Ear Training for Beginners (Plus "InTune!" App Review!)

One thing I neglected my first year of teaching was devoting time to ear training. I was probably overwhelmed as it was, but really it's not difficult to incorporate this critical musical skill. We want our student musicians to have discerning ears. You can start this right from the beginning of the year. Here are a few of the things I did this past year. I feel like it's resulted in more musically intelligent students.

Five Ways to Teach or Clean Articulation

It's never safe to assume that students are articulating correctly. Students get by through their beginner year with ways of faking it, and of course we as teachers can only spend so much time on one given thing. It's understandable. Articulation has to be retaught and reinforced every year, throughout the year. Sometimes I forget this, and yet I'm always surprised by how much things clean up after addressing articulation. It's as if the band was slurring it's speech, and suddenly they remember how to enunciate. I'm sure there are a lot of ways to teach it, or word it, but here are a few of the things I've used with some success.

4 Ways to Supplement the Beginner Band Book

Beginning Band students need
supplemental exercises to develop their
playing just like we did to develop ours.

I made a lot of mistakes with my first beginner class. One of the biggest by far was not supplementing their beginner band book. It's not that I didn't want to, or didn't know how to. It was more that I was so busy in my one man gig that it ended up as one of those things that just slipped by. Determined to make the beginners at my next job vastly different, I started working over the summer to create supplements. I've always been told that if you present everything through the book, you're probably in trouble, or that it's all about how you use the book. In some recent conversations on the Yellow Board I've found that some teachers use the book itself as a supplement, and have a large list of other things that are the base. Currently I'm in the school that spends half the class out of the book, and half in the book. The first twenty minutes or so are spent on supplements. I wish I were one of those teachers who had spent years collecting various materials to incorporate into their beginner curriculum. I need more time. Until then, if you're still spending the bulk of your time in the book, hopefully this will give you a few ideas to get started:

The Easy Way to Teach Scales

Forget playing the scales, I used
to get this way just teaching them.

It was my first year of teaching. I had a heterogeneous beginning band class, and I was ambitious enough to include horns, giving me four different pitches of instruments to contend with when note naming. I wanted so badly for them to have as many scales as we could get, or at least get them up to the scales they needed for the All-District Band Auditions they would face the next year. So I pushed. But every time we started a new scale, it was a nightmare. Going one group at a time, grinding out the notes, checking the fingers, it took forever. And even with my best efforts, nearly half the group would play wrong notes. I wish I knew now what I knew then. There is a much, much easier way to teach scales to beginners!

A Motivating Pass Off System

On second thought, yes!

In my first year of teaching I rarely used playing tests for beginners. I mostly did it for grades, and sometimes only once per grading cycle. I didn't understand how important it could be for motivation. Instead I wanted to use every moment of class time to learn new lines, and move as quickly through the book as we could, battling classroom management problems along the way. All of the good beginner teachers I know regularly have their students play for a grade. Over the summer I discovered a music pass off system that, it turns out, has worked wonders for student motivation, leading to students being more on task in class and an explosion of practicing outside of class. If you are like I was then, I hope this will encourage you to adopt a regular individual performance grade. If you already do regular playing test grades, then this system might interest you as well!

Teach Beginners to Count Rhythms

It's easy for a young musician to get lost
without some kind of counting system.

By now counting systems have been adopted by almost everyone, but some people still avoid teaching a counting system. My thought is that most people who don't teach a counting system probably are not familiar enough with one, or perhaps they already use one and have thought about switching to another but haven't because they're not used to it. Either way, students need a schema that helps them understand how to break down rhythms, and counting systems become extremely useful the more complicated the rhythms get. Personally, I'm an Eastman Counting System guy. I wanted to provide links to pages explaining the counting systems, but after the first 3 pages of google search I gave up on finding them. So here I'll briefly explain the two most widely used systems for band, traditional and Eastman, and then tell you why I recommend A) Using a counting system and B) Using Eastman.

Simple Procedures to Develop Literacy & Technique

Wait... is he the only one reading music???

Two of the biggest goals we work towards with beginners, after tone quality, is music literacy and playing technique. When I was in college I had the chance to observe a great beginning band teacher, and made notes of the procedures he used to teach new music to his students. Later on, attending workshops and reading posts on the YellowBoard reaffirmed that this was indeed a widely used practice by great beginning band teachers. The procedures are simple, easy to teach, and quickly become a routine to learn new lines of music. In the process it teaches music literacy, technique, and teach students how to break down and learn new music independently. If you're an experienced teacher, you probably already do this or something like it. But if you're struggling with your beginners, or if you're a pre-service teacher, then I hope this article will help shed some light on how to help your beginners with what can be a daunting task when presented all at once - learning and playing new music.

Building Beginners Through Sound Before Sight

The first several weeks of Beginner Band are crucial to the over all success of the students. These kids are often required to learn two skills at once, both of which involve multitasking - playing and instrument, and reading music. I had heard for years about the idea of Sound Before Sight, mostly as an elementary pedagogy but also by some as a beginning band method. My earliest attempt at this was missing some key components that ultimately resulted in a slower start to reading and playing, and less progress over the year. This year my friend and I worked together to develop a comprehensive curriculum that would both train the students on the basics of playing while simultaneously building them up for reading and playing. The two classes who got the full treatment are currently having better success than anything we've experienced, while the class that didn't get all of it is still struggling on the literacy end. Hopefully there's something in here that will give you ideas for your own Sound Before Sight curriculum, as having one that is effective can definitely make a big difference for your students!

5 1/2 Teaching Toys to Improve Tone

Just kidding... not these kinds of toys!

One of the big changes we've made this year is that we wanted to find a variety of ways to tackle embouchure and tone, including using various toys and tools to keep things fresh and hopefully give them something to relate to when switching over to the instrument. I've wanted to do some of this stuff before, but just never got off my butt to go get the stuff. This year was going to be different, and while some of these things are just small stuff, I think it's made those classes memorable for the kids while "tricking them" into learning. Enjoy!

Four Fun Tricks to Align the Band's Pulse

Greetings!

One of the biggest things I've had to do with my band is work to align the ensemble's pulse. Even once the quarter notes lined up, often eighth notes across the band wouldn't line up properly. Sometimes it's just that players aren't agreeing on how to shape the ends of notes, but just as often is can be a lack of subdivision. You can explain subdivision and tell them to subdivide, which is better than nothing, but I've found that getting them to externalize it and then referencing that is more helpful, and more fun. So here are a few ways you can try this out with your group.

Six Wind Pattern Applications in Rehearsal

Greetings!

Sam Pilafian leads a band in
breathing exercises.

Back in January I wrote a post titled, "The Transformational Power of The Breathing Gym". If somehow you're unfamiliar with this awesome product, please click on the link to learn about what it is and its effectiveness. I shared some of my stories about individual student breakthroughs or small groups successes. There was a reflective post later on where I briefly mentioned a few other things I had found success dealing with using wind patterns, but until now I haven't written a post that puts it all together in a way you can easily use in rehearsal.

A Wind Pattern is where you isolate the breathing and fix that before going back to the instrument. I also have students finger the instrument while breathing. Playing a wind instrument is almost entirely about the wind. We know that air support causes probably 90% of the problems we have, and Wind Patterns are a good way to isolate that aspect of playing. So here are six situations where you can tell students to Wind Pattern:

RythmBee Works!

Hello again!

I've been interested in RhythmBee! since attending a workshop with, among others, Cindy Bullock. She is a nationally recognized, retired middle school band teacher who made her name working at Nemitz Jr. High School in Odessa, TX. My jaw drops every time I listen to a certain clip of one of her honor bands. She's one of those incredible music teachers that gets kids to do things that seem impossible. If she says something, you want to do it without question.

Anyway, I spent the $200 for the package that is targeted for small school and middle school bands. It has to be one of the best investments I've made for the program so far. When the website says that RhythmBee works for everyone, they're not joking. The only people it won't work for are the students who refuse to look at the screen.

Articulation Markings Schema and Handout

Hello again!

This past semester, one of the things I realized is that I wished I had a visual representation for articulation markings. This led me to recently develop one myself. It is based on the system that I was "raised on", which has a couple of components to it. This components combined give you an easy way to explain how to interpret different articulations based on previously learned concepts, which I really like. Here we go!

The Three Parts of a Note

I wish I could thank whoever started explaining articulations this way. The concept is that a note has three parts. Label them as you like. I prefer to use 1. Attack/Start of the Note, 2. The Body/Sustain of the Note, 3. The Release/End of the Note. 

If you simply explain this idea to students, they can probably come up with an image in their head, especially if you tell them to imagine it this way. Once this idea is established, you can more easily move on to explaining any articulation they'll come across. 

The Three Levels of Listening

Greetings!

One of the most difficult things to teach students is active listening skills. I was very fortunate in my early high school experience to have someone present a schema for listening to me that was easy to understand and apply. I've continued to use it as a player and a teacher with success.

For any readers who haven't taken Education courses yet, a schema is basically a model for understanding something that you create in your brain. For example, if you know the rules for the NFL, you've developed a schema. However, when you watch Arena Football, you have to adjust your schema (understanding of how football works) slightly to accommodate the different rules. It's also possible to have to develop completely new schemata when the information you discover cannot be assimilated into an existing schema. Moving on...

The Three Levels of Listening

Developing active listening skills
takes guided practice. It's like
developing a seventh sense.
(The sixth is Kinesthesis)

I don't know who came up with this, otherwise I would give them credit. The idea is that there are Three Levels of Listening. You focus your listening on specific things in specific levels, and when you have achieved certain things on that level, you move up to the next one while still monitoring what you've already worked on at the same time.

Level One - Listen to Yourself

As teachers we understand that if a player does not sound good individually, it will be impossible for them to blend into the sound of the band. So, the first goal is to train students to listen critically to their sound and their playing, and to make adjustments. When you begin putting this schema into practice, you start with "Level One - Listen to Yourself". 

There are certain check offs at this level (as with all of them). They're all related to individual playing. For example, "Are you playing with a good tone quality?" "Are you playing in tune?" "Are you playing with good articulation/style/musical shaping?" And you could go on. If they can answer "Yes" to all of these questions, then they move on to Level Two.

Ideas to Create a Community of Learners, and Student Ownership

In this blog I mostly just want to get out some ideas I've had as the year has progressed and my education classes have made me think. I'd love to hear your thoughts about these. Sometimes I have great ideas, and sometimes they're crazy, and the bad news is that I rarely know the difference!

One topic I've read about deals with creating a community of learners. There are certain prerequisites, such as having a positive classroom environment (both in terms of the room's organization as well as good classroom management). But the idea is that you take the focus away from yourself as the teacher, and focus on student centered activities. This involves less lecturing and individual practice, and more group activities and discussion. Everyone is learning, including the teacher, and everyone helps each other to learn.

There are a LOT of things they talk about in education classes that band pretty much has built into it. But I think in regards to this one, I'm not so sure. Traditional rehearsals are entirely grounded in the idea that when you're not playing, you're not talking, and you're devoting 100% of your attention to the conductor, even if they're not talking to you, else you'll face the wrath. Of course, as players we always find ways to communicate, whether it's whispering extremely quietly, or whatever. When conductors are dictators, students find ways to bend those rules, even if just a little bit. At least that's my experience coming up in bands with that kind of environment. And hey, it works.

But what if there were more ways to make students responsible for each other's learning, and thus improving their learning in the process? Specifically, teaching a concept has the highest retainment rate and helps you to achieve a deeper level of learning than does anything else. So what are some ways to better create a community of learners and give students more ownership? I wonder how some of these ideas would work out.

Marching and Playing Fundamentals


My typical experience of marching techniques involves an explanation/demonstration of a marching technique by an instructor, with guided practice by the instructor in a block. Following that you'll usually break into sections, and the section leaders drill the new technique while giving the section more individualized attention. The ratio of officer to section members varies, of course, but it's better than the large block. Notice that the section leaders are now teaching, which increases their understanding and ultimately helps them become the stand out marchers of the band. After several minutes you'll return to the large block and drill some more. Some teachers have one group of students watch another, whether it's through the form of a section contest, or whatever kind of contest. This can be useful as you can see what makes someone look good or bad, but there is no guarantee that all students will watch intently. Though when you make a contest out of it, those chances do increase.

What if we were to do something like this? After reviewing previous techniques, we teach them the new technique and drill it for several minutes in a group setting. Then we number the columns or rows in 1's and 2's. Students turn towards their partner, introduce themselves, and then fall back into attention. We can then have the 1's fall out and watch the 2's display the technique, reminding them before hand of the check list of things they should look for, and with a previously instilled attitude concept that says they are ultimately responsible for the band's total success, and that every one of them really is a vital member of the band, along with some tips on how to give and receive constructive criticism (again, a safe environment is a prerequisite for establishing a community of learners).

Now what happens? Now we have a student teacher ratio of 1:1. The 1's are getting a deeper understanding of the marching techniques by not just watching it, but teaching it, and the 2's are getting one on one attention to help them improve. I think we could have the 2's display the technique a total of three times, with feedback after the first two. As soon as they stop, 1's assume the position of attention, and then 2's become the teachers. Having just had comments on their technique, they'll be even better prepared to coach the 1's (this seems unavoidable). We could even have the students shake hands or hug afterwards and say thanks for the help. We could either drill as a large group again to assess the total progress to that point, or go straight to sectionals where the section leaders, who have more training and probably better trained eyes (and probably higher expectations) will try to catch anything that was missed. Then we can still conclude with a giant group block at the end to review. I'd also be willing to instruct students to stand between two different people at each session so they're getting coached and coaching people they're unfamiliar with.

And yet there would be an element of urgency to this process, and a sense that students should be grateful for each other's help, because I am a big believer in having a marching certification process. For anyone who is unfamiliar, marching certification is like your marching techniques final exam, where you march through an established drill (ex: series of box drills), and demonstrate perfect marching fundamentals. This is with the threat (I hate to say it) that they must be certified to have a spot on the field during the half time show. The sequence should be challenging, but achievable, so that it is doable by everyone, but there is a real sense of accomplishment at the end. Then you do whatever it takes to make sure every student passes certification. Those who get certified right off the bat can root on those who are still trying, and can even coach students who are having significant trouble. The goal for an entire session is to pass certification, and you stay behind at the end of the day to keep working with anyone who couldn't do it in that time period.

Regardless of how hard it is, you hype it up as being a challenge. With this test of skills on the horizon, I think students can bond together with the common goal of helping each other to get through it, even on a one on one level. My only concern is that some students will be less experienced and knowledgeable than others, but rotating partners at each session should help to lessen the impact on any one student and give all students a more consistent experience. I don't know, I just think it could work.

I've also heard of a similar approach to teaching playing fundamentals in beginning band, such as having partners check each other for posture, horn carriage, etc. I don't think you can use this in all situations, but I think it would work well for certain things.

I went into much more detail on that than I had intended.

In Music Rehearsal?

I honestly think the most important thing you can get the students to do to improve during rehearsal is to motivate them to focus on improving at something no matter what's going on. For example, when I work with a group I say up front that if I start addressing one section, I expect the students not in that section to do something to get better. They can mentally count rhythms, finger through passages, etc. etc. There is music to memorize, and much to be done in general, and because time is the one commodity we never get back, they shouldn't waste a moment of it just because I'm addressing a section or an individual.

However, I think it's still somewhat possible to have a "community of learners" in the context of rehearsal. But you have to sacrifice something. Silence. Now this one I'm still undecided on, and I will probably arrive at a conclusion within the first couple of years of teaching, but here is what I'm debating. Actually, I tried this out over the summer and generally liked the results.

I gave the students permission to talk, but with certain restrictions. Above all else, they had to restrict their discussion to music related items. This way, if someone needed help (like a fingering or rhythm question), they had my permission to ask a neighbor before asking me. I figure the most problems they can fix on their own, the better for all of us. They were required to use the softest voice possible so that I could still communicate with who I needed to. If I could not communicate easily with who I needed to, I could remove that right. Finally, they could only ask each other questions if I was addressing someone else. If I was addressing them, I required their full attention.

You sacrifice the complete silence that most directors cherish. But silence is an interesting thing. Some students are able to focus better in complete silence, while others (particularly those who have enough siblings and animals at home) concentrate better when there is at least a little bit of ambient noise. So as long as the noise is of a low level such that I can easily communicate with who I need to, I don't think it hurts me. Silence or noise? Either way, some students are better off than others. If the noise level gets too loud, enforce the whisper rule, and if it happens again, enforce a "talk out". For non-WT people, the idea of a "talk out" is that, once enacted, only the director may speak a word. The consequences for uttering even a syllable during a talk about are apparently severe, though I never asked what happens. Everyone just shut up and I assumed if I talked I would get kicked out of band or something. I could just as easily have a student immediately put their instrument away and exit the ensemble formation, and call home after class. So through this concept it might be possible to create a community of learners even in music rehearsal, even if it was more limited. Maybe this will end up being totally wrong. But as long as the general rule is that they quietly stay on task individually until a question arises, I think it could work. Certainly a mad house is unacceptable. I've seen directors work in such an environment, but I can't imagine how, and the bands themselves were usually not that great. Of course, almost all of the talking was not related to the task at hand. But that kind of volume just plain made me angry. Anyway, I guess we'll see.

Other ideas to promote student ownership...

Have you ever considered that most subjects have student tutors, but band doesn't? Granted, even your best players have bad habits that you don't want them to pass on, but at the same time they could still offer some valuable help. I know in my high school tuba section, we traded tips all the time. In large enough cities you might have a small army of lesson teachers, but not all students can afford that, and I rarely see Jr. High/Middle School students taking lessons. Worse, what do you do if you're in a small town where no lesson teachers are available? Well, of course you can set aside some time each day to teach a private lesson or two, but you'll probably give priority to your older students, or at least those in the high school.

Keep in mind this specific idea is for small school bands, where often the Middle School and High School are merged onto one campus.

Why not have students from your top band, who are willing, able, and (based on your judgement) capable, teach lessons to beginning band students? Call them Band Tutors. Let your high school students know that these players are the future of the band, so the more help we can give them, the better the band will become when they become members. In larger areas with middle schools that have students start in the 6th grade, with 7th and 8th graders split between two skill based bands, you might still be able to find students willing to tutor beginners, but I don't know. Maybe, maybe not. But that first year of band is covering material so easy that it should be easy for even 8th graders to coach their 6th grade peers, as long as they've been well taught.

White sheets - of course. Ben Zander, conductor of the Boston Philharmonic (among other things), promotes a practice in which students answer the following question on a blank white sheet at the end of rehearsal - "What can we do to make more beautiful music?" For students, it might be that they need a cue, or need more help with a passage. But ideally what you want is feedback on the interpretation of the music itself. It might be a beautiful chord they want held out longer, or something else. You can then read over the suggestions and pick the ones you're interested in experimenting with the next time you hit those sections. With this practice, the end result is more of a collaborative effort than strictly the interpretation of the conductor (though that is the heaviest influence). Using student recommendations that are appropriate gives students a stronger feeling of ownership and pride in the music, in addition to having given them more liberty to exercise their artistic creativity.

As this has turned into a long post already, I'll conclude with these two brief ideas.

One question I've asked myself is how we can use the high school band to help support social causes both as a means for student intellectual growth as well as to build support among the community. I recall my high school band doing a food drive at least once, and at the concert the director explained that it had come from the band members and shook hands with the director of that organization on stage. Sure, it could be something as simple as that, or preferably we could maybe perform at an event or offer some volunteers or something. I'm not sure.

But what I'd like to do is compose a list of local organizations that advance various causes. At some point during the year I could give this list, with a description of the organization's purposes, to the students with instructions to read about the organizations and causes. At some point towards the end of the year we could take some time to vote on which organization(s) the students want to support in the next year. We narrow it down to 1-2, and then I can get in touch with those organizations to see how we could get involved. This way, not only are we building a positive reputation and positive connections throughout the community, but the students are learning positive values in the process, and have ownership over which causes the band supports. Hopefully it will involve a performance of some type, but that might not always be the case.

Finally, I'm also interested in having students choose the theme for the marching show each year. I'm currently preparing for the event that, like most other ASU music grads, I'll end up with a job as a director at a small school (though I wouldn't mind a job working with beginners in a large area, as I think it would benefit me more in the long run). With that in mind, I'm gradually piecing together a show, just in case that happens. But after that first year I could let the students help with that. My instructions would include paying more attention in their core classes to discover the underlying lessons and themes that can apply broadly to benefit us as Americans, or as a human race. For example, a student studying World War II in history, or related literature in English, may discover some important lessons about the evils of oppression. If the theme of oppression (not a show title, but a theme... part of the show's message) made the final cut, then I could go forth and find music that suited that theme. Shostakovitch or any number of composers would have great music that could be applicable to such a theme. I would provide guidance through the elimination process, but the end result would be based on what the students wanted the show to convey. Then I could go find the music and put the show together. This way the students get at least a small amount of ownership at the ground level of the show, while I still do the most important aspect (at least in my view), programming. But just this small thing makes the show their show, their message, and so on.

Well, that's a LOT of ideas I've thrown out there. What are your thoughts? Are any of them good? Or are they crazy? Your feedback is always appreciated. Thank you, as always, for reading, and take care!

Musically yours,
Mr. Cooper