jingles in a classroom setting to teach to the students. Also if used at home, after reading and listening along to the story parents can possibly learn the themes and play them for their children or the children themselves can learn the music. The book targets an array of audiences and can be used for differing purposes. It was amazing to see everybody's hard work and dedication pay off, and all my fellow music education students did such an incredible and inspiring job with all their projects. I honestly feel honoured to be apart of such an intelligent and passionate year group. Overall the night was a great success and everyones seemed to really enjoy the concept and end product of our children's book. It was a pleasure working with Felicity on this assignment and we consider to do more of this type of work in the future as we both thoroughly enjoyed it. Tech. Unit overall Before starting this unit, although I knew a little, I must admit I was not advanced in technological use, and although I'm not an expert now, I know a whole lot more about different technologies and their importance in education today, especially music education. During this unit we were introduced to an array of technologies that have such an important use in music education today in engaging and motivating students in a way they can relate. Although at times this unit was challenging overall, it was a unit I will never forget! I've now got my own website and twitter account that documents this process. I learnt quite a lot from my fellow classmates and teacher James Humberstone, thank you for giving me the opportunity to broaden my knowledge on use of technology in the music classroom. This unit has given me excitement for ideas to take into music education in my future career. Signing out for one last time.....
Signing in.... Welcome back to another technology 'Create project' blog post. Since last post we have now finalised our project and just need to put the ibook together. My focus in the assignment was Illustrations, singing the main jingle and narrating the story. For the illustrations I sketched the images first then coloured them in to give a more accurate image. Initially we were going to paint the images with water colour however the water colour wouldn't have shown up as clear in ibooks as using coloured pencils which we decided to do in the end. Since the last blog that showed some of the image drafts, I have finalised the images. After long hours of colouring in I finished and sent them to my project partner Felicity, for her to collate them all in the ibook, along with the mp3 files for each page along with the narration as well as written text on the page to read along. Recording the narrations (voice overs): Felicity sent through the garage band files with the music she composed and I recorded myself speaking the text over the top using a snowball mic, then sent the final product back to her to place in the ibook. Below are the final images (in order): The use of bright and vibrant colours, targets the books set audience 'Children' and reflects the excitement Holly feels in the lead up till christmas. We aimed to create as realistic images as we could as shown below Above are the finalised musical themes for each day in the lead up till christmas day. Each theme was based of the main jingle however vary in tempo and tone colour to suit the mood of each page as the mood slightly changes. Attached is the final edited story line for the children book 'Holly's Christmas' Overall the process to creating this children's book, was a process of learning how to formulate a children's book, by using ibooks to create an online, multi-useful and interactive book for children. The process included creating a theme, a storyline, illustrations for each page and music to reflect the theme of each page along with a main jingle to tie the story together. A link to the complete ibook is uploaded below, so click to get the first look at 'Holly's Christmas'. https://www.dropbox.com/s/amwf4dvk4dbl4ri/Holly%27s%20Christmas.ibooks?dl=0 Signing out..... Signing in.... Remember to ALWAYS back up your compositional recordings and if you've done that double back it up!!! Today, a day before the compositional assignment is due I was unfortunate to experience losing all my comp. recorded material (that I have previously posted about), although I had backed up all the material on a USB the files could not be found on the laptop or USB. I went into university to finalise recording the electric bass part (with Luke peterson on Bass) and overall editing. During recording the bass riff, my Garageband crashed and all previously recorded parts disappeared and were not retrievable. I asked the technology department for assistance, in which they tried their best to look for the missing files but were unable to locate them. I therefore made the quick decision to re-record my entire composition. Recording the bass part first, the Piano line again and the drum patterns for each section were also recorded again followed by vocals. I recorded each instrument theme or part separately (as shown in the image below) just to make it more accessible to play around with while editing. When recording the first time, I used higher quality recording devises which gave an overall clearer and cleaner sound. Today, I only had a snowball mic to record with, which still did an accurate job, however I needed to edit a little more, by adding compression and effects on the instrument lines to make the recording sound more professional. After re-recording the composition, I began to edit by adding compression on the vocals, balancing all the parts in terms of volume and placement (panning) and adding tasteful effects like fading in and out. After a solid day of re- recording and editing, it all came together! This is my LAST Blog post for the compositional project. I hope you've enjoyed reading my comp. journal and the processes I have taken to follow my 'Baby steps' and in some cases re- adjust them to complete the composition 'Falling For You'
Signing out..... Signing in...... Recording & Editing Day!!! Today was planned to finalise recording, I went into university and set up a practise room with recording equipment, kindly supplied by Pani. I recorded the piano chord progression first in two takes, then the vocals in another two takes, and then recorded the drum patterns. For each section of the song, verse, chorus and bridge there is a slightly different drum pattern, therefore I recorded each section separately which made it easier to get accurate for a non- drummer (myself). About two bars were recorded for each drum section, which was enough to play around with in garage band and duplicate if I needed more to cover an entire section. The drum pattern for the chorus and bridge have been slightly adjusted (Shown below- left is the adjusted/ right is the original), with help from Ender (percussionist). Editing took place after recording, I needed to line up all the drum parts with their corresponding sections and ensure balance between each instrumental part were equalised. Tomorrow I will be recording the electric bass riff with Luke and this will finalise my audio recording.
Until next blog...!!! Signing out.... Signing in..... Just another compositional journal post!! 1. Instrumentation Hook/ Riff: Still following my 'Baby step' structure, the riff or hook was stated as one of the last compositional steps in which i have done in my own composition. In my first draft session, although I didn’t have a riff composed, I expressed my ideas of creating a riff and Jim suggested I put the riff in the bass line. The riff was my final composing step, I sat at the piano and experimented with different notes and rhythms while listening to the draft recording of my composition. 8/11/17: After a few attempts writing of writing a riff, I finalised my Electric bass riff: The riff is still to be recorded, stay posted for more blog post to follow my compositional process. Note: as I composed each instrument part and each section, I would add it to a score and record it as documentation. Signing out.... first reflection on the creative process of writing our own interactive children's book!!!11/7/2017 Signing in... Welcome back!! The first lesson we had to work on our Technology creative projects gave us the opportunity to formulate a story line or theme, the illustration outline for each page and get started on a musical theme or jingle. The story Felicity and I have created is called 'HOLLY'S CHRISTMAS' and it tells the story of a little girls countdown to christmas day and all the activities she gets involved in, in the lead up to Christmas. Here is an outline of our storyline so far.... I am in charge of the illustrations for the children book and at this stage I have been sketching some draft pictures.... We are having a different image for each page and each image illustrates Holly's adventures in the lead up to christmas. At this stage we are thinking of using water colour to create a soft wash of colour for the images. Felicity has taken charge of organising the music for the storybook. So far she has formulated a short, catchy jingle that will be repeated as each day progresses closer to christmas day.... We are enjoy the process to create this children's story book and look forward to the end project! Stay tuned for more of the creative process....
Signing out!!! Welcome back once again!!!
Signing in..... This blog post combines the last two tech. lessons. Our second last technology class gave us the opportunity to work on our tech. digital creative projects, in which we presented or lift pitches on a couple of lessons ago. We had this lesson to collaborate on our projects and ask Dr. James Humberstone any questions or advice we needed, which was extremely helpful. In this lesson, we finalised our children’s book storyline writing about the countdown until Christmas day and started on illustrations and composition. Final Tech. lesson The next and Final Technology lesson was a recap of the overall tech. course and the evolution of technology in the music classroom and in general education. Technology can:
Digital natives- grown up with digital aspects/ connectivity around them Digital immigrant- those that have adapted overtime to use of technology Prensky says, people that are born after that divide between being digitally native or immigrant, will always speak tech. with an accent rather than taking it for granted. How children are engaging with tech. Society thinks in two ways in response to the uprise in Use of technology: Childhood at risk- tech. is ‘going to break our brains’ Christakis: Baby Einstein talks
Childhood empowered- now we are all connected/ accessible Put a computer in the wall in hope the children in the slum, could learn how to use the computer, they learned English (language) and how to use the computer.
Questions that are asked surrounding tech.
Overview of course content: Class 1: Sound trap/ sequencers/ step sequencing/ making loops Class 2: Notation software- in the browser/ graphics/ copyright Class 3: screen flow/ audio recording/ align different bits of video with audio/ cameras Class 4: Format/ all that stuff together Class 5: 1 to 1 learning/ Bring YOUR OWN DEVICE/ use tech. to teach/ combine sound, graphics, photos etc/ hype cycle of new tech. / Filter Bubble (where our news comes from) Class 6: Synthesisers/ browser/ maker movement/ step sequencers Class 7: remix culture/ mash-up/ Abelton/ hardware drum machines/ visual metaphors for step sequencing/ process of pop and classical musicians GETTING THINGS DONE! Weapons of Mass Distraction: What is mindfulness- focusing your attention/ breathing exercises Fixing the overload in your life-
It has been a pleasure having you follow me on my 'Technology in Music Education' journey, learning about the use of tech. in music education, the introduction of new and advanced technology, not only for composing but performing and allowing students to engage in learning through the assistance of Technology. Signing out.... Welcome back for another Blog Post!!! Signing in.... This week’s lecture was the final heavy content lesson for technology in music education. Returning to the themes looked at in week 1, about online culture changing how children interact with music, and ways music educators can utilise these interest’s children develop in their everyday lives and adapt that to learning in the music classroom. The lesson began by looking at some circular sequencing programs, like GROOVE PIZZA! Here is a short tutorial on how to use the circular software. We also discussed repertoire choice in the music classroom and ideas of whether using music or remixing certain songs is considered stealing, like that of “Grey Album”, which takes sections of the Beetles “The White Album” and Jay Zee’s the “Black Album”, which was later removed for copyright issues. As music educators, we need to choose music of different types of complexity for students to perform, prepare and improvise that may be assessed. Stay posted for more Blogs to come!!! Signing out... Signing in again....
Welcome!! What’s real? Today’s Technology lesson was all about how real the integration of technology in Sydney schools, based on our own practicum placements. We also looked at performance technologies and technology for performance as opposed to being used for composing music. Looking at using technology to perform from synthesisers to digital DJing decks, loop pedals and other interfaces. Some technologies we took at look at include: Artiphon- guitar controller
Ableton Live- program where you plug launch pads in and create
Gadget- Step sequencer $50/ on the ipad Bitwig- another software The reading for this week’s lecture was Chapter 6 of Pamela Burnard and Finney’s book ‘Music Education with Digital Technology’ written by Dave Chales, which discusses technology as a replacement for education by slowly incorporating it into education for those students that have been kicked out or dropped out of school. Chales starts with a set of ‘Turn tables’- goes through the process of getting students to understand they can learn to DJ, their DJ heroes didn’t use other people’s music but create their own music and some self- taught. The students soon realise they can extend what they are doing to create their own beats, through use of Reason, Ableton and FL (Fruit loops) studios (reason- software initially most popular). The use of Popular music is most relatable for many students as students are surrounded by the Pop culture. Students learn Beat programming- software composing, effects, duplicating and programming Another topic raised in this week’s lecture is How much does Technology translate into schools/ education? Debates for and against technology in education have been formulated. Some points put forward include:
For access to Ableton live here is the link: www.Learning music.ableton.com (website) Extra concepts- Pedagogical aims: Flipped learning: don’t think of school as what happens first but as fun
Blended learning:
Hype cycle: get a new tech, become excited, use it, fails-
Smart sparrow:
Until next Blog... Signing out!!! References:
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