I started my field observations yesterday morning. I'm observing a 3rd grade class this semester. This school is definitely a lot different than the other schools I've observed at before; it's only 11 years old and definitely full of the more privileged, advanced kids. I'm not sure if I will like it ...
I didn't do anything in the way of actually interacting with kids. The classroom teacher told me she only wanted me to observe, so that's what I did. It wasn't too bad, because the kids had music and gym, so I was able to move around. But still ... I really hope I get to do some real things next time I come. I know I will do some actual teaching eventually, I'm just hoping that day comes really soon.
Friday, February 20, 2009
Wednesday, February 18, 2009
Musical instruments
One of the assignments for one of my education classes - Teaching in the Primary Grades - was to create some kind of creative expressions something that could be used in an elementary classroom (i.e. bulletin boards, beanbags, calendars, puppets,props for a book, etc). Being the musical person I am, I decided to make some musical instruments out of recycled materials. My original plan was to make many different kinds of percussion instruments. My list included: tambourines, shakers, maracas, rainsticks, and castanets. I emailed several friends and asked them to save some of their trash for me. I mostly received water bottles and toilet paper tubes, so I decided to narrow my list of instruments down to two: maracas and shakers.
Yesterday, I spent most of the afternoon creating instruments. Dori was kind enough to help me. The maracas were easy. We just poured some rice into them, glued the caps on, and painted the outsides. The shakers were a bit harder since we had to close the ends of the toilet paper tubes somehow.
Dori came up with the idea of cutting pieces of construction paper a bit larger than the ends of the toilet paper tubes and taping them in place. That worked really well.
It was kind of challenging to come up with different designs to paint on each instrument.
The end result was certainly nothing special, but I think it will serve its intended purpose.
I also got lots of cool paintbrushes out of the whole ordeal. Definitely worth it :P
Yesterday, I spent most of the afternoon creating instruments. Dori was kind enough to help me. The maracas were easy. We just poured some rice into them, glued the caps on, and painted the outsides. The shakers were a bit harder since we had to close the ends of the toilet paper tubes somehow.
Dori came up with the idea of cutting pieces of construction paper a bit larger than the ends of the toilet paper tubes and taping them in place. That worked really well. It was kind of challenging to come up with different designs to paint on each instrument.
The end result was certainly nothing special, but I think it will serve its intended purpose. I also got lots of cool paintbrushes out of the whole ordeal. Definitely worth it :P
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