Lesson Plan for Implementing

NETS•S—Template I
(More Directed Learning Activities)
Template with guiding questions
Teacher(s)
Name Lauren Pittman

Position Orchestra Teacher

School/District Creekland Middle School/Gwinnett County Public Schools

E-mail lpittman1229@gmail.com

Phone 770-315-9011
Grade
Level(s) 7

Content Area Beginning Orchestra

Time line 3-4 class periods of 60 minutes each

Standards (What do you want students to know and be able to do? What knowledge, skills, and strategies do you
expect students to gain? Are there connections to other curriculum areas and subject area benchmarks? ) Please
put a summary of the standards you will be addressing rather than abbreviations and numbers that indicate which
standards were addressed.

Content Standards:
Georgia Performance Standards for Beginning Orchestra
● MMSBO.2 Perform instruments, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music
○ c. Utilize correct finger patterns in performing scales and repertoire in the keys
of D, G, and C.

● MMSBO.3 – Reading and notating music

○ Identify notes in the staff and on ledger lines of respective clef.
○ Read and notate notes within the following key signatures: D, G, and C
○ Read and notate rhythms containing whole notes, half notes, quarter notes,
eighth notes, dotted half notes, and their corresponding rests in the time

● MMSBO.5 – Composing and arranging music within specified guidelines

○ Create original rhythm patterns in 4/4 time.
○ Compose simple melodies for respective instrument in the key signatures of
D & G major

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 NETS*S Standards

Empowered Learner
● 1.C Students use technology to seek feedback that informs and improves their
practice and to demonstrate their learning in a variety of ways
Digital Citizenship
● Students engage in positive, safe, legal and ethical behavior when using
technology, including social interactions online or when using networked devices.
Knowledge Constructor
● 3.c Students curate information from digital resources using a variety of tools and
methods to create collections of artifacts that demonstrate meaningful connections
or conclusions.
● 3.d Students build knowledge by actively exploring real-world issues and problems,
developing ideas and theories and pursuing answers and solutions.
Innovative Designer
● 4.a Students know and use a deliberate design process for generating ideas, testing
theories, creating innovative artifacts or solving authentic problems
● 4.b Students select and use digital tools to plan and manage a design process that
considers design constraints and calculated risks
Computational Thinker
● 5.c Students break problems into component parts, extract key information, and
develop descriptive models to understand complex systems or facilitate
problem-solving.
Creative Communicator
● 6.b Students create original works or responsibly repurpose or remix digital
resources into new creations.
● 6.d Students publish or present content that customizes the message and medium
for their intended audiences.
Global Communicator
● 7.c Students contribute constructively to project teams, assuming various roles and
responsibilities to work effectively toward a common goal.
:

Overview (a short summary of the lesson or unit including assignment or expected or possible products)

Students will participate in a self-paced tutorial of the notes of the G major scale.
Activities will include:
● Teacher-created specific video tutorials
● Drag and Drop identifying notes on the staff and fingerboard location
● Note reading identification drill
● Student-generated performance video performing G Major scale & interval exercise from their method
book
● Creation of an original composition that includes pitches of the G Major scale
● Student-generation performance video of the original composition
● Students will share the video and composition and performance with their peers for peer evaluation

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Essential Questions (What essential question or learning are you addressing? What would students care or
want to know about the topic? What are some questions to get students thinking about the topic or generate
interest about the topic? Additionally, what questions can you ask students to help them focus on important
aspects of the topic? (Guiding questions) What background or prior knowledge will you expect students to bring
to this topic and build on?) Remember, essential questions are meant to guide the lesson by provoking inquiry.
They should not be answered with a simple “yes” or “no” and should have many acceptable answers.

What are the notes of the G Major Scale?

Where are they located on your fingerboard & how do you play them?
Where are the notes located on the staff?
What are the similarities of the D major and G Major scales?
What are their differences?
How can learning more notes make you a better musician?

Assessment (What will students do or produce to illustrate their learning? What can students do to generate new
knowledge? How will you assess how students are progressing (formative assessment)? How will you assess
what they produce or do? How will you differentiate products?) You must attach copies of your assessment and/or
rubrics. Include these in your presentation as well.

Formative assessments:
Drag & Drop of pitches & fingerboard map
Note Reading Drill
Student performance of method book exercises

Summative assessment:
Original composition and student performance video

Resources (How does technology support student learning? What digital tools, and resources—online student
tools, research sites, student handouts, tools, tutorials, templates, assessment rubrics, etc—help elucidate or
explain the content or allow students to interact with the content? What previous technology skills should students
have to complete this project?)

Google Slides
Teacher created tutorials using Screencastify
https://www.musictheory.net/
https://www.noteflight.com/
https://info.flipgrid.com/
Final Assessment (Composition and Performance) Rubric in Google Classroom

Instructional Plan
Preparation (What student needs, interests, and prior learning provide a foundation for this lesson? How can
you find out if students have this foundation? What difficulties might students have?)

Students should be able to perform the D Major scale with characteristic tone and correct left/right-hand position.
Students need to be fluent in identifying the notes of the D Major scale and play exercises using quarter, half, 8th
note rhythmic patterns and their corresponding rests.
Students have been working on these skills since the beginning of the school year. Previous formative (teacher
observation/quizzes) and summative assessments (playing tests) are used to evaluate this prior knowledge.
Learning the notes of the G Major scale is the next sequential step in beginning orchestra repertoire.

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Management Describe the classroom management strategies will you use to manage your students and the use
of digital tools and resources. How and where will your students work? (Small groups, whole group, individuals,
classroom, lab, etc.) What strategies will you use to achieve equitable access to the Internet while completing this
lesson? Describe what technical issues might arise during the Internet lesson and explain how you will resolve or
trouble-shoot them? Please note: Trouble-shooting should occur prior to implementing the lesson as well as
throughout the process. Be sure to indicate how you prepared for problems and work through the issues that
occurred as you implemented and even after the lesson was completed.

Students worked in the orchestra classroom and were issued a school laptop if they don’t have a personal device
to use. Students worked individually on the module and worked at their own pace to complete the task. If
necessary, the teacher will partner students who may be struggling through the module.
I made myself familiar with all of the Web 2.0 tools by working through each activity myself. I also watched video
tutorials on any possible issues that I may encounter and the solutions. In addition, I created videos for students
to reference for “how-to’s” of each Web 2.0 tool that they engaged with. If I have an issue with hardware
(computers) I am fortunate enough that there are more computers available in the laptop carts issued by the
school . I can also assign partners to each device if necessary.

Instructional Strategies and Learning Activities – Describe the research-based instructional strategies you will
use with this lesson. How will your learning environment support these activities? What is your role? What are the
students' roles in the lesson? How can you ensure higher order thinking at the analysis, evaluation, or
creativity levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy? How can the technology support your teaching? What authentic,
relevant, and meaningful learning activities and tasks will your students complete? How will they build knowledge
and skills? How will students use digital tools and resources to communicate and collaborate with each other
and others? How will you facilitate the collaboration?

Activating Background Knowledge:

Referencing the D Major scale and the skills that we have learned to perform that scale.
Scaffolding:
Building on what the students already know and introducing each new element step-by-step through the process.
Skills will begin at a lower order of thinking (define, identify, explain, etc) and move to mid level thinking skills
(contrast, relate, correlate) and finally higher order thinking (Design, develop, perform, collaborate)
Technology will support my teaching by providing platforms that reflect the scaffolding I will be implementing:
Drag & Drop (Google Slides)--Identify and Label
Musictheory.net--Identify
Performance of G major scale video (Google Slides)-- perform
Noteflight.com--Compose/Write
FlipGrid.com--Evaluate & Collaborate
The authentic and meaningful activity will be the performance of the composition using the notes of the G major
scale. This activity also meets the evaluation and creativity levels of Bloom’s Taxonomy.

Differentiation (How will you differentiate content and process to accommodate various learning styles and
abilities? How will you help students learn independently and with others? How will you provide extensions and
opportunities for enrichment? What assistive technologies will you need to provide?)

The activities themselves are differentiation. There are a variety of ways that students can demonstrate learning.
If needed I can manipulate the number of activities that need to be completed and the levels of higher-order
thinking needed to complete the tasks. I can create an extension of this activity by asking students to create a
“You’re the Teacher” video on how to perform the notes of the G Major scale. The student would choose the
platform they wanted to record with and any additional resources they wanted to use for visuals (whiteboard,
pen/paper, etc)

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Reflection (Will there be a closing event? Will students be asked to reflect upon their work? Will students be
asked to provide feedback on the assignment itself? What will be your process for answering the following
questions?
• Did students find the lesson meaningful and worth completing?
• In what ways was this lesson effective?
• What went well and why?
• What did not go well and why?
• How would you teach this lesson differently?)

When issued a survey regarding this lesson at least 90% of students said they found the tasks engaging. What
they liked the most was that they could complete work at their own pace and that they could ask peers for
assistance if needed. They said they also found the videos helpful.
The piece of the assignment they liked the least was submitting their performance to FlipGrid for peer evaluation.
My students are used to me giving them feedback on video submitted evaluations but they are nervous to
perform in front to their peers. However, I found that this nervousness was a further motivator for student
engagement as students wanted to give a solid performance.
I think that the included video tutorials gave me more opportunity to work with students one on one. The ability to
monitor the room and make myself available was an important contributor to the success of this lesson. In
addition, the built in scaffolding helped students to gain confidence in learning this new skill.

Closure: Anything else you would like to reflect upon regarding lessons learned and/or your experience with
implementing this lesson. What advice would you give others if they were to implement the lesson? Please
provide a quality reflection on your experience with this lesson and its implementation.
When using a tool that relies on outside links, make sure that they all work before sharing with students. Nothing
is more frustrating to both student and teacher when a tutorial or instructional video doesn’t work and then there
is no access to content that is required for the task.
Provide as many “how-to’s” for tech skills as possible. Give students a way to find the answer to their own
troubleshooting before asking you.
I really liked this lesson for my students. Learning scales isn’t the most exciting thing to be honest and I think that
this task provides a variety of resources for students to learn new content and complete both formative and
summative assessments at their own pace. The variety of assessments and activities to meet the needs of all of
my learners and I think that all the students felt successful with their performance.

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