A4L+Unit+4+Photos

Please upload any pictures of student work here. **File Not Found** Seedfolks Symphony-Samantha Blake-E.B. Ellington This recording is the first "run through" of the completed rondo. Students are still working to perfect their parts, learn when their supposed to come in and I am also playing the major beats along with them to help guide them through. However, it's a great example of a work in progress!

**File Not Found**

This recording is an example of the motif performance process. You will hear each of the four groups share their motif for Kim, along with their explanations of how they chose instruments and made compositional decisions. This is my class's first performance, so you can get an idea of where the students started in the process, before being able to put together their entire rondo (first link). Students really enjoyed being able to hear themselves play each motif when I uploaded their recordings to the computer. It was also helpful in the selection process when we created the entire rondo. Students could go back, listen to each group, then select the group they felt best represented the character or theme. From there, groups were able to adjust the motifs accordingly so they all fit into one rondo.

Students in this picture are playing "drums" made from coffee cans and Halloween pumpkins, shakers made from water bottles & rice or beans, and a "guitar" made from a baby formula box with rubber bands.

Students in this picture are playing instruments that include a cardboard box drum, a tin can drum set and a store-bought rainstick ($1 at General Dollar).

Students in this picture are playing the tin can drum set, a juice bottle drum, the store-bought rainstick and the spoons.


 * Special Note: I found great "real" instruments, such as a hand bell, a drum and a baby's xylophone, at Goodwill and paid no more than $3 for any of them. All I had to do was disinfect them and turn them over to my students. I have also found that wind chimes work as a great substitute for a xylophone, but the wooden ones break easily in the hands of children. Pier One also has jingle bell sticks for $5 and Dollar General had rainsticks for $1 (though they're very soft). I was happy to buy and make my own instruments, stored in plastic bins from Walmart ($5), so that I don't have to share & can use them any time we have free time to rehearse our rondos.

~ Submitted by Samantha Blake - E.B. Ellington 4/12/2012

Video link from EB Ellington Seedfolks performance Spring 2012 []