BP7_Comment to JeVaughn Jones

JeVaughn has found a great web-based music production site similar to Garageband, called Soundation.
Please follow this link to my comments on her Blog.

BP 6_Comment to Cherie Hellenbrand's Post

      Click on this link to see my comments on Cherie Hellenbrand's post on Goanimate

BP5_Songsterr

http://www.songsterr.com

Songsterr is a website dedicated to guitar music and notation.  TAB is a unique music notation system developed solely for guitar and bass guitar.  There are hundreds of TAB sites online.  Songsterr is unique because of it’s interactivity and breadth of TAB for popular guitar songs available.   As a music teacher who has a few sections of guitar, this site has been a great engagement tool for my students who want to learn the latest guitar songs and classics of the past.  Thanks to Guitar Hero and Rock Band many popular musicians of old are still popular today.

As I demonstrate Songsterr in the Screenflow above, the features that make Songsterr so great are the mixing capabilities, printing function, and half speed capability.  It’s neat to have the ability to hear all the parts to a particular song along with the part that you are working on.  You can then mute that part and play along with the rest of tracks.  Also as the tracks play you can choose to play the metronome to help you stay steady, a built in tuner and a scrubber tool so you can see where you are suppose to be in the song!

Features about this website which makes it a great Web2.0 Tool is the fact that you can leave comments and feedback about the TAB that you are you playing.  You can flag TABS for incorrectness or other things, you can submit corrections to TABS and you can submit your own TABS.  In order to fix or submit tabs you do need to purchase additional software called Guitar Pro.  Some cons that I’ve noticed about the site is that to get all the features such as the mixing capabilities and printing, you need to pay for a subscription.  The TABS are not always correct.  The TAB doesn’t teach you about technique. (Although that’s my job as a teacher :-) ) It would be nice to be able to have more control on the tempo.  Not just half speed and full speed.  The sounds are MIDI based and not super realistic.

I need to give Annie Woodle thanks for introducing this site to me.  It’s really been great and I’ve been able to implement it into the program that I teach.

BP4_Simple Diagrams_WEB20Tool

Simple Diagrams

http://www.go2web20.net/site/?a=SimpleDiagrams

Simple Diagrams is a great program to communicate and convey your ideas in a simple and fun way.  As an educator this can be an effective tool to help students learn complicated skills and concepts that normally would take a long explanation in shorter amount of time.  By the time a verbal or written explanation is used you may lose half your students.  Because Simple diagrams uses symbols and pictures along with text you are reaching linguistic, spatial and logic learners.  The above example simplifies and possibly conveys in a clearer manner what I am writing here in 250 words.  This is a much more effective means of communication while the playful graphics helps to create a more memorable and enjoyable learning experience.  In my classroom I could see using this software to create concept maps and brainstorm sessions.  This would also be beneficial in creating detailed steps for concepts and lessons that may be difficult in a simplified manner.  Often times in band we have many detailed steps and things we need to know in preparation for concerts and performances.  Using this software will help communicate complex messages to parents and students.  Some cons from using this software so far is that the free version does not allow to save and an annoying popup appears about every 5 minutes.  You can only export to a PNG file and you can’t print which may reduce flexibility of output.  However there are easy ways around this, it may just add more time and steps.  Overall I was impressed with the simplicity of the application, ease of use and effectiveness in which it can be used to communicate messages.

W1_Reading

Garageband Screenshot

My AR research is going to center around the implementation of a practice software called Smartmusic by Makemusic.  Smartmusic will allow me to create assignments by using music from any number of popular band method books that are available on the market today.  I can also create assignments from music that we are preparing as an ensemble and I can create assignments using the music notation software, Finale.  As I gather my research materials I will be focusing on the following 3 subtopics:

1. Computer Assisted Instruction (CAI) in music and Current practices
2. Development of sound musical practice habits
3. Motivation and engagement in music

Dunnigan, P. (1993). The computer in instrumental music. Music Educators Journal, 80(1), 32. Retrieved from Education Research Complete database.

This article will serve as a resource for my CAI and current practices subtopic.  As this article is seriously out of date it will not serve well from a data stand-point.  However the author made several points that are still relevant even in today’s upgraded computer systems.  What strikes me as funny is that Dunnigan cited 3 most common computers in use (at that time); Apple II, IBM and Macintosh! The article looked at a study of Michigan band and orchestra directors and their use of computers.  While it found that nearly half of the directors used computers, most of them used it for the sole purpose of clerical work.  There was very little done regarding instruction and pedagogy.   This depicts exactly what I have hypothesized that is still happening in today’s world of band and orchestra instruction.  Dunnigan also pointed out my same reasons as to why computers are not used which is that most schools lacked equipment available for serious instruction and in many school systems, budgets were getting tighter and tax dollars were dwindling, thus making the acquisition of computer equipment a real challenge.  Even after nearly a decade ago these things still seem to be true.

McDowall, J. (2009). Making Music Multimodally: Young Children Learning with Music Technology. International Journal of Learning, 16(10), 303-315. Retrieved from Education Research Complete database.

This articles focus will be part of my CAI and current practices subtopic.  This study was conducted on Australian elementary music students’ engagement and comprehension in music concepts.  A series of lessons designed around computer based music software was implemented in 2 classes.  The software involved was a loop based composition software called Super Duper Music Looper and a midipad software synthesizer.  The teachers used the software and hardware to explore music concepts and also had students create music and sounds with the software.  The study found significant improvement in engagement and proficiencies at learning some of the musical concepts.  Additionally the study showed that the learning processes and activities would not have been able to be duplicated using traditional school music resources.

Crawford, R. (2009). Secondary school music education: A case study in adapting to ICT resource limitations. Australasian Journal of Educational Technology, 25(4), 471-488. Retrieved from Education Research Complete database.

This article would also fall under CAI and current practices.   The paper was a study of Australian Music teachers’ use of computers in their music programs.  Even though Australian music teachers on average have a lot of technology available to them, the study focused on one particular individual and their perception of technology.  She taught in a particular area and school that had serious limitations in technology.  It showed that technology was severely missing in her class and subsequent interviews indicated why.  She stated that inferior quality technology and lack of adequate amounts of technology hampered her efforts to use technology.  While the article is more recent it is still missing relevance in my research since it reports only what is currently happening in Australia.

Walker, D. (1995). Connecting Right and Left Brain: Increasing Academic Performance of African American Students through the Arts. Retrieved from ERIC database.

This article will help support my subtopic Motivation and engagement in music.  The article studied the effect of an after school fine arts program for at-risk students in the Lansing, Michigan area.  The premise of the study purported that the study of fine arts not only improved on scholastic achievement but also improved on student self confidence and social responsibility because fine arts incorporated whole brain learning.  The author believed that it is this factor that at-risk students should participate in such activities.  The study included about 68 students 54 of whom were identified as at-risk, who participated in an afterschool fine arts program.  The study found that the afterschool program did have a positive affect in both increasing student achievement in school and increasing student confidence and social responsibility.

BP3_Diigo Group

So I am new to Diigo, but so far it looks to be a very cool and an effective tool in my research.  Looking forward to seeing how well the collaboration portion works.

If you would like to join the group please feel free to click on the link below.  It's free!  Well it'll cost you some of your time! :-)

http://groups.diigo.com/group/tkbachAR


Here are the much anticipated screenshots for my A+ Grade

I'm part of the Ripples Group!

My Group page

BP2_iGoogle Screen Shots

Home TAB

FSO TAB

AR TAB

ETC TAB