Madison Gilleland

gillelmp@dukes.jmu.edu
Block 3 Placement
Hanover High School

Impact on Student Learning Project

PURPOSE
The purpose of this project was to implement a unit that introduces, developed and
strengthened the students' understanding and recognition of intervals. In the first weeks of this
placement, I observed that this class had a willingness and excitement to learn. They had a
very clear understanding of solfege and could sing scales on solfege syllables. Some students
in this class also had an interest in music theory but struggled with matching pitch. Because of
this, I decided to teach a unit on intervals. I chose intervals because I felt that it was a good
way to transfer the knowledge they already have with solfege to a new concept. Giving
students a new way to conceptualize the relationship between pitches in an effort to improve
their intonation.

UNIT STANDARDS & OBJECTIVES

MCB.2 – The student will develop aural skills by
a) distinguishing major and minor tonalities
MCI.2 – The student will develop aural skills by
a) identifying diatonic intervals (M2, m2, M3, P4, P5, M6, and octave)
MCAD.2 – The student will develop aural skills by
a) identifying all diatonic intervals
b) distinguishing descending half-step and whole-step intervals

PRE-ASSESSMENT
Overview:
The assessment process for this project included one pre-assessment worksheet. This
worksheet included examples of both recoginizing intervals in written form on a staff, as well
as listening examples. The pre-assessment worksheet also included questions like “what is an
interval?” and “what are the three types of intervals?”
Results:
The results of the pre-assessment showed that the majority of the students were fairly
unfamiliar with intervals. A couple students had the right idea on what an interval was but
were unfamiliar with the correct language we use for labeling intervals. The main approaches
taken by the students was that of writing soflege syllables, numbers, or “skips” and “steps.”

You can find the pre-assessment worksheet results at this link:

https://drive.google.com/drive/folders/1lyi67YFyNAtllE8p47JOWJVUC-L2-t86?usp=drive_link

LESSONS
Lesson One: 2/8/2024
In this lesson the concept of intervals was introduced by defining the term on the board as
follows – An Interval: the distance between two pitches. After this description was shared, we
also went over the three types of intervals we were going to be learning about: major, minor,
and perfect intervals, and how those can be abbreviated. Finally, I introduced the students to
major 2nd, minor second, major third, and minor third intervals. I did this by drawing notated
examples of the intervals on the board as well as providing listening examples from the piano.
For the listening examples, I also told students some songs they can think of that have those
specific intervals as a way to remember what they sound like (example: happy birthday starts
with a major second interval).

Lesson Two: 2/12/2024

For the second lesson in this unit we reviewed what was learned in the first lesson and
continued with some more intervals! We learned about perfect fourth, perfect fifth, major sixth,
and minor sixth intervals in this lesson. Similarly to the last lesson, I drew notated examples of
the intervals on the board and provided students with listening examples from the pinao, as
well as songs to listen for to help identify the intervals. For both the written and listening
examples I also threw in some of the previously learned intervals in order to continue building
on and connect the content they’ve been learning.

Lesson Three: 2/14/2024

In this lesson we briefly reviewed and finished learning about the rest of the intervals that
were left: major seventh, minor seventh, and perfect octave. Like before, I drew notated
examples of the intervals on the board and provided students with listening examples from the
pinao, as well as songs to listen for to help identify the intervals. For both the written and
listening examples I also threw in some of the previously learned intervals in order to continue
building on and connect the content they’ve been learning.
Lesson Four (Review and Post-Assessment): 2/16/2024
For the final lesson we reviewed everything we had learned! This Included the definition of an
interval, the three types, and every interval learned (m2, M2, m3, M3, P4, P5, m6, M6, m7, M7,
and P8). During this review, I wrote each interval name underneath a staff and asked students
to volunteer and draw a matching interval. After we reviewed both written and listening
examples, the students completed the post-assessment.

POST-ASSESSMENT
Overview
The post-assessment tested the knowledge and skills the students had learned through this
process, and was the exact same worksheet as the pre-assessment. When completing the
post-assessment students seemed more confident and some were seen using their solfege
hand-signs to help with audiating the interval listening examples.

Results
The results of the post-assessment showed that students had a much more clear
understanding of intervals, in both written and listening examples. Four out of seven students
got a 100% on the post-assessment, and the rest of the students only missed a few of the
questions. Overall, their understanding had significantly improved over the course of these few
lessons on intervals.

REFLECTION

Student Learning
When reviewing the results of both the pre-assessment and post-assessment, it is clear that
the student had gained a much stronger understanding for intervals. Evidence from the
pre-assessment showed that intervals were a new concept for the students that they were
unfamiliar with. This program uses a lot of solfege in their daily learning, so some students
transferred that knowledge into the pre-assesment. However, intervals weren’t something
they knew about already. The post-assessment shows that students now have a much
stronger understanding and knowledge about intervals and how to both identify them visually
and aurually. Students also began recognizing them in the repertoire we were working on in
class! On a few different occasions when working on pitches in the music, students would point
to spots in the music and excitedly identify the interval unprompted by me. That sort of
transfer is evidence of the impact the unit had on their learning as well as their excitement of
continuous learning.
Instructional Adjustments
This specific class was very small, with there only being eight students. This small class size
allowed me to easily adjust the pacing or delivery for what the students may have needed at
each moment. They were eager to learn and were often very interactive and willing to answer
questions I asked to informally test knowledge when prompted. There was constant student
engagement and group reflection/learning throughout this process.

Potential Modifications
When teaching this topic again, I would love to incorporate more fun visuals. I would include a
slideshow as we go through the different types of intervals, both visually and aurally. I think
this would cater to a broader range of learning styles and adapt the lesson to meet more needs
of each individual and unique student. A slideshow presentation would also have made this
even more fun for students, with the use of pictures, colors, and playing songs to relate to each
interval. We often talked about songs that started with each interval, but in the future I want to
have those connections laid out for the students more clearly and interactively.