Assessments - Concert Grading & Playing Test Rubrics

Today, I've posted a set of grading sheets for concerts and playing tests. I usually edit them every few years or for each assessment to focus on the skills being graded. So if nothing else, these are a good place to start. 
I really like to make kids think about their performance and to reflect after. Often, they don't realize how much they've learned during the process of working on a set of concert music. 
Feel free to print and use them to make your own.
Enjoy!

Angela

Classroom Organization

I am a bit of a nut when it comes to classroom organization. I love to make all of these cute things to keep my supplies in. Unfortunately, after about 2 or 3 days everything is still a mess! I have to say, last summer, Pinterest was a lifesaver for me! I created several organizational tools that were great for helping me and my students to keep up with our supplies. 

Strings Supplies:

This is just a small parts (nuts, bolts, nails, etc...) caddy from Lowe's or K-Mart. I liked this tall one for holding all of the supplies we use in class regularly. I went to a craft store and picked up 3-4 sheets of music themed scrap book paper and used it to make the drawer fronts. It worked like a charm for rosin and rubber bands. I have to say that with the number of kids I have, the rock stop drawers had a tendency to get overfilled! Eventually, I just went to a little plastic bin for those. To make the front and sides nice, I covered them with contact paper (sides) and a thin duct tape (K-Mart).

Below is the one that I made for my teacher's desk. Also worked well so that I had a place to put everything and my middle desk drawer didn't begin eating my hand each time I opened it! 

Again, I just used some card stock to line the drawers. Here is what they look like w/o all of the decoration. 

I also found some old magazine holders at various thrift stores throughout the summer and covered them with contact paper. These were nice to look at, but I will be honest - they ended up holding a lot of papers that I was too lazy to file at the end of the day. I am hoping to repurpose them this year. Ideas?

This green frog basket was a great find! Frogs are our class mascot, since it's a part of our instrument. I cut off the cloth handle so that I could use it to store my class set of shoulder rests. I teach in an area where kids can't always afford everything, so I find it's better to have 4-5 shoulder rests on hand then to have kids with bad posture! You can see where the supply caddy from above sits as well - and yes, the end of the year mess! Sorry for that! :)

Happy Organizing!,

Angela

Concert Assessments

As I kick-off this blog, I thought I would start by posting some of the information and assessment sheets that I used at towards the end of this year. Eventually, I will put these in a format where you can download them and make changes - but for now - here they are. 

The first one is a playing test assessment form. I'm sure many of you have these kinds of rubrics that you use for playing tests. I'm always trying to come up with one that will be quick and easy to use - yet student friendly.

 If you have one you want to share - feel free! I used a great site: http://www.rcampus.com/indexrubric.cfm 
to search for a similar rubric (it was theater - not music) and alter it as needed.

The next pic is of my post concert evaluation form or PCE's as they're know to my students. Not only to these fit the 'writing requirements' so many of us are expected to include in our curriculum, but they are a great way to get the kids to actually think about their concert experience. 

Often, writing can be like pulling teeth for middle school students (boys in particular). This year I tried to vary the PCE's by using a different format for each. Since this was towards the end of our school year, I used an interview format. The students each received a sheet and were required to move around the room to ask their classmates the various questions. In order to keep kids from being lazy and just asking those around them, I had 2 rules: 1. They could NOT ask the same person anything! 2. They had a set number of minutes/seconds to ask the questions and record their answers. This was a fun, social way for them to evaluate their performance and for a few of them - they got to interact with kids outside their normal social circle! 

Like I said before, I am working this summer to put these into a format where folks can download and customize. Hopefully, I'll have some of those up soon. 

Angela