Ms. Mangusso's Music class
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What Time Is It?

9/18/2012

2 Comments

 
Well time has gotten the best of me these last few weeks.  I have been struggling trying to get through everything in my lessons.  We have a really crazy specials schedule this year.  We are on a construction calendar because this summer they will be redoing the roof.  We will be getting out a month early so this project can be done.  This means our school day is longer by 20 minutes a day.  We were able to add 4 more minutes to our specials time.  We see each class for 49 minutes instead of the usual 45mins.  All the classes come to specials at odd times (e.g 9:24-10:13, 10:13-11:02).  I have been trying my best to make sure I finish on time, but I haven't been consistent with it.  I decided I needed a timer to help me keep track. 

After doing a Google search on classroom timers I finally found a winner.  I really like the MegaTimer from Kagan.  It is large enough to see from across the room and it has large buttons that are clearly marked.

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This timer does a lot of different things. I love the student selector.  Whenever I need to pick a student to do a job I can quickly push the student selector and it will pick number.  You can program the number of students in the class from 1-99.   I put it on 28 because that is the largest class we have right now.  I assign all my students a number.  I use Easy Grade Pro grade book program and I can easily keep track of everyone's number using Easy Grade Pro.   I assign numbers by ABC order using their last names.  Students keep the same number all year.  If a student moves out, then their number stays unassigned until a new student moves in.  My students are good about remembering their number, but if they forget I print out a list that has their number.  I use the numbers for everything (e.g. picking students, assigning recorder folders, rhythm folders, bags of manipulates, etc.).   The students love to watch the timer select a number.

I use the countdown timer a lot.  On my lesson plans I put the time of how long I want to spend on each activity.  I set the timer before we begin each activity.   I turn the clock so we can't see it counting down.  Otherwise some students would sit there the entire time watching it count down and then they want to announce how much time is left or do the final 10 second countdown.  The count down clock will beep once when it's at the 80% mark.  The beep is not too obnoxious, but it is loud enough to hear.  As you can see in the picture above the stop button is nice and big.  

There are some other features that I haven't used yet:
1. Team selector: works just like the student selector.  You can program how many teams you want to have.
2. Random: This can be used in different ways. You can use it like using dice, spinner, random numbers to create math equations, etc.  You can program it to the number you want to use.  The max number is 9,999.
3. Stop Watch: works like any standard stop watch
4.  Alarm clock: you could set the ending time of the class


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I really like how all the buttons are clearly marked.  They all have preset times or number, but if you want to change the settings you just hold the button for a few seconds until the number blinks on the screen. Then you just use the up and down arrows to change the settings to what you want.  It does save your settings.  
I purchased mine directly from the company's website:


http://www.kaganonline.com/catalog/JMT/

I also purchased the AC adapter (doesn't come with it).  The clock can run on batteries.  It takes 6 double A batteries.  I don't know how long it last on batteries since I use the AC adapter. 

I really love this timer and it really has helped me to stay on track so I can get to everything on the lesson.  I am also no longer late getting my classes lined up and ready to leave. 

2 Comments

Are You on Target with Your Effort?

8/26/2012

9 Comments

 
My first few weeks of school have been going well.  I have been very busy trying to finish up setting up my room and getting class list and seating charts ready.  I also spent a lot of time trying to update my website. This week I will be introducing all my classes to my Effort rubric.  We are an Expeditionary Learning school and having students self assessment themselves is one of the components.  We use a rubric of 1-4, 4 being the best.
I will discuss how a 4 is a person who has full colorful music.  They even go back and fix mistakes without being told to (that's why it has a repeat sign).  I will also go over each of the bullets below.

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A 3 is a person who does good work most of the time, but makes a mistake (the rest).  Sometimes they will fix them on their own, but occasionally they need a little reminder or they just excepts the one mistake.
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A 2 is a person who does sloppy work.  Their work is not complete and they make several mistakes.  A 2 is also a person who is starting to be a passenger.  We always say "We are Crew, not Passengers".
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A 1 is a person who doesn't get any work done and they often give up when things are hard.  They are being a passenger.
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Many classroom teachers have their students record their answers either in a notebook or on an effort sheet.  I teach 500 students and that would be a lot of paper and it would take up valuable time getting out the paper and pencils.  I have created an Effort scoreboard.  Throughout class I will move students names.  I only move their name when they are not doing good work.  During our debrief time I will move students names up.  All students start off on a 3 "Ready to Learn" they have to earn the 4 or whatever score they will end on.  Students who got moved down to a 2 can be moved up to a 3 and students who got moved to 1 can be moved up to a 2, but they cannot be moved up to a 4 since a 4 does high quality work and follows all the expectations. 
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When a student gets on a 1 it is Teacher's Choice this means that I will decide what needs to happen to help the student to make better choices.  Most of the time I will ask them to go and sit in the Isle of Rest.
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The Isle of Rest is a quiet place where students can go to refocus or to calm down.  I do not make students write or owe a recess because they went there.  I have provided some tools for students to use to help them to refocus. There are sand times, liquid timers, stuffed animal, paper to draw or write their thoughts down or just to doodle.  I also have a copy of the rules to help remind them of the expectations.  Sometimes I will ask the students to go practice the rules.  I don't micromanage this.  If students do it, then great, but it's okay if they just sit their.  The only thing I care about is that they are quiet and they are not distracting the class.  I will call the office if the student refuses to comply to this expectation.
If anyone wants a copy of my PowerPoint you can click here to download it.  I will also put it on my download page on my website.
Effort Rubric Download
I know some people want to sign-up to receive an email when I update my website and blog, but unfortunately Weebly doesn't have this feature yet.  I am hoping that this feature will be coming soon.  They did a survey last month asking users what we would like to see and it was one of the choices.  Crossing my fingers that it will be the next new feature.

Tami
9 Comments

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    Tami Mangusso ariosostudio@gmail.com

    Ms. Mangusso

    Welcome to the Arioso Studio music blog.  Students enjoy singing, dancing, playing instruments, composing, and playing music games in music class. I hope you enjoy my blog where I will share news, events, pictures, and videos from our music class. Thank you for visiting!

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