Firsts, etc.

If you don't want to be humbled, don't be a first year teacher. Every day, situations come up that I've never faced before, so I can't fall back on prior knowledge and experience. Sometimes I feel like I handle the situations like a pro, and other times I totally blow it. This post will address some of these issues where I've felt bewildered in a sort of scatter-gun fashion.

-My students are incredibly far behind in terms of their ability to read (music, that is). I found out on day one of band camp that the students were just largely unable to read even basic quarter note/half note rhythms. To give you a picture of it, when we read out of Essential Elements 2000, it sounds more like Atmospheres by Ligeti and less like When the Saints Go Marching In. And after about two bars of musical nothingness, the students give up, quit playing, and just look at me.

What do I do? The junior high band is composed of 6th-8th graders, about 45 all together. The jazz band, about 12 kids, faces the same problems (which reminds me, I'll update my post about improvisation in jazz band class in a later post). I am currently in the first stage of David Newell's teaching rhythm with both groups. The sequence begins with performing rhythms in a call and response format, which even proves difficult right now. Next, I will use rhythm flashcards to show them what they are playing translates to in terms of notation. But even this system only teaches one "type" of rhythm at a time. For example, right now, we're only doing call and response with quarter notes, eighths, and half notes. But we have to start there, right? We can't just jump into sixteenth note rhythms, syncopations, and hemiolas?

The problem is that the kids are getting restless. All this work on fundamentals and not enough fun playing is tuckering them out. The ironic thing is that what they want is what we have been taught NOT to do. They want me to put a piece of music in front of them and just tell them how it goes. They want to memorize their parts and play just a few tunes all year using this format. They don't want to learn. They want to be completely dependent on me. I'm trying to convince them that our fundamental work will pay off to the tune of playing way more music and student independence. Right now, they aren't buying it. but it's only been 2 weeks in.

What I must do, however, is make sure that I pound rhythm reading into my beginning band kids' heads like crazy. Which leads me to another thing.

-Beginning band is bonkers. There are so many logistical pitfalls. I had about 35 kids interested in starting band this year, which is great! The problem is many students come from pretty poor families, and they are just unable to rent instruments. Some were turned away from our provider because of bad credit. I've loaned out almost all of our school instruments. What's going to happen for next year?

-Classroom management is a tough art. Thank God for Harry Wong, as his work has helped me tons. My band kids are used to coming into the band room and raising hell, so we've spent two weeks reforming bad habits. Like everything else, we're making improvements, but we have a lot of room for improvement. I've had to resort to handing out demerits, which is a school-wide penalty system. It stinks being the bad guy, but I believe in the concept of sticking to your guns and being firm, 'cause Harry Wong says that kids will respect you and your system more because of it. Hopefully that proves to be true.

-Other bewildering things include purchase orders, transportation requests, Teachers Retirement System, insurance, all sorts of bills. Growing up is tough.

-Among all these things that are frustrating and mind-buzzing, I am loving it all. It's probably still the honeymoon stage, but I am relishing the role of teacher. I love being able to talk with students who need a strong male presence in their levels. I love getting the chance to teach music. Today we had our first parade (yeah, middle schoolers marching....) and it went as well as I think it could have. The busses showed up, I didn't lose any kids, and we played pretty well! These kind of events build so much team spirit and pride. They're awesome. It was so rewarding being on the other side of that this time and facilitating that for my students.

Quick funny story: In between our parade songs, the drumline was playing a simple cadence, which predominantly features the quads at the beginning of it. During one of the cadences, the quad player dropped out unexpectedly, and I was originally irked with him. He got back on, and later I asked him what happened. The poor kid told me his pants became unbuttoned. Haha. He had to get readjusted, then just kept on marching like a trooper!

So the first parade is down, we have a little bit of time to spend on fundamentals, and I'm super excited. There are many pearls to take away from the first few weeks, even amongst the rampant confusion.