at home and this, of course, includes practicing their instru- ment. Included in this time are also opportunities for stu- dents to create their own music using a set of guidelines or expectations that I have defined. The students actively en- gage with composing at home and class time is spent shar- ing each other’s compositions in small groups or as a class. Compositions are performed by the composer, their peers, or most often from the computer using our Smart Board. What is particularly enlightening are the conversations that the students themselves create and lead while sharing each other’s compositions. They talk about music, how to make music better, and what can be done (compositionally, as well as a performer) to improve music performance. This type of student-led inquiry transfers into our rehearsal set- ting. Time is saved because my students do not need me to constantly remind them to think as musicians. They know what to expect in the music because they themselves have created it and understand the performance needs of band music because they have had similar desires for their own compositions. Students are more enthusiastic about spend- ing time practicing music that they have created themselves than book exercises or excerpts from our concert music. We are saving time because students are motivated to play their music (and their instrument) better.
Embedding Composing Into Your Performance Classroom First I should repeat: I don’t teach composition. I am con- stantly amazed at how well young musicians already com- pose; they just need the opportunities to do it. Many students are probably already composing in your program on their own. Notational software and a classroom projector is a good place to begin to help students get the sounds from their head to the music staff. This technology allows students the op- portunity to display, edit, and perform their compositions. If you have not yet discovered
Noteflight.com, make it a to-do. Conversations in class explore ways to make student compo- sitions stronger (or more playable). Young performers know right away if something sounds good or not and they will fix and make adjustments to their pieces with encouragement and guidance. Here are some ways to include composing im- mediately into your classroom:
1) Teach something, then have the students compose. Even after a young instrumentalist learns their first five notes, they are ready to start creating. Within your own cur- riculum you already know some of the yearly hurdles you face. For me, my sixth graders struggle when we first try exercises with 3 beats to the measure and when we first in- troduce the concert E natural. Sixteenth-note rhythm pat- terns are always tricky when first introduced in 7th grade. Likewise, teaching “march-style” to my 8th grade students is always a hot topic. These are great opportunities for stu- dents to demonstrate their understanding by having them create their own short melody or piece. When students are
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asked to take a concept and create something new it requires them to put the new concept into musical context. This type of informed knowing is a higher-level thinking skill and re- quires a strong understanding of the lesson as opposed to the uninformed doing required to match the performance style of your neighbor or conductor’s singing (Blair, 2009).
2) Students create their own performance quizzes. Students should be encouraged to create their own goals for improved performance. A step further would be to ask stu- dents to create their own etude that demonstrates their goals. There is a level of ownership and agency when the student is given the opportunity to show you what they can perform, or how they have improved, through performing their own music. I have found through my own research that students tend to do this in all their compositions (Xydas, 2014). Flute players write in trills, clarinet players compose melodies that cross the break, percussion players compose for mal- let parts, and brass players push themselves one more note higher. The level of anxiety to perform in front of the class is also lower when students are allowed to perform their own composed works.
In my ensembles, I have students create three goals for them- selves prior to leaving for winter break. Their goals range from specific instrumental techniques (learn new alternate fingerings, increase range, new scale) or general music per- formance (new scale, selection from method book, etc.). They are asked to create a composition that demonstrates these goals and their improvement on them. This composi- tion is their playing quiz in January.
3) Students create new melodies to the concert repertoire. By simply providing students with the harmonies and accom- panying rhythmic grooves from one of your concert pieces students can demonstrate their understanding of phrasing or various beat or rhythm patterns by creating a new melody. While learning Steve Hodge’s Wind Mountain Overture (grade 1.5) the group struggled with feeling the syncopated rhythms of the harmony and percussion while performing a melody that wasn’t syncopated. I asked the students to create a new melody to a simplified accompaniment incorporating the syncopated rhythms. (See figure 1, next page)
Participating in this opportunity allowed students to create, hear, and even perform their own melodies while working with syncopation. Students would inevitably practice their own melodies with the accompaniment played by the com- puter or entire class, developing their own understanding and feel of syncopation in a meaningful and beneficial context. This also allowed students to see how their parts fit with the whole and required them to think past their own part while exploring how music works.
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