Teaching Academic Skills Through the Exploration of Music
Sloan Edward Williams III
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Give FeedbackWhat Students Gain Through This Type of Study
Students gain both music and academic skills through this type of curriculum unit. Music skills can be acquired for basic musical symbols, notation and musical concepts. Music symbols such as the staff, treble and bass clefs and bar lines are fim to learn if put into the context of a film, literature or game. Students will also leam the notes of the staff when the treble clef is in use, what a time signature is (like 4/4,3/4/, and 6/8/), and very basic dynamic markings: forte, mezzoforte, piano. Students will also learn the basic elements of a simple musical phrase or melody such as (Three Blind Mice). With an interdisciplinary approach more abstract concepts such as foreshadowing can be clearly presented by first showing that concept used in a film clip, then demonstrating the same concept in terms of musical themes (foreshadowing) with music either by means of the same film clip or a series of short musical sections shown on film. Foreshadowing can then be presented in a literary text. The process of the adaptation of a key concept or abstract idea will be explained in more detail later in this unit. The advantage of this manner of teaching is that concepts that are hard to convey when presented by themselves become easier for students to identify, see and understand when seen in action in different disciplines.
Academic skills learned through this type of curriculum unit will depend on the background, the defined need area(s) of the students, the grade, level and the types of teaching styles and experience of the teacher using this procedure. The student needs of an elementary school art teacher are different from the student needs of a person teaching an advanced high school English acting and creative writing course. The desired outcome from the students taught by each teacher who uses this unit is also as diverse as the approach presented. Some of the defined academic skill areas are as follows:
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1. Vocabulary lists: help to map, draw out, define, indentify, or clarify the context of an abstract idea or concept presented in more than one discipline. For example, the concept of theme used in “Star Wars” can be presented by using the introduction of the film.
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Theme: The central subject of a work of art, film, musical piece, or book.
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Leitmotif: A short musical phrase that is designed by a composer to characterize an object, image, symbol or person in a dramatic work, like a musical theme.
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Plot: The main story of a literary or dramatic work.
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Film Plot: The main plot of a film.
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Character: Features and traits that form the individual nature of a person or a thing.
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Students see, hear, and read the concept of theme while viewing the introduction of the film clip of,”Star Wars”. Leitmotif is used for each character including the opening of the film plot with the specific musical phase, song or melody to match. The plot of the film is read as a text just as a person would do if reading a novel. The concept of theme becomes understood readily by the students viewing the film. The character of the music can also be related to what is being viewed on film. A music teacher working on the orchestra can have students pick out different instruments, and also talk about how each instrument might represent a type of character, or create a type of mood.
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2. Exposure to science: the use of a journal is a way to encourage students to participate in the development of their powers of observation. With the use of film clips, a teacher can demonstrate the benefits of observation not only in science, which, of course, is the first step to scientific thinking, but can show how that same skill applies to art and music as well. Scientific relationships such as in the film ‘Jurassic Park” can take the rather unknown point of view of a paleontologist and bring it into the realm of filmgoer. Film can dramatically present the wonder of the great scientific minds and why their contributions are so great. The study of sound waves in this film is a point of departure for music as well. Sound waves are used to observe and find dinosaurs in this film. The graphing of sound waves or the use of sonar demonstrates the mathematical form of observation, or using math to view or study the what is normally not visible to our world. Musical notation is also a form of graphing, observation of, or recording of sound waves. The choice of how their powers of observation are used, whether for science, music, literature, or art is theirs.
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3. Historical Perspective: whenever you use more than one discipline to convey or present a concept historical context or perspective is only a film clip away. While social studies, music or American history is not the central subject of this unit, there is another advantage of using this type of approach. Many filmscore composers use music actually from the time period in which a film is set or create music based on musical forms, structure and styles from a time period shown on film.
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4. Developmental Skills: this area of learning is one that can not be addressed directly, yet is of utmost importance in terms of the acquisition of academic skills. If a central concept is presented through the lens of differing disciplines, cognitive, listening, memory, analytic, even gross and fine motor skills are stimulated. Since virtual reality machines are at present new, awkward, and very expensive for most classrooms to employ practically in the classroom, film clips are the next best thing. The more senses that are involved, the more learning has the chance to take place in the classroom as a whole. Given that each person learns in different ways, the multiplicity of a interdisciplinary approach supports a wide range of levels, styles, and types of learning in the class room.