In a recent Music Education Twitter Chat,which took place on April 20th, 2010 EST the question of “What the Most Important Topics to Teach in the Music Classroom” were discussed. I was surprised to find out that many music teachers who participated in the chat thought music composition was not taught enough in schools and was not treated with enough importance in the music classroom.

So this got me thinking why!

  • Why doesn’t it get taught in the music classroom?
  • Do you think it is an important subject for music teachers to teach?
  • Are there too many other things to teach first?
  • Is it hard to teach? Is it hard to mark?
  • What resources would you use to teach music composition in the classroom?

Personally, I am really passionate about the need for really inspiring, fun and solid ideas for teaching music in the classroom and I don’t think that sticking students on computer programs such as “Garage Band” or “I-Nudge” really does much for the creativity of our students. To me, programs like this feel more like a “time filler” than anything else. But I would be very interested to find out how music teachers are using these programs successfully especially in the music classroom. I would love for you to prove me wrong on this and feel free to share lesson plans, ideas and inspiring stories that you have found with using such tools.

There was also a website resource discussed briefly in the chat, called “Approach to Composition” which is a set of lesson plans designed to help with teaching music composition concepts.

I would love to know what you think of this site and if it’s something you’d find useful. Has anyone used these lesson plans in the music classroom? Do you think they need extra content added to them to make them successful for the classroom? The lesson plan that particularly caught my eye was one on writing a Commercial Jingle. Is this lesson plan useful to you?

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