Get FLAT for EDUCATION accounts for you and your students HERE! I love Flat for Education.  There are so many ways to use it as teacher!  I can't imagine not having it.  I've been purchasing student accounts for each one of my students every year for the past 3 years.  At first, I had students login occasionally to play around with notation, composition, or complete a rhythm assignment.  The more I use Flat, the more uses I find for my students.  This year when I announced to my students that I purchased them Flat accounts, they cheered and thanked me!&nb ..read more

  I found this cool Halloween decoration for my home...and I've been looking at it thinking I'd like to use it in class one day for a rehearsal game...  I bought some eyeball bouncing balls from WalMart and I put one of each color (pink, blue, green, orange) in each caldron.  Students will pick a caldron, then choose an eyeball from a caldron.  The color on the eyeball dictates the challenge we will work on in class. Here's the link:  SKELETON Here's the link: EYEBALLS You don't have to have a prop like that because I made the entire thing in Canva!  It's als ..read more

  For some background on this, I teach 364 students each day in 6 class periods at one school.  4 periods of beginning orchestra and 2 very large class periods of intermediate (year 2) orchestra.  On Tuesday this week, I had one class period that was extra wiggly and distracted.  They had been making excellent progress and I considered them to be one of my best sounding classes until this week.  As I reflected on what had caused this change, I realized it was because we needed to review rehearsal procedures.  I don't find it very effective to lecture students ab ..read more

 Here's a fun way for beginners to practice the song 'Itsy Bitsy Spider.'  Let them figure out the notes and play it to see if they wrote the notes correctly!  Includes parts for violin, viola, cello and bass! FREE HERE ..read more

  It can to tricky to find music for beginning orchestra for a first concert in October.  My beginners can play Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, and they could use some practice at reading the notes we have learned so far.  This piece uses the same notes from Twinkles:  D, E, F#, G, A, and B.  The rhythms are easy and quickly learned.  Students learn dynamics, and they learn how to make a cool sound effect (pizz and slide).  I have included parts with regular notation for students who are fast at note reading and also parts with simplified notation (note names ..read more

  On Friday, my students finished their first 2 weeks of playing instruments.  They have been FLYING in their progress and I've been enjoying helping them learn and grow musically.  I started to think of all of the concepts they have learned and are practicing to refine so far.  It's quite a list! 1. Bow holds on straws 2. Bow holds on pencils 3. Bows holds on bows 4. Bow exercises 5. Instrument care 6. Instrument parts 7. Rest position 8. Instrument set up 9. Ready position 10. Play position 11. Pizzicato 12. Rock n rolls: bow placement 13. Bow weight, bow speed 14. Open ..read more

  My students LOVE it when we play rehearsal games!  It's a great way to increase student engagement and focus on specific skills.  Fortnite is huge right now and it was really fun making this Fortnite inspired game.  I hope you like it!    I designed the game in Google Slides.   It's fully editable - so teachers can change the notes, excerpts and rhythms as needed.  I used screenshots or 'music snippets' for each of those.  Best of all....It's FREE! CLICK HERE  to access your free download ..read more

  I'm so excited...IT'S FINALLY FINISHED!  I've been working on this project for quite awhile and I can't wait to use it with my students.  My students do a lot of bell-work activities at the beginning of class and it's been working well to use that time for students to practice writing rhythms or note names.   It's a great way to help students learn notes...BUT...students need more than worksheets.  I have noticed my students get very good at writing note names and learning notes on paper.  When it comes to actually PLAYING those notes, the skill doesn't a ..read more

  Do you know what students need more of?  CHOICE!  To motivate students, they need to develop ownership of their playing and progression.  One way to intrinsically motivate students is to provide options and allow students a voice in the learning process.  I just designed this beginning orchestra warm up game called WARM UP ROULETTE!  Try it!  Let me know how it goes.   CLICK HERE TO PLAY! (It's like a slide show, so viewing it works best from a computer ..read more

  One thing I always wish for at the start of each school year is more VERY EASY beginning orchestra music for our first concert.  Our first concert is always at the end of October.  By that time, students are just solidifying note reading on the D string (perhaps some A string notes as well).  They have learned the standard rep all beginners have learned...Mary Had a Little Lamb, Twinkle, etc....but those tunes are so short (thought we often do perform those at our concert...there's time for them to perform everything they have learned!)   I also want them to l ..read more