This is a nicely designed musical resource from the San Francisco Symphony. Explore music, instruments, how music is composed and more. The radio area has a good selection of classical tracks to listen to with your class.
http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/Music%2C+Sound+%26+Podcasts
There is an amazing amount of free TV online. The challenge in enjoying is simply knowing where to look.
As a guide of online TV, Spreety provides easy to navigate links to the highest quality, legal entertainment choices, including popular online TV shows, classic TV shows, music videos, news, online sports, and movies online. Our research of trusted online TV sites is the foundation for the free and safe guides of Spreety TV Online and iPhone TV Online.
A site with 82 classic novels at last count as downloadable ebooks. Easy to download and comes in many formats for e-readers and PCs.
http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/English
"Here's an article written in 1944 by Stephan M. Cory (University of Chicago January 1944 edition of Childhood Education). It is a classic satire written in the first person of a seventh grade student discussing his experiences in elementary school.
I think it's a great example of the contrast of learning in rigid formal environments and learning in the context of meaningful problems and authentic tasks. The focus is public education but it's not a stretch to extend to classroom training in the workplace."
This is a great site to find audio and video versions of some children's classic books, many read by the authors.
http://ictmagic.wikispaces.com/English
I wonder if most parents (and even some teachers) even know what this means. Sometimes I think we are too entrenched in old-school ways of thinking students need to know and love classics instead of understanding how literature is a reflection of the times and using the classics as mentor pieces for creating something which reflects here and now!
kids need to be in systems that care for them and are focused on literacy they will need to be successful in their lives instead of being focused primarily on standardizing their way to "high student achievement" based on a metric that is growing less and less relevant each day
We need to really look at our definition of the word achievement! Do we mean they have achieved a high score by regurgitating info/facts? Do we mean they understand something and can apply that understanding in a new and meaningful way?
I'm mad that the "big" conversations around "reform" in education right now all revolve around basically doing what we've been doing for the past 100 years only "better," and that we'll get there by incentivizing teachers to teach for a test.
That is their reality; it wasn't ours. The NCTE knows it.
Just like we recognize that times are different from when my parents attended a 1-room school or when there less than 50-100 in a graduating class in a whole town, we need to recognize that times today are different.
A list of free (and largely public domain) audiobooks that you can download. Comprised mostly of classic literature, many of which are featured in school literature courses.
"There's something about origami that really seems to capture children's imagination. In most of the classes that I have taught over the years, there has been at least one child with a real passion for origami. Many a show-and-tell has been dominated by incredible paper-folding creations, from water bombs to paper dragons. Think back to your own school days; which of these origami classics do you remember creating?"
the Renaissance was a period when scholars and
artists began to investigate what they believed to be a revival of
classical learning, literature and art. For example, the followers
of the 14th-century author Petrarch began to study texts from
Greece and Rome for their moral content and literary style. Having
its roots in the medieval university, this study called Humanism
centered on rhetoric, literature, history and moral philosophy.
The concept of “flow”, describing the subjective psychological state in which a person is completely immersed and fully concentrated in an activity which is enjoyable and rewarding, is often associated with optimal functioning
Anxiety is generally regarded as having an antithetical relationship with flow
The clinical implications of this negative association between MPA and flow suggest that a two-pronged approach focusing on facilitating flow and positive functioning as well as reducing pathological MPA may bring about improvements in the performer’s subjective performing experienc
Seligman’s (2011) most recent model of well-being, from the field of positive psychology, understands well-being as comprising five elements: Positive emotion, Engagement, Relationships, Meaning and Achievemen
There is a substantial body of Music Performance Anxiety (MPA) research providing evidence that MPA is a debilitating phenomenon (Kenny, 2011) which can affect musicians at any stage of their careers, from highly experienced professional performers (Fishbein, Middlestadt, Ottati, Straus, & Ellis, 1988; Kenny, Driscoll, & Ackerman, 2014) through to child beginners
Anxiety is often described as having an antithetical relationship to the experience of flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1975), and it has been suggested that fostering techniques for facilitating flow may provide a powerful tool for reducing MPA and encouraging optimal performance
“when performance anxiety was highest, flow was lowest and vice versa … the presence of one minimises the magnitude of the other” (Fullager et al., 2013, p. 251), and a recent study found evidence of a strong, significant negative association between flow and MPA amongst 200 professional orchestral musicians (Cohen & Bodner, 2018), supporting Kirchner et al.’s (2008) earlier findings with music students
Investigations of the efficacy of existing methods for treating MPA indicate that Cognitive Behavioural Therapy based interventions are most effective (for an overview, see Burin & Osorio, 2016).
However, evidence suggests that pharmacological methods, particularly beta-blockers, are most commonly used, often in the absence of medical supervision (Cohen & Bodner, 2018; Kenny et al., 2014) and that the subject of MPA is still stigmatised, with many musicians and teachers unwilling to talk openly about it
Csikszentmihalyi’s nine dimensions of flow as follows
Although there was an increase in flow over time, this was not significant, F(1, 20) = 4.27, p > .05, η2 =.18, and there was no evidence of a significant interaction between group and time, F(1, 20) = 0.56, p > .05, η2 = .03, indicating that the hypothesis that there would be an increase in self-reported levels of flow in the intervention group, was not supported.
Figure 4. Judge-rated musical performance quality and signs of performance anxiety in the intervention group.
These results support the fourth hypothesis that there would be an increase in judge-rated PQ and a decrease in judge-rated SPA.
Results showed evidence of a significant negative association between MPA and flow, and three out of the four study hypotheses were supported: the music performance skills intervention was found to be effective in reducing pre-/post-test MPA in the intervention group compared to the wait-list control group; there were significant improvements in positive and negative affect and state anxiety associated with the performance situation in the intervention group; and there were significant improvements in judge-rated PQ and behavioural signs of performance anxiety. However, there was no significant change in pre-/post-test measures of flow. These findings will now be discussed in more detail.
This supports the understanding of MPA as a specific type of anxiety, where the performer suffers from MPA without necessarily being generally anxious or impaired in any other areas of his/her life (Clark & Williamon, 2011; Hoffman & Hanrahan, 2011) and corresponds to Kenny’s (2011) description of the first and most mild of three types of MPA (for full coverage of this issue, see Kenny, 2011).
Thus, the absence in improvement in levels of flow in the current study could also be due to the low average hours of daily practice reported
The increases in participants’ positive affect and decreases in negative affect after the second simulated performance compared to the first indicate that the intervention was effective in facilitating positive emotion, the first component of Seligman’s (2011) PERMA model of well-being
Evidence of improvements in judge-rated performance quality indicate that the intervention was also effective in facilitating the fifth (Achievement) component of the PERMA model.
“Ironically, it may be that the last people to receive some benefit from the therapeutic value of music may be the musicians themselves” (Brodsky, 1996, p. 95).
Hopefully, such an approach will enable developing musicians to acquire the skills necessary to enjoy satisfying, successful and healthy lives as performing musicians, in which the threat of debilitating MPA and the need to recourse to beta-blockers are a thing of the past.
Cohen, S., & Bodner, E. (2019). Music performance skills: A two-pronged approach – facilitating optimal music performance and reducing music performance anxiety. Psychology of Music, 47(4), 521–538. https://doi.org/10.1177/0305735618765349
BY CHAIM CLORFENE AND SIMCHA GOTTLIEB
Miracle of the Maccabees was written, produced, and directed by Chaim Clorfene and Simcha Gottlieb, whose additional credits include many pioneering Jewish educational films, videos, radio programming, books, and multimedia. Together, they created the classic radiodrama, "The Mysterious Golem of Prague," starring Leonard Nimoy - recently remastered and re-released on CD. They always appreciate feedback, and can be contacted at gotsimcha@gmail.com. (27 Minutes)