An update

Well, May came and went and I didn't blog. I think about blogging...then I don't because nothing interesting is going on. I guess now that it's June and my year is drawing to a close, I may as well sum up what's been going on. We just had a pops concert that was organized mostly by the orchestra teacher which included the 2 jazz bands and some members of the chorus.  It was a great concert and lots of fun - I got to play snare drum and hi-hat for a couple of the orchestra pieces! I also co-arranged the grand finale (Gangnam Style) with the orchestra teacher which featured the jazz bands, orchestra, a Korean student doing the rap, and dancers! 

After the concert back in April, I began a strange new journey into figuring out what the heck to teach the kids for the rest of the year. Being that this is the first year the 8th and 9th grade band kids are separated and being taught by 2 people, I got to figure out how much of the composition project that the other teacher traditionally does I would use and how much I would come up with on my own. I spent about 2 weeks doing sight reading and teaching the kids about phrase structure, doing improvisation exercises, working on ear training (more on that in a later post), one listening assignment, and a little theory as we went for the kids to understand the details of what I was teaching a little better.  After that I decided I wanted to teach them about compositional techniques such as theme and variation and assigned a theme and variation assignment - to write 2 variations on Hot Cross Buns.  I had a lot of fun writing the rubric for the composition assignment because that really forced me to realize my end goals for the students. Probably in real life, you're supposed to come up with firm objectives and then do the rubric, but it was sort of a hand-in-hand thing. I mean, I knew that the kids needed to have an understanding of how to write a manuscript so I borrowed (and was sure to credit) the 9th grade band director's rubric about correct number of beats per measure, if the key, clef, and time signature were in the correct order and were there, musical terms were spelled correctly, etc. I used that for 50/100 points then wrote the next 50 points of rubric.  It was hard for me to quantify "musical creativity" which was a main part of what I hoped the students would get out of the project so I came up with categories such as using more than 2 elements of variation for full points (changing rhythm, adding pitches, changing the time signature, altering the octave of the theme, adding in new sounds like clapping or trills) and making sure there was variation between variations.  So far as I'm grading the variations, all the kids have been getting good scores and some of them wrote great stuff! 

Besides the compositions, the students had etude testing (which is happening now) and also had a chamber group project.  That chamber project had another cool rubric that emphasized that a chamber group of any size needs to have communication, have well-thought out positioning, leaders, agree on style, basically all the stuff that college musicians still work on in chamber music. I hadn't conducted a full-group-reading-a-piece-type rehearsal in a long time until we were working on 3/8 and 6/8 this past week. Now I have to finish compiling the info for the written final and the review sheets and grade all the playing tests. Woooo! Busy busy push till the end of the year. 

It's bittersweet for sure that the end of the year is coming because I don't know if I'll have a job next year and real life approaches with rent, Internet, phone, TV, life insurance, health insurance, car payments, food, furniture, and all the other stuff that comes with moving out and on my own. And oh right, I'm getting married next month. But at least my fiance has a job and at least I can leave this position knowing that I did a good job in the time I was there. 

Concerts and Being Let Go

I would like to preface this post by saying that I haven't gotten stress pimples in a long time...until now. But it was worth it. Please do read on, now that the hygiene comments are out of the way.

night of jazz

As I mentioned in my last post, on April 3rd there was a district-wide Night of Jazz which my jazz lab ensemble was part of.  There was very little time for the band on stage, but we were able to run every piece and check balance.  When it was finally time to line up to get on stage for the performance, I had the students in the hallway outside the stage door.  I had never been so frustrated at students ever (until the next Tuesday...more on that in the next section). I calmly asked them to be quiet because there was only a stage door separating them from the audience. Nope. Didn't work.  So then I went to whisper-yelling because it has always been an effective way to strike fear in my heart. I said something along the lines of "I know that your prefrontal cortex is not fully formed yet and it's difficult for you to decide what's right and wrong and what you should or shouldn't do, but right now you should be quiet."  That stifled their conversation for about one minute, then when they stopped concentrating on the fact that they didn't know what a prefrontal cortext was, it was back to normal.  I don't like yelling; I have a really loud voice but I don't like having to use it (remember this for the next paragraph). The overall logistics of the Night of Jazz went smoothly.  5 groups performed and it was only about 2 hours.  All of the kids played really well, especially considering it was the week after spring break!

junior high school spring concert

Our Spring Concert was exactly a week after the jazz concert- April 10th. The two sections of the  8th grade band (and the two sections of 9th grade band but those aren't my students) don't get to meet as a whole until the week of the concert.  My combined rehearsal was scheduled for the day before the concert - Tuesday April 9 - and I was looking forward to hearing the whole 110 piece band together for the first time.  We had 2 periods - about 80 minutes - to work on the pieces, talk logistics for the night of the concert, and to run everything.  I expected to feel uplifted and optimistic after those 80 minutes. Instead, after the kids left I silently stared at my computer screen for a good 5 minutes, contemplating whether or not to cry and just generally thinking "clakdfmspoidfupigjlkj". Three things that didn't help my classroom management efforts were a) it was the first hot day of the year and all the kids were wearing shorts, thus making their brains think "Summer! No more focusing!" b) it was about 90 degrees in the band room c) the kids were excited to see their friends from the other class.  I had to raise my voice and be the "bad guy" way more than I wanted to be. I always like to feel like I'm honest and acting like myself when I'm in front of kids; students of any age can see through you if you're being phony so I strive to have a good relationship with my pupils.  I didn't feel like me when I was yelling and being so stern.  Thank goodness the other band director was in the room to help quiet kids down, get them extra copies of music, and take care of the 3 suddenly broken instruments.  When it was all said and done, I felt bad for treating the kids how I did and felt like I was an ineffective teacher for those 80 minutes.   
On the night of the concert, I had the 8th graders report to the lunch room 45 minutes before the concert started.  It takes waaaay longer to tune 110 kids than one would think, especially when they can't hear you announce that it's time to tune because there are also 90some ninth graders in the same space also playing and talking. My supervisor got me a microphone so the kiddos could hear me a little better, which was really helpful.  The students played very well and I was way more relaxed for this concert than I was for the jazz band concert and way way more relaxed than I was for my one piece when I was student teaching.  The 9th grade percussion ensemble also played really well for me.  I was very happy when it was all over.  

getting my sixty day notice

So going back to how I felt terrible after my rehearsal on Tuesday...I took the time that day to make concert reflection sheets for the kids to do when I would be absent on Thursday for an interview (more on that in a future post).  I left the band room to make photocopies of the reflection sheet and of course half-way through, the photocopier was convinced it was jammed although there was no jam, so I was gone longer than I expected.  That didn't help my daily upset-ed-ness level.  When I got back to the band room, I felt like having no human interaction. However, that plan was thwarted by the fact that the principal was in the room aaaand he was there to see me.  He wanted to go into my office to chat. Great - he must have heard that I yelled at one student in front of everyone and now I'm in trouble. The conversation went something like this. "Am I in trouble?" "No!" "Oh good!" "But I'm here to give you your sixty day notice." "...lolwat?"  

When you're in a leave replacement position, the district has to let you know that you won't be returning with the same contract, so they give you your 60 days.  However, when one has had a trying day and feels that one is an inadequate teacher, one does not want to hear "here's your sixty days!" It's kinda funny in retrospect.  

Overall, I feel good about the concert! I look forward to the rest of the year when we get to work on improvisation, composition, and small ensemble pieces.  

"Ms. Teacher-lady?" Who? Me?

Tomorrow I have my first concert! It's the district's Night of Jazz.  The jazz band from the 6th and 7th grade school, my jazz band, the auditioned jazz band from my school, and the high school jazz band will all play before a college band plays.  I really should have said "my" jazz band; I saw them twice and pretty much just polished what was already taught.  It's going to be a great night for the kids 6-12 to see not only their peers play, but to see a highly advanced band.  The only downside is that I haven't been able to rehearse with my kids since before spring break...so here's hoping the sound check doesn't spell disaster!

Okay, so now to explain the title of this post. It's been great having my own band classes and not really having to answer to anyone.  I have two veteran teachers that I share the room with so when I have questions, the answers are easily within reach.  Maybe that's why I never feel like I'm clueless like I did when I was doing general music. I love having preps, an office with a desk, a computer that I'm always logged in on.  I feel great.  Somehow, though, all these thinsg don't make me feel like I'm a grown-up.  Yeah, I have authority in the school to call kids out in the hallway when I'm on duty or to discipline kids in my class.  Yes, I'm getting paid to do what I have worked pretty much my whole life to accomplish. But it was a funny moment when my dad told me he'd be coming to my school to visit.  

My dad is the acting supervisor of fine arts in a school district now (he's supposed to be retired!). The high school in his district is creating a band room out of what used to be a big storage room, so my dad and the high school band director are going to visit band rooms that would serve as a good model when they design the space.  The instrumental music room at my school used to be the cafeteria (the lunch service windows are still on one wall to prove it).  Since it's a re-purposed space like what they'll have in my dad's district, he'll be coming to look at it tomorrow. Last night, my dad told me about when he'd be visiting and I said that he should email the other band director and tell him.  My dad goes "Why do I have to email someone else? You're the teacher!" 

Woah.

Yeah, I am the teacher.  I already said I do understand that.  But somehow those things didn't equal me being able to make a decision like approving a visitor to come scope out the room. I guess this whole being an adult thing is an on-going identity growth issue.