Amy M. Burns

Elementary Music Technology and Integration

Amy M. Burns has taught PreK-grade 4 general music for over 25 years at Far Hills Country Day School (FH) (https://www.fhcds.org/). She also teaches grade 5 instrument class, directs the FH Philharmonic, is the Performing Arts Department Manager, and teaches privately in the after-school conservatory after being the director for over 20 years. She has authored four books and numerous articles on how to integrate tech into the elementary music classroom. She has presented many sessions on the topic, including four keynote addresses in TX, IN, St. Maarten, and AU. She is the recipient of the 2005 Technology in Music Education (TI:ME) Teacher of the Year, the 2016 New Jersey Music Educators Association (NJMEA) Master Music Teacher, the 2016 Governor’s Leader in Arts Education, and the 2017 NJ Nonpublic School Teacher of the Year Awards. Her most recent publication, Using Technology with Elementary Music Approaches (2020), published by Oxford University Press (OUP) is available from OUP and Amazon. Burns is also the Community Coordinator for Midnight Music (MMC) at https://midnightmusic.com/, the General Music Chair for NJMEA Board of Directors, and the Elementary Music Consultant for MusicFirst (https://www.musicfirst.com/), a company built by music educators for music educators, dedicated to helping music teachers and their students make the most of technology in the classroom.

#techtiptuesday MFE #7 - 3 Ideas for using the Kodály Supplementary Tab in Class

April 16, 2024  /  Amy M. Burns

What is MusicFirst Elementary?

MusicFirst Elementary Powered by Charanga is a cloud-based curriculum designed for elementary general music, catering to grades K-5 (with plans to include preschool and grade 6) and consisting of 36 progressive lessons per grade. Upon logging in to MusicFirst Elementary, you will find an interactive resource acting as a virtual textbook, complemented by lesson plans, curriculum guides, assessment resources, and six innovative web-based tools such as a drum machine and a digital audio workstation for music creation and video scoring. Originally created by Charanga for global use, MusicFirst Elementary is fully compliant with the National Core Arts Standards, ensuring that all standards are met at each grade level. With a successful track record in the UK for over 27 years, used in more than 70% of schools, the curriculum has been adjusted to align with the U.S. educational system.

Recently, MusicFirst Elementary has expanded its curriculum by integrating new materials based on feedback from elementary music teachers. One of the latest enhancements is the Supplementary Tab, offering a well-curated collection of resources to enhance music lessons.

The Supplementary Tab includes practical teaching aids related to classroom instruments, Kodàly instruction, Spanish songs from all of the grade levels, engaging animations to assist in learning musical elements, theory and instrumets, musical productions, and games, enabling educators to elevate their lesson plans by incorporating these resources.

The video focuses on Kodaly Supplementary Songs, offering a collection of Kodaly Folk Songs that can be tailored to suit your students' skill levels. You can teach these songs using stick notation, staff notation, solfege syllables, and hand signs.

#techtiptuesday

An idea we can do for decoding the melody is to hide the lyrics and the solfa hand signals. For example, we could use Cobbler Cobber. We hide the lyrics, hide the hands, and press the vocal tab on the bottom. Click play and pause after the first phrase. Ask the students to echo the singing. Then ask them to decode the pitches. Continue for the remaining phrases. If this is a lesson where they are practicing rhythms, you can have them decode the rhythm as well.

Another idea for this type of setup is to improvise new lyrics. Let’s go into La-sol-mi and click on Harry Hare. This melody is very similar to We Are Dancing In the Forest, so you could hide the lyrics and click on the solfa tab at the bottom of the screen. Have the students listen to the solfa and ask them if they can identify another song with those pitches. Then have them create their own song using those pitches and their own lyrics. 

And another idea is to grab a tone set like the C Major Tone Set and click on the three dots next to it. I can then add it to a lesson or create a new lesson around this tone set and add resources from the curriculum. In this example, I will add it to the Rainbows Song in 1st grade since it is keyed in C Major and I can review the tone set with them using this resource and customizing the lesson so that it is added to Unit 3 Lesson 1

This is just one tab in the Supplementary Tab. Check back to deep dive into more of what this has to offer. And if you would like a brief description, check out the MFE #techtiptuesday playlist for shorter, briefer videos of MusicFirst Elementary! The wise folks at MusicFirst Elementary Powered by Charanga have crafted an amazing program for your elementary music classroom!

Resources

MusicFirst Elementary 30-day Free Trial: https://www.musicfirst.com/software/musicfirst-elementary

MusicFirst Elementary Playlist with in-depth videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO2UG241-fB6Ghg2abkM1PvcB-j1TySq-

MusicFirst Elementary #techtiptuesday with shorter videos: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLO2UG241-fB5gvd-38w5B9OYFkiwGgLhZ

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