Marcos de Niza HS Sightreading Balladair

Wow, where to start my last reflection! To begin with, comparing myself from the very beginning of the semester, and even the beginning of this year, I’ve noticed that my demeanor as a music educator and overall person has definitely changed. Most of the time, when watching myself teach, I can never find a single aspect I like about myself or my teaching style. But, for some odd reason, this video has been an extreme turning point for me! Looking back and remembering what was going on through my head when my time was approaching to teach, all I remember saying to myself was “Just do it. Just hammer through your lesson and do your thing. You know everything you need to know. Trust your gut. JUST GO!” After my lesson ended, I honestly didn’t remember quite that much because it seemed like everything went by so fast. But now looking upon my recording of how I did, I can definitely tell that my inside remarks towards myself really helped me focus on what was at hand instead of being nervous like I usually tend to be. I need to remember to tell myself that every single time now to result in good outcomes!

Go ahead and take a look at my final lesson taught at Marcos de Niza High School.

*Due to the safety and privacy of previous students, all photographs and video recordings have been graciously taken down as of August 4th, 2015. Please contact the creator personally to grant access if desired to view independently.*

Title of Video: Final Unit Teaching @ Marcos

Over all, I was highly impressed with how the students approached the lesson! I had low expectations going in so that I wouldn’t be disappointed coming out, and I was very pleased that most of the students did what I asked and were all very attentive. Through out the lesson, I could tell who was and wasn’t grabbing on to my remarks, and I immediately gave feedback on how to improve what was needed. For example, my constant bickering with the low brass to play out more was something I kept having to work on because I felt like they weren’t giving me their undivided attention. In my lesson, you can also clearly notice how I gave them specific directions on how to improve: “Open throat, nice deep tones”. I consider this one of my strengths in this lesson because I felt like I completed a decent  teaching cycle with them. Secondly, I remembered to give the students compliments when needed while still providing a comment to grow on. At the beginning of my lesson after my warm up, I dove right into the piece and went straight to the very last measure. Without saying anything, I had them play the last note of the piece. Sure enough, they took what we had just learned in the warm up regarding balance to the last note of Balladair, and I complimented them on their success, while still telling them to keep it up throughout the lesson. I feel like many music educator and band directors often become too comfortable with their students they see on a daily basis and often let good remarks fall behind, continuing to perfect this and that. Once I noticed something drastic, especially without having to give instruction to them, I let them know how well they did! As my third strength I would like to touch upon, I would consider my presence off the podium being a big leap for myself. I wanted my students to be more relaxed with me during my lesson compared to how they were with the three teachers right before me, but I still wanted to get their attention and focus on me since the class period was coming to end. With standing off the podium for the warm up, I also received their undivided attention even leading into the piece when I stepped up!

A huge difference that was noticed from everyone (without say) was the ensemble performance quality comparing the students to us in class. I love my fellow classmates no doubt, but having a full band in front of me was definitely a much better experience! The numbers surely didn’t even come close to adding up, which in the end made the biggest impact.

If I was to repeat this lesson, I would aim at becoming more picky with everything and giving more complete teaching cycles. I noticed that I often continued on with my plans and refrained from fixing this or that. With such short time to work with, that causes for a lot of bypass routes and ends up focusing on the bigger idea of things. With more time, I would try dissecting every small sound I heard and would really place a high aim for my students by the end of the period!

In conclusion, this was such an amazing experience that makes me 100x more excited to start teaching soon! From looking back at the very beginning of the year to now, this exact moment, I can’t even put into words how drastic I see myself growing and becoming a “real band director”! I am so excited to see the growth I make in a few years and to be able to look back upon all of these reflections.

My Goals for Student Teaching:

1. I want to aim at achieving constant teaching cycles as much as possible. Everything I will say and do while in class should always be revolved around a teaching cycle. I know that is going to be a huge struggle for me, but in the end, I know it’ll benefit my experience as a music educator in the long run and will result in good/great things as well.
2. I want to continue improving my ear. Whether it be working with a student one-on-one or with a full ensemble, improving my ear will result in more things to fix, then resulting in a better outcome over all. Higher expectations, better performances, better students.