2008/09/16 Using Digital Media in a variety of ways

When my school first had access to Discovery Education Streaming (it was a different name then) I was in love immediately. I felt as though a thousand doors had opened in my classroom and my students and I could walk through any for a new adventure every day. For me, it was another lucky penny in my pocket.
I teach general music to students from kindergarten through the eighth grade. Every year we discuss the same musical elements, with some occaisional new subjects, but generally the focus remains the same but the exploration becomes more in depth with each advancing grade level. I have decided to use sound as my topic focus for my project. Obviously, sound is important to music however my students, like many people, assume they understand sound. They take it for granted that it is there and a part of music. But how it happens, how it works, why is it is important, what does it do for us, these are all important questions that need to be asked.
The video on Discovery Education Streaming on Sound will give me the opportunity to help my students explore all the avenues of sound and eventually lead us to a more musical path of instruments and the voice. A segment can be used as an introduction to what sound is. The segment can help students then discover the properties of sound. In discussing musical instruments students can categorize them by how they produce their sounds. Instruments can change pitch but how does that occur? Students can listen to environmental sounds and compare them to traditional sounds. Students can design and create their own simple instruments based on the principles they have discovered on their exploration of sound. We also have discussed hearing loss in young people and this could also take our class down the negative side of sound.
I am really excited about this project! I think that this idea will easily adapt for different age levels and the activities will reach the multiple intelligences of my classes. I think my challenge will be in keeping the work concise and streamlined and not becoming a curriculum unto itself.