Organize Facilities
The more structured things are, the better. The first day the students showed up for camp they noticed a huge change in their environment. What used to be a train wreck of a band hall was suddenly highly organized. It was clean (though it's not always clean at the present), there was a place for everything, and everything was in its place. Last year the students and community looked down on them, but this gave them a sense that this year was going to be different. I do my best to maintain this organization, despite the fact that it's never made it back to its original state. It's still a huge change from what they used to have.
If you need a simple system for cleaning/organizing your band hall, instrument storage, office, etc., check out my previous articles on Four Steps to Organize Any Space and How to Organize a Music Library.
Use Procedures for Structured Rehearsals
But our rehearsals are also as structured as I can get them. We have procedures for entering the room, when to start, when to play, when to stop playing, consistent commands for procedure based learning (common solutions for problems that we use enough to warrant a title so that they immediately know what exercise to use and how to execute it). When the band gets start to get out of hand, I immediately call them on it, and if I really want to punish them for it, we practice the procedures as if it were the first day of camp (usually the procedure for when I want them to get quiet).
This kind of structure deals with preventative classroom management, or the things you do that prevent most behavior problems. It allows us to work as quickly and efficiently as possible, and therefore achieve as much as possible.
If you need some ideas on procedures, I wrote a series on it a while back. I can't say that I use 100% of what I wrote about, but I use almost all of it and it's been successful for me: Procedures Maximize Learning, Classroom Procedures, More Classroom Procedures for Band, and Quickly Addressing Fundamentals.
Plan for Rehearsals to Increase Productivity
The first step is equipping yourself prior to the planning period. I recommend a couple of different ways. The first and most useful is to record the band in a run through. This lets you listen repeatedly and catch more. From there I'll use sticky pads during my planning time as a reminder of what to listen for, and as I'm doing that I will generate a few exercises or procedures we can use to improve it (if it's an ensemble wide problem). Certain problems can also be addressed and discussed during the warm up as well, such as balance, intonation, pulse, etc. In lieu of recordings, which I do at least twice a week, I might instead note problem spots in rehearsal by placing a sticky pad on that measure. Even if I don't write anything down, simply placing it there will help recall the problem... most of the time.
The only caution I give with sticky pads is that too many of them can actually desensitize you, not to mention it can become difficult to see a certain part when you need to. Still, used correctly it helps a lot, and that kind of prep work really paid off for us come contest time.
Parental Contact
I admit this is one of my weakest areas. I have enough discipline concerns at the end of the day in my elementary music and 5th and 6th grade band classes that I would have to make a hand full of phone calls, and by that point I'm exhausted. It's not a valid excuse, and I hope to do much better next year, especially at the beginning of the year.
But I have made phone calls when dealing with the High School Band. Again, I could do much better by making positive calls as well as concerned calls. But I have called home when a student was so talkative throughout the week that it was hindering our progress. I can't stress how helpful this was in gaining the cooperation of those students. You could argue that it was gaining their fear rather than their respect, and I wish I could've got them to simply buy in the way everyone else had, but at the end of the day they were cooperative, and that's enough for me. Now that the band has achieved success and is performing at a much higher level, if I'm lucky, they might decide to buy in later. In the mean time, what they do in rehearsal has become a contribution rather than a detriment.
A tip for this is simply as follows - be respectful, calm, and always talk from the standpoint of concern. When I talk to a parent, I don't complain about their kid. I tell them I'm concerned. I point out at least one positive thing (for example, they might be a good player, and if not they might enjoy being in band to be around their friends, which I have no problem with), and I remind them that I want their kid to be successul in band, and to be a contribution. My goal is always to figure out what we can do to reach that. If it's a particularly tough case, I have even asked if they have any recommendations for what I can do in class to help keep them on track. By being respectful, professional, personable, concerned, and humble, most parents have no problem taking my side. This year there was only one instance where that was not the case, and it was because the parent simply didn't believe that a student in high school band, an elective class, should ever get less than an A, because it would tank their student's chance of getting into a big Division I college. Even if their student failed to complete an assignment. Well, you can't win them all!
And that's okay. There is no silver bullet when it comes to this stuff. Most parents (the percentage depends on your District) are willing to talk to their kids and punish them if necessary to help them stay on track. Most of them simply aren't in the loop about things. So don't be afraid to call. As long as you exhibit the traits listed above, you should be fine!
The next blog of this series, which will deal with goal setting and achievement for the band, both in the programming and in the rehearsal sense. Thanks for reading, and until next time, take care!
Musically yours,
Mr. Cooper
No comments:
Post a Comment