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.

Countdown to 2024: 10 Elementary Music Activities for a First Day Back to School #2

December 31, 2023  /  Amy M. Burns

#2 A Music Game and Using https://app.magicschool.ai/ to Create First Day Back Activities

In this post, I leave a very popular music game “Let Us Chase the Squirrel” and a tool that can assist you in creating last-minute activities and games.

Music Game: Let Us Chase the Squirrel

Using https://app.magicschool.ai/ to Create First Day Back Activities

Last August, I attended the New Jersey Association of Independent Schools (NJAIS) Innovation Conference and discovered the website Magic School, which is an Innovative AI-powered platform designed specifically to assist teachers in a myriad of tasks related to lesson planning, assessment writing, and communication. When I vlogged about it on my YouTube channel just a few months back, the video now is outdated due to how many advances Magic School has made over the past few months.

Two Activities Created with Magic School

Activity #1: Having Magic School Create a Lesson Plan with an Activity (free version)

When I logged into Magic School, I discovered that I have the paid Plus version available to use for the next couple of weeks. The first activity can be found in the free version.

I click on the Planning filter at the top of the page and scroll down to Lesson Planning.

  • I used Grade 2 as the average grade between Preschool and Grade 4.

  • In the Topic box, I inputted “First Day Back Activities from a Winter Break for Elementary Music Class”.

  • In the Additional Criteria, I typed “Music Games”.

  • The result is below. It is a rhythm activity that is similar to #4 “Decode Wordart into Rhythms” which I wrote yesterday.

  • I also tried the 5E (Engage, Explore, Explain, Elaborate, and Evaluate) Lesson Activity and you can see more results below. This gives you a more in-depth activity where you can go through all of the Es or pick and choose the best that will work for your class.

  • If you need a quick activity, that will be written as a lesson plan with objectives and standards and would be able to be used in your classroom, this free website is wonderful.

Activity #2: Asking Raina the AI Chatbot to Create an Activity (Paid Version)

Raina is the AI Chatbot.

Since I have a free trial for a couple of weeks to the paid version, I decided to ask Magic School’s chatbot to create an activity.

  • I clicked on Raina on the left side of the screen.

  • I first asked Raina: “Please give me the first day back from break music activities for elementary music class”.

It gave me five activities that varied from games to singing. As I read through them, I could adapt these for various grade levels.

I then tried again. I asked Raina:

  • “Create an activity for the first day back to an elementary music class from winter break.”

This time Raina gave me one thorough activity. This would be more challenging to pull off because not every class or grade level would connect to this activity. I came to the assumption as most people do with AI tools: be as specific as possible and ask for many choices.

Pricing:

If you are interested in checking out Magic School, I feel that it is worth the time to check it out. This site can save you a lot of time and provide you with many ideas. It also can greatly assist you in writing those emails that can be challenging to write, give you ideas for writing letters of recommendation, assist you in writing reports, help you write that song for the administrator who is retiring, and so much more!

If you are interested in checking out Magic School, I feel that it is worth the time to check it out. This site can save you a lot of time and provide you with many ideas. It also can greatly assist you in writing those emails that can be challenging to write, give you ideas for writing letters of recommendation, assist you in writing reports, help you write that song for the administrator who is retiring, and so much more!

Come back tomorrow for #1 as we will have reached 2024! Don’t forget to check out the first day’s New Year’s Rhythm Play-Along video and the Steady Beat Play-Along for the youngest elementary students!

Resources:

Magic School: https://app.magicschool.ai/

Let Us Chase the Squirrel: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1db-8tLsK3EGARYyT3VbWOrg-B2GXGhpq/view?usp=sharing

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