which are their best. It also gives a cushion for those who messed up one of their three record-
ings. After two days, I drag all the files onto a flash drive and delete the folder. I have them to
listen to at my leisure and students must be responsible for their files. Any late recordings are
done individually and I simply have them save the file to my flash drive as they record it.
The reality. This method is great because students sing in a valid choral situation. You, the
teacher, conclude an entire class of assessments in one time period – it generally takes less then
an entire class to complete three assessments. Students are using their laptops in a productive
way and they are responsible for the process. Through trial and error, I did learn to be prepared
to adapt to several issues:
o There will be times you cannot hear a student in their assessment. It may be because
the student sitting next to them has such a loud voice, or they were sitting too close to
the piano or recorder, or they forgot to turn on their volume, or their voice is simply so
soft it does not carry. There is a place on the assessment rubric that states that the
voice was too soft to be heard. The assessment then needs to be re-scheduled indi-
vidually and, in most cases, I do not assess electronically but one-on-one.
o There will be students absent and students who do not have their laptops. Again, their
assessments are re-scheduled individually and are generally done one-on-one.
o Garage band is an electronic re-
cording and you will hear the
Figure 2: Rubric for Garage Band Assessment
student’s voices through the
electronic imprint made. I am
comfortable assessing diction,
breathing, pitch, rhythm but not
Student Name ____________________
tone quality or timbre. It simply
Chorus 7 8
does not allow for a valid as-
sessment.
Song: _____________________________________
Assessment on: diction, rhythm, pitch, harmonies…
In our high stress, little time environment,
E (exceeds) M (meets) P (partially meets) D (does not meet)
it is very easy to let valid assessments eat
Comment:
up most of our time or simply fall to the Continue for subsequent songs:
side. By using the live recording aspects
of Garage Band, we can minimize the
time required for quality assessments and
 I was unable to hear your assessment. Please see me to
schedule personal time to re-assess.
allow a high level of student participation
and responsibility in the learning process.
Shari Tarleton teaches Choral and Classroom Music at Brunswick Junior High School, Brunswick, Maine. She
can be reached at starleton@brunswick.k12.me.us
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