Steady+Beat+with+Ants+Go+Marching

This is a great lesson plan for teaching students about marches and keeping a steady beat. This is also great for those students who can't use verbal communication as it gets them moving and teaches them steady beat. My students really enjoyed it, I think because they were able to get out of their seats and move around a bit. It works great if the teacher is the leader and you take them all around the room. You might even try making a student the leader. There is also plenty of books out there that talk about marching ants that would make a great addition to this lesson.

__Subject/Grade__: 1st grade __Concepts/skills__: improvise, steady beat, singing** __Objective:__ Students will be able to improvise a four beat melody on a C major pentatonice scale on Orff instruments and march to the steady beat of "Ants Go Marching".** __C major pentatonic__ 1. What is improvisation?-->Do students know what this is? Explain that improvisation is making up a song on the spot. 2. Students have done four beat rhythm patterns before, so apply this to the improvisation. Tell students that we are going to improvise our own songs using the xylophones and metallophones. Use any of the keys on the instrument and make a four beat composition. Give an example of this. Students may only use ta's, ti ti's and rests. 3. Go around and have each student play their composition individually for the class, making sure each student is praised if they have a four beat melody. ** Assessment: ** Have students take turns improvising so everybody is heard. This is an informal assessment, looking to make sure students play a four beat only melody. __ “Ants Go Marching” __ 1. What is a march?-->Some students know what this is. If not, explain to the students that a march started hundreds of years ago when they needed a way for all the armies to get to the battle field all at the same time, so they played music that they stepped in time to. This was called a march! 2. Play a march for them i.e. “The Ants Go Marching” 3. What type of song did I just play? 4. Bring out the Big Book, pg. 74 à What do all the verse have in common? (One by one, little one stops to have some fun; two by two, little one stops to tie his show, etc) 5. Now students can sing the song and march in place to the steady beat. ** Assessment ** : Now that students can keep the beat, it’s time to march to the battlefield! March with the students one by one around the room, like follow the leader. Students sing along with the song as they are marching. This is an informal assessment.
 * __Teacher__: Amanda Coon
 * __National Standards Met:__ Sing, listen, play, improvise, history/culture

-If time, pick one student to start out as the first ant. When the class sings "the little stops to have some fun", have the student whatever action they see fit. That student must then pick a student to be ant #2. When the students sing "the little stops to tie his shoe" then that student must do that action and then pick a student to join. This continues on until all the students have been picked. (you may have to do this more than once)

Jared edit Amanda, I will try this lesson especially since I have not done anything with improvisation yet. I like that you have set parameters for the assessment of the improvisation(4 beats). I would take it a little farther and talk about close notes and far away notes, close notes being more desireable. Also maybe ending up where they start could be an approach to consider. LeBruce Edit We did a similar lesson with our first graders. Another objective other than marching to the beat was improvised dance. We had each student find their own space where they wouldn't touch anyone (we have a large room). Then we played the follwing game while assessing. One way we got to assess each student is by having them come up one by one. We always focused on the student who was the little one for assessment. For example, one student starts and is the little one, i.e. the ant marching "one-by-one". They stop to have some fun (whatever they chose to do), then start marching again. They pick the another student to be the little one, who lines up behind them. They stop to tie their shoe, then march again. They pick the third student to be the little one. So on and so forth. We usually had to play the game twice to get all the students involved.
 * Effectiveness reminders:** Students can get a little crazy during the follow the leader, so make sure you are watching. Practicing the marching in place first seemed to help!

I like how you are introducing improv to the students. There are just a few spelling errors throughout, but I know that spell check doesn't pick up on everything. The assessment is clear (students should only play for 4 beats) but if you only have kids for a 20-30 minute class, could this be too time consuming with a larger group? If so, I may recommend putting them into smaller groups. I really like the incorporation of movement into the classroom. While your working on two different activites, is there a way to tie the two together? Perhaps when planning the lesson you might be able to find a recording of the piece in "C" and have the students improvise over the recording in beats of 4, and then talk about the March. Under the section about "Ants go Marching" subtitle 3: "What type of song did I just play?" you may consider offering them suggestions. Also, you may use this as a leading question before playing the recording, letting the students know ahead of time what they should be listening for. Perhaps if you have studied other types of styles (i.e. watlz, etc.) you could compare them. I think this lesson is entirely appropriate and fun at the same time for the students!

Amanda - What a great lesson! I have tried the same lesson with a different melody and found it to be a very effective lesson. I would try to expand a little bit on the improvisation. For example, a lot of students are may find this activity very overwhelming especially at first. Improvisation should be fun and exciting, not scary and intimidating, so maybe you could break it down a little. I would put a rhythm up on the board so there are some parameters and the students do not feel totally lost. That was very useful for me. It may also be helpful to have the students end on home tone (tonic). I think that experimentation is great, but I also think that students need to have a happy balance between experimenting with notes and still having a basic structure. Another idea is after the students have had a chance to practice, have them put on a "performance" of their improvisations for each other. Our students REALLY had fun with this! Overall - this was a very fun and well written lesson! ~Beth Cheyney

Great lesson, I love that you tackle improvisation so early! I agree with Beth and would just like to make one suggestion on how to break down improvisation. You could explain that we can improvise rhythms, melodies, or both at the same time. Write a rhythm on the board and clap it together, then make them improvise a melody using the rhythm. Next, you could give them only one bar (or two I suppose) on which to play, but the student comes up with their own rhythm. After they've improvised both a melody and a rhythm, it may be easier for them to put them together. I know this approach is a bit tedious, but not all classes of students are the same. Some will happily try out anything you say, others may be timid and unconfident and will appreciate more structure when learning such an unstructured concept :) I love the variety offered in this activity, though; it's so easily adapted for different situations! -Jessie Beran