Strategies for Effective Teaching and Learning

Sound and Sight:
The Use of Song to Promote Language Learning

Trina Timoti/1188621/18th July 2013

Reference

Margaret Trinick, R. (2012). Sound and Sight: The Use of Song to Promote Language Learning. General Music Today, 25(2), 5-10. doi:10.1177/1048371311402066

Article Summary
The author Robyn Margaret Trinick passionately enlightens the reader to consider “what would life be like without music or singing”. She looks at the pressures put onto teachers and how music is put on the back bench, with many teachers now seeing this subject as less important and too time consuming.
Trinick suggests that music is an important social and cultural experience for every child because it incorporates personal and cultural expression, which is a big part of our ever growing society and creates a sense of belonging and well-being for each student in and out of the classroom setting. Trinick explores if music is innovative or if greater awareness is needed, and how we learn through music. She also looks into the domains of mutual benefit, song choice and issues that may and will arise, and what can be done to overcome these.
The author has a particular interest in connections between music and literacy, seeing it as a valuable tool for learning, particularly during a child 's first 4 years of school.
Throughout the article analysis is identified and discussed with a range of key elements, principles and literature for benefits and issues, focusing attention on the affective, linguistic, cultural, and cognitive benefits of using song’s in the classroom.

This informative article concludes with the author noting the importance of more research needed and gives evidence of a teacher asking her student’s what their thoughts are on music, which gives a nice ending.

Critique 1

The author Trinick has written about a subject that I also see as an integral part of education and development. Trinick has used varying examples to express her knowledge and insight into way’s teachers can incorporate music or singing into their classroom environment. A good example of this was shown with the lyrics ‘Ma is white, whero is red’. This iconic New Zealand song is a good example of how two cultures and two languages can be incorporated in a fun way, to help children understand not only linguistics, reading and rhyme but also how to better understand and appreciate the native tongue of Aotearoa. She sees singing as helping learning, which could be extended into all subject areas, as a fun, and educational activity for all children. For example, songs could be used to help children learn, practice and internalize concepts such as alphabet songs, counting, grammar and punctuation songs "School House Rock” (Kinderart, 1995), “Multiplication 7" (School House Rock) and “Songs for Teaching about Question Marks and Their Use”. These give children a great learning foundation to gain important concepts. In my view children gain a broader appreciation and understanding of all subjects, retaining more information through music and song, because “research has proven that children who are taught with music score 34% higher on IQ tests than children that aren 't”, (Teaching through Music).
Robyn Trinick expresses concern for teachers to not feel pressured into eliminating this integral subject, due to growing demand of the New Zealand governments National Standards, requiring teachers to gain greater evidence of student achievement in the areas of numeracy and literacy. I fully agree with her; however I would have liked to see examples of how this could have been achieved.
I like how the New Zealand curriculum was used with “children begin to make meaning of the ideas they are receiving” (Ministry of Education, 1996) with the emphasis on meaning, which I believe we all gain when something we see or do becomes relevant to us in our lives, and helps us to relate to others better. The author gives examples of how jingles in adverts and the alphabet song (due to repetition), stick in the memory bank. I would have liked to have seen stronger examples of how to create an environment of good memory, thinking and creativity in the classroom, by using examples like de Bono’s “Six Thinking Hats". This would be a good way for teacher’s to encourage students to come up with different songs for different subjects, which uses parallel thinking and achieves the given task effectively in small groups. Another idea is the use of songs, and sing-a-long story books, to teach reading and listening comprehension. Students can act out and sing the story line, determine sequence of events, analyze characters, and much more.

In conclusion, the author used a good variety of quotes and evidence from numerous reputable writers to strengthen her case on why music and singing is so important, which is good. I would have liked to see statistics or graphs giving evidence of success with children using music and singing compared to not using it, in everyday New Zealand classroom’s.

LESSON PLAN
In my lesson plan or lessons I would start my day with gently playing music, for example something melodic without singing, to encourage the students to quietly settle. Once settled the students will be advised that music will be used to facilitate transitions between activities and this will be the norm every morning from now on. This is so the students have a familiar sound to recognize and use as a foundation for certain times of their day. For example the same song will be played every time I want the students to come quickly and quietly to the mat where they will be required to wait patiently till everyone is seated. A welcome or name song can be sung in the morning upon arrival. Another song can be used to signal the end of an activity. A closing song can be used to sum up the day 's activities and remind students of materials to take home. To encourage further motivation in the students they will be given the opportunity at the beginning of mat time to come up with their favorite song’s which will be written onto card by the teacher if working with very young students or student written if working with more able students. The cards will be placed into a box that the students will brightly decorate, giving them ownership of it and a feeling of importance. A student will be given the opportunity to pull a card out of the box before morning tea and another student will pull a card out before lunch. The first song will be sung to start class time immediately after morning tea and the second to start class immediately after lunch. This will encourage the students to be seated and ready to go and will also encourage the more reluctant students if they were the one to have chosen the song.
After lunch and the chosen song sung, the teacher will hand out a blank sheet of A4 paper and a crayon to each student. They will then be advised to find a space away from others. They will be told this is a time to enhance expressive vocabulary which involves drawing and then a group discussion. Music will be played to encourage students to draw what they see and feel. When enough time has elapsed the students will be encouraged to regroup and a class discussion can be activated to talk about the emotions expressed in the music and how they are reflected in the drawings. If the children are struggling to stay focused, I will play or hum foreboding music such as the theme from Pragnet, Chopin 's "Funeral March," or the theme from Jaws. This will tell the children they are not on track or are in trouble. The music will stop when focus or order is regained. This lesson should take 45 minutes.

REFERENCES
Priggen, P. (Producer). (n.d.). The story of stuff [Motion picture]. Retrieved January 25, 2008 from http://www.storyofstuff.com/index.html

Dorough, B. - Three Is A Magic Number- YouTube. (n.d.). YouTube. Retrieved July 18, 2013 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDbeVB4admk

Kinderart. (1995). School house rock. [Video Disc]. Retrieved July 18, 2013, from http://www.kinderart.com. San Mateo, CA. Creative Wonders.

Krause, K. L. D., Bochner, S., & Duchesne, S. (2003). Educational psychology: For learning and teaching (2nd ed.). South Melbourne, Vic: Cengage Learning Australia.

Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: Early childhood curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media.

School House Rock - Multiplcation 7 - YouTube. (n.d.). YouTube. Retrieved July 19, 2013, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RgCJw64yNA

Teaching through Music. Kidedotals: Social Learning Community - Free K-12 Lesson Plans,
Videos, Songs, Learning Modules, Parent & Teacher Training. Retrieved July 20, 2013, from http://kidedotals.com/book/export/html/22

Song for Teaching about Question Marks and Their Use. (n.d.). Educational Songs & Children 's Music from Songs for Teaching®. Retrieved July 20, 2013, from http://www.songsforteaching.com/kidzup/q

References: Priggen, P. (Producer). (n.d.). The story of stuff [Motion picture].  Retrieved January 25, 2008 from http://www.storyofstuff.com/index.html Dorough, B. - Three Is A Magic Number- YouTube. (n.d.). YouTube. Retrieved July 18, 2013 from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LDbeVB4admk Kinderart. (1995). School house rock. [Video Disc]. Retrieved July 18, 2013, from http://www.kinderart.com Krause, K. L. D., Bochner, S., & Duchesne, S. (2003). Educational psychology: For learning and teaching (2nd ed.) Ministry of Education. (1996). Te Whariki: Early childhood curriculum. Wellington, New Zealand: Learning Media. School House Rock - Multiplcation 7 - YouTube. (n.d.). YouTube. Retrieved July 19, 2013, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0RgCJw64yNA Music from Songs for Teaching®. Retrieved July 20, 2013, from http://www.songsforteaching.com/kidzup/q