As of August 2014 I moved from Australia to South Korea for an adventure in teaching at an international school! As I start a new teaching career in a beautifu part of Korea I am able to continue innovating and exploring with Apple Technology in the classroom. My new school has a 1:1 MacPro Program and my seniors in particular are running Yosemite with the latest versions of iBooks and iBooks Author. That and the requirements of the International Baccalaureate Diploma Music Programme gave me the impetus to start my seniors on creating their own content and presenting their ideas in a professional manner with integrated media – almost as if they were writing their own textbooks!
…iBooks really makes it easier to present good work with audio and scores!…(Grade 11 Student)
As part of the Diploma Level Music Course students need to investigate two distinct musical cultures and compare them using two or three musical ‘links.’ These links could be Pitch or Rhythm related but the students are required to undertake academic research in completing this task. Some successful topics for students to explore are the links between Jazz pieces like Chick Corea’s Spain and a Bach Fugue, Bohemian Rhapsody by Queen and Hungarian Women’s song or even a South Indian Carnatic work compared to an aria from Monteverdi’s L’incoronazione di Poppea.
The software entitled iBooks Author is uniquely suited to help students and staff alike create digital media from Textbooks, Storybooks, Work-samples or, in this case, advanced musical analysis assignments. (Note: the examples here are from my current students and are still works in progress. What it is clear is the level of engagement and detail in their work).
What I particularly love is the ability to drag in any media type from video, to score images or melodic transcriptions and instantly annotate and link to my research. When my students found the interactive widget options and how easy it was to format their ‘books’ they started creating entire works on everything from Scriabin to Mozart and Overtone Singing! (this video inspired my students).
Whereas our initial task was to only create an abstract with an annotated bibliography, my students quickly took the task beyond its original description and started incorporating information from academic articles, annotating scores with SKITCH and editing audio clips in Garageband to embed into their work.
I cannot post and share my students work yet because they would say they aren’t finished! Once they submit their work I hope to share many advanced publications by students investigating and analyzing music from around the globe. Just imagine what we could all learn if your classes did this too!
