The #MusEdChat on 3-15-2010 discussed the topic “ How have you collaborated with other teachers and schools?” Collaboration was discussed in multiple ways, mainly performance-based collaboration, and tools used for collaboration.
Performance-Based Collaboration
Many of the participants suggested ways to collaborate with other musicians that included performance. On both instrumental and choral levels, teachers have joined ensembles with other schools. @kgard said,” In my area we do a big show choir festival and every school has to watch every other school perform. It’s Fun!” @shawdave collaborates with a band in the area: “HS level. Joint programs with neighboring county band. Each band plays separately, then combined for 2-3 pieces.” He then went on to explain that separately the bands are smaller, but combine to make a huge band, which the students enjoy. The chat participants then talked about collaboration through county band and chorus opportunities, which was seen as a great way to meet musicians in the area. This is a great way for teachers and students to collaborate with musicians in their community. Community ensembles generally offer a low-pressure environment where students can get musical experience outside of their high school ensembles. Multiple participants also stated that blogs, wikis and websites are all good forms of collaboration for ensembles.
Collaborative Tools
There are a lot of tools out there that help music educators to collaborate effectively. Multiple chat participants suggested the use of Skype as a collaborative tool. This has been used in quite a few ways. A lot of the participants thought that Skyping experts into a classroom (college professors, composers, etc.) offered a great opportunity for students to learn from people they generally wouldn’t be able to learn from. The idea of having a colleague Skype into a rehearsal to listen and critique was also proposed. Many participants discussed the use of Google Forms to collaborate with their students and parents. While some of them found this useful, it was not useful to those attempting to use it in a rural area. While these new tools are very effective for collaboration purposes, some participants used more conventional forms of communication. For example, @mrsnyhof stated,” I did an Olympics lesson that was shared by a friend of a friend… just collaboration by email though.” Collaboration on the collegiate level was also briefly discussed. @pisanojm stated, “I frequently will bring in HS/MS teachers into the classroom to talk with the college kids about their experiences…win/win.” It was also suggested that high school teachers bring music education students into their classrooms to speak.
Links
Here is a list of links discussed in this week’s #MusEdChat:
- A project by @pisanojm with Balmages, Boysen, Watson, and Weller – http://bit.ly/b3E6YK
- Article on Video Conferencing and Instrumental Music Lessons by @rdammers – http://upd.sagepub.com/current.dtl
- A collection of Music Teacher sites on @cybraryman ‘s site – http://bit.ly/88AvG7
- SyncTube – http://www.synchtube.com/
- Google Form example – http://bit.ly/cQOnFY
- Open-sourced music curriculum by @brandtschneider – http://sites.google.com/site/shsmusiccurriculum/home
Participate!
Those who participated in this chat shared some very useful and creative ideas on how to collaborate with each other and even with parents to make themselves better at what they do. If you were not able to attend this chat, check out the transcript to see the entire conversation. If you are interested in chatting with music educators from across the globe, join us in the #MusEdChat on Twitter, Monday nights at 8:00 p.m. EST! If you aren’t familiar with Twitter, learn how to participate here!