Weeks 5 & 6

The last two weeks of teaching practice have come & gone, and as I write this, it's already Week 7, the last week of teaching practice. I would have written about Weeks 5 & 6 (April 26th - May 7th) earlier but lesson planning and writing about my North Island Adventure needed to come first.

My Year 9 English class was away at camp for Week 5 so that gave my associate & I a spare period to relax and plan future lessons. Riccarton High School operates the Kokiri Lodge Programme for the Year 9 & 10 curriculum. For 4 days, junior students stay at the Kokiri Lodge on the west coast of the South Island where they participate in a rigorous outdoor program. Students travel on the TranzAlpine Express train, a route that I took with my parents back in 2008. If I had the time, I would have gone along but I had to teach my Year 12s & 13s. The Year 9s had plenty of stories to tell when they came back on Week 6. Once those stories were out of the way, my associate proceeded to teach them a new topic: advertising. At the end of one lesson, I showed the class some creative advertisements that I found on the Internet.

Week 5 was dedicated to getting my Year 13s ready for their Baroque Era Quiz on Thursday, meaning review, review, review. I stressed to them that if they knew the definitions then they would be set for the quiz & for life. The quiz was written in 3 parts: listening, definitions, and long answers. The results were quite good with the majority passing and five students achieving very high marks. For Week 6, the Year 13s had to choose a topic for their research assessment and work on it.

My Year 12s were instructed in the creation & structure of an 8 bar melody. To make sure they really understood, I tasked them to write an 8 bar melody for Friday, in a major or minor key, with a time signature, and a simple bass accompaniment. Before they got working on the keyboards, I showed them several tricks with melody writing: repetition, inversion, retrograde, augmentation, and diminution. The melodies I received on Friday & the following Monday were impressive and written in different styles. The following week, I introduced them to primary & secondary chords, and they were given time to work on their final musical compositions.

The alternative Year 9 music class finished learning about Ice Cream Chords that were popular in the 1950s. The examples that were used by my associate were 'Those Magic Changes' from the musical Grease, and the annoying 'Heart & Soul' by Hoagy Carmichael. After that, there turned their attentions to learning how to play the melody & chords of the popular New Zealand song 'Renegade Fighter' by the rock band Zed.

My second & final observation from the College of Education happened on Friday of Week 6, with me teaching my Year 9 music class. I had to teach & control students with ADD & ADHD. The topic was learning the structure of the song 'Cruise Control' by the NZ band Headless Chickens, and getting the students to play the melody. Overall the lesson went better than I expected but I have to admit that if my college associate wasn't there, I would have had to refer several students for disruptive behaviour. When it comes to students with learning difficulties, you have to be constantly working them, otherwise they quickly lose interest and chaos ensues.

The month of May is New Zealand Music Month, a Middle Earth oriented promotion run by the NZ Music Commission. Basically, all media outlets (TV, radio, internet, etc) advertise & show off Middle Earth's best & brightest musical stars. Of course, there are also many live concerts that are staged across the country. To show my support, I've been wearing the NZ Music Month pin; white circles on a black background. During Week 6, the school jazz band, barbershop chorus, and kapa haka group performed at the library to celebrate New Zealand Music Month. The performances were all well done & the audience gave all the acts a standing ovation.

I should also note that several days ago was May 4th, unofficially known as Star Wars Day where fans celebrate Star Wars culture & the landmark films by George Lucas. 'May the 4th be with you.'