Music and Physical Education

Benefits of Music and PE:

Music incorporated into PE class is an important stimulant for the mind and body. It helps to get students ready for their day while keeping them active. Music draws deep emotions.

Physical Education teachers have incorporated  music and dance into their curriculum in a number of creative, fun ways. Examples are listed below:

1. Dance comes in numerous styles/genres.

“When you teach your kids to play basketball, there’s only one way to play. Same goes for football, soccer, and almost any other sport or activity. Dance comes in countless genres and styles, from ballroom to modern and beyond. With such a variegated collection of genres, it’s easy for each student to find something he or she enjoys, whether it’s stomp, ballet, waltz, hip-hop, or tap.

Even better, you can easily combine styles. Teach your kids several genres and, at the end, have groups put together unique routines that combine elements from all the dances they have learned. Consider recording the routines and using them to promote dance and activity to other kids. This not only gives them that extra bit of motivation but gives them an end result to strive for and look forward to.”

2. Music motivates movement.

“Music naturally stimulates parts of the brain responsible for unconscious movement, which explains the head bobbing, shoulder shrugging, and toe tapping that you don’t even think about when you hear your favorite tune on the radio. Younger students should have no problem getting down on the dance floor, but even the most self-conscious of teens should have no problem moving with the groove. Even without formal instruction on any specific dance style, you should notice a distinct change in the mood and atmosphere that encourages students to continue moving.

This comes in handy when you feel that students are straying off task. Just crank up the tunes to get their attention back to the activity at hand. For an even greater motivator, you can have the kids recommend songs—school appropriate, of course.”

3. Music is a great timer.

“Music is a great way to keep time when you don’t have a clock. As suggested in this trainer tip video, when students are using weight machines, you can create minute-long chunks of music followed by fifteen to twenty seconds of silence to give students a chance to reset the equipment and move to the next station, doing away with clocks, alarms, or a stopwatch and whistle. You can apply the same idea to running laps, warming up, or stretching.”

4. Music enhances performance.

“Music naturally blocks the voice in your head that tells you to quit when you get tired. This dissociation effect has been shown to reduce perceived effort and increase endurance, essentially tricking people into performing intense exercises for longer periods of time.

As mentioned above, music has a positive affect on mood. Music makes students happier by presenting a more welcoming, positive atmosphere that motivates students to push themselves and work harder.”

5. Dance is a lifetime sport.

“The great thing about dance, as noted in this trainer tip video, is that it is a lifetime sport. It’s a timeless activity that is perfect for all age groups, from kindergarteners to octogenarians. It works out your coordination, rhythm, flexibility, and various muscle groups throughout the body. Unlike contact sports and many other activities, dancing is low impact if you do it right, so it’s easy on the joints. It’s also easy to vary the difficulty or intensity of any dance to fit students’ skill levels and preferences.

Even if students don’t pursue a career in dance, it’s something that carries over throughout various social functions—weddings, proms, nights on the town—so it doesn’t hurt to learn a few basic dance steps.
Dance and music are deeply ingrained in society. Find some fun, creative ways to incorporate both into your PE classes.

“SPARK Physical Education Curriculum.” Spark PE The Benefits of Participation in After School Activities Comments, sparkpe.org/blog/benefits-of-music-and-dance-in-pe-class/.

Music and Math

Hokey Pokey With Shapes:

This activity helps young children learn different shapes such as polygons while using the Hokey-Pokey song. These shapes can be made with felt cut-outs or even paper cut-outs.  The shapes will be used by replacing the body parts in the song with the shapes. Students will use the name if their shapes to replace the words in the song. This activity can be used in Preschool-Kindergarten.

Materials:

“Cut out shapes with different colored felt pieces. For instances orange circles. Make enough felt shapes for every child in your class. Try to at least use the major shapes such as triangle, circle, rectangle, square and oval. Other suggestions are diamonds, semicircle and hexagons for more challenges.”

Lyrics: 

Put your circle in, put your circle out put your circle in and you shake it all about,
You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around, that’s what it’s all about.

Put your rectangle in your rectangle out, put your rectangle in and you shake it all about,
You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around, that’s what’s it’s all about.

Put your triangle in put your triangle out put your triangle in and you shake it all about,
You do the Hokey Pokey and you turn yourself around, that’s what’s it’s all about.

“View a Plan.” Hotchalk Lesson Plans Page: Lesson Plans by Teachers for Teachers, lessonplanspage.com/mathmusichokeypokeyshapesideapk.htm/.

Resources

Lessons and Places For Job Opportunities:

There are lots of opportunities to teach and learn music in the Kentucky area. The different types of music that can taught or learned are piano, singing, and guitar.

Guitar Emporium of Louisville:

This business has been opened for 40 years. This shop gives lessons, appraisals, and as they called it, “test driving.” Meaning they let anybody test out their guitars to see how they like it. Guitar Emporium of Louisville is located on Bardstown, Rd in Louisville, KY.

Mom’s Music:

Mom’s Music is also a business located in Louisville, KY. At this business they provide family lessons along with private music lessons, jazz lessons, and rock lessons. All mom’s work at this shop and have been open and teaching lessons for 35 years.

 

Taylor Robinson Music and Voice Lessons:

This business is located in Louisville, KY. People are able to come and learn how to sing, play the piano, play the drums, the guitar and even learn how to write songs. If someone did not want to drive up to Louisville for lessons, Taylor Robinson Music and Voice Lessons, offers private lessons over the Internet. Also, one of the instructors can come to your house or the instructor’s approved home for lessons.

 

Miles Ahead Music:

Miles Ahead Music is located in Lexington, KY. There is also a store located in Louisville, KY. They provide lessons, rentals, repairs, and sales. Miles Ahead Music has lessons for beginners up to advanced.

 

Advocacy

Incorporating music into education is very important. It helps students to gain more knowledge. This is because they are enjoying activities they are doing while learning content. A few examples listed below are ways of how music education helps students.

1. Musical training helps develop language and reasoning: Students who have early musical training will develop the areas of the brain related to language and reasoning. The left side of the brain is better developed with music, and songs can help imprint information on young minds.

2. A mastery of memorization: Even when performing with sheet music, student musicians are constantly using their memory to perform. The skill of memorization can serve students well in education and beyond.

3. Students learn to improve their work: Learning music promotes craftsmanship, and students learn to want to create good work instead of mediocre work. This desire can be applied to all subjects of study.

4. Increased coordination: Students who practice with musical instruments can improve their hand-eye coordination. Just like playing sports, children can develop motor skills when playing music.

5. A sense of achievement: Learning to play pieces of music on a new instrument can be a challenging, but achievable goal. Students who master even the smallest goal in music will be able to feel proud of their achievement.

6. Kids stay engaged in school: An enjoyable subject like music can keep kids interested and engaged in school. Student musicians are likely to stay in school to achieve in other subjects.

7. Success in society: Music is the fabric of our society, and music can shape abilities and character. Students in band or orchestra are less likely to abuse substances over their lifetime. Musical education can greatly contribute to children’s intellectual development as well.

8. Emotional development: Students of music can be more emotionally developed, with empathy towards other cultures They also tend to have higher self esteem and are better at coping with anxiety.

9. Students learn pattern recognition: Children can develop their math and pattern-recognition skills with the help of musical education. Playing music offers repetition in a fun format.

10. Better SAT scores: Students who have experience with music performance or appreciation score higher on the SAT. One report indicates 63 points higher on verbal and 44 points higher on math for students in music appreciation courses.

11. Fine-tuned auditory skills: Musicians can better detect meaningful, information-bearing elements in sounds, like the emotional meaning in a baby’s cry. Students who practice music can have better auditory attention, and pick out predictable patterns from surrounding noise.

12. Music builds imagination and intellectual curiosity: Introducing music in the early childhood years can help foster a positive attitude toward learning and curiosity. Artistic education develops the whole brain and develops a child’s imagination.

13. Music can be relaxing: Students can fight stress by learning to play music. Soothing music is especially helpful in helping kids relax.

14. Musical instruments can teach discipline: Kids who learn to play an instrument can learn a valuable lesson in discipline. They will have to set time aside to practice and rise to the challenge of learning with discipline to master playing their instrument.

15. Preparation for the creative economy: Investing in creative education can prepare students for the 21st century workforce. The new economy has created more artistic careers, and these jobs may grow faster than others in the future.

16. Development in creative thinking: Kids who study the arts can learn to think creatively. This kind of education can help them solve problems by thinking outside the box and realizing that there may be more than one right answer.

17. Music can develop spatial intelligence: Students who study music can improve the development of spatial intelligence, which allows them to perceive the world accurately and form mental pictures. Spatial intelligence is helpful for advanced mathematics and more.

18. Kids can learn teamwork: Many musical education programs require teamwork as part of a band or orchestra. In these groups, students will learn how to work together and build camaraderie.

19. Responsible risk-taking: Performing a musical piece can bring fear and anxiety. Doing so teaches kids how to take risks and deal with fear, which will help them become successful and reach their potential.

20. Better self-confidence: With encouragement from teachers and parents, students playing a musical instrument can build pride and confidence. Musical education is also likely to develop better communication for students.

“20 Important Benefits of Music In Our Schools.” NAfME, 25 Apr. 2018, nafme.org/20-important-benefits-of-music-in-our-schools/.

Music and Movement

 Music and Movement

This activity can be used for preschool aged children.

Goals: “The children will be able to learn the song through memory. They will be able to sing the song through looking at a Rebus Chart by the end of the scheduled time allotted for lesson.”

Objective: “The children will be able to learn the song through repeating the words after me. They will also be able to follow along with an Rebus chart. They will tell me what the picture that represents the missing word.We will then play a game including singing or saying the words of the rhyme.”

Materials: The rebus chart, an easel to hang the chart up on so the children can see it. A bone and a chair that will be placed in front of the classroom for the game they will play.”

How to Play:  “First, I will sing the song to the children. I will then place the rebus chart in the front of the class. We will in a group read the chart together as they call out the word that is represented with the picture. They will then sit back in there seats from gathering on the floor to go over the rebus chart. Once back at their seat, I will place a chair infront of the classroom with the back of their chair facing the children. I will have a child go and sit in the chair with his or her back facing the rest of the class and his or her face looking at the board straight infront of him or her. I will place a new dog bone underneath the chair and I will point at one of the other children to get up and very quietly walk up behind the chair and sneak the bone out from underneath the chair and go back to their seat without getting caught if possible. Then the child sitting in the chair will turn around after the class says, “Doggie, Doggie, where’s your bone, somebody stole it from your home. Guess who, it might be you, it might be a monkey from the zoo.” The child will then look around and see if he or she can guess who has the bone. Then if the guess made is correct that disqualifies the person holding the bone out. If the guess is incorrect, then the one with the bone goes up and sits in the chair and places the bone underneath the chair again. Then the process will be repeated throughout the duration of the game.”

Where Can Students That Don’t Speak English Get Help (In The US)?, 1 Dec. 2018, http://www.teach-nology.com/lessons/lsn_pln_view_lessons.php?action=view&cat_id=6&lsn_id=26243.