“Students gain a deep understanding of repertoire and ‘how music works’ through their own creative process”
The NSW Orff Schulwerk Association has their teacher accreditation courses on this September. Levels 1, 2 and 3 are on offer with some excellent presenters and trainers. If you, an innovative music teacher, have never undertaken the 6 day extensive teacher accreditation course – you must! You will be singing, performing and composing with other teachers in a supportive environment, having fun preparing lessons for your junior or senior music classes. Best of all, you will be inspired to go back to your classrooms with a renewed approach to teaching music. Remember, if you love teaching music the Orff Schulwerk approach imparts a love of music, an interaction with music and an innate understanding of music to all ages – even us teachers!
What is the Orff Approach?
• Orff-Schulwerk is an approach to music education that was initiated by composer-educator Carl Orff and teaching colleague Dorothee Gunther in the 1930s
• It is concerned with what the student does to be musical.
• The focus of the Schulwerk approach is to the learner and the needs of the learner
More info at the Alliance for Active Music Making, Mary Shamrock Ph.D.
Students are encouraged to perform, improvise, compose and talk about music, leading to a holistic understanding of notation and analysis using the concepts of music. These experiences of imitation and exploration provide the basis for deeper conceptual understanding, almost as if the Bloom’s Taxonomy for Music Teaching was integrated into the very seams of Orff Schulwerk.
Furthermore, creativity is not discouraged, but allowed to be expressed and then built upon in such music lessons. Through emotional and intellectual responses to physical and aural experiences, students develop deep aural and musicological understandings of the musical concepts. Isn’t this what we strive for in our music classes and strive to draw-out from our senior HSC students? My love for this approach and why I continue to train in the levels (often out of my own pocket) is because of its focus on catering for the lifelong learning of my students. I do not want to teach in a factory assemble line, pushing kids through the HSC onto ‘whatever they do next’ and welcoming in the next batch. I want my students to know about music, interact with it past school, remember me as a teacher who showed them how to compose with knowledge and to discuss music with understanding. Who knows, they might link these skills to other parts of their lives in a positive way too.
Resources and Courses
• Sarah Brooke – Creative Educator
• James Humberstone – Composer Home, Australian Music Composition
• Victorian Orff Schulwerk Association – Resources
• NSW Orff Schulwerk – Products Page
• NSW Orff Schulwerk Association – are on Twitter & Facebook
More Free Lessons & Resources
+ Free Orff based Lesson Plans – SIOX Valley Chapter of AOSA
+ Orff Orchestrations for the Music Classroom – Making Music Fun
+ Free Lessons and Materials – Orffsite.com
+ Orff 101 – Classics for Kids
+ iPad apps for Orff style lessons – Wrightstuffmusic
+ Class Arrangements – Wrightstuffmusic
+ Dr Seuss Orff Lessons – Wrightstuffmusic
+ Noteflight & Toy Story 3 Orff style lesson – Wrightstuffmusic
(information gathered from NSW Orff About)
Main image courtesy of Kunstbox via Compfight Creative Commons
