Agenda and Assignments

The SideBar

We have a lot to cover in class and limited class time, so you have to make sure you keep up with your reading assignments. And don't cheat... don't just answer the questions and e-mail your answers... read the chapters! If you have any questions about an assignment or something you read in an assignment, don't hesitate to e-mail me [JM]

March 7

  1. Work on projects. No new material seeing many are excused from day's lab session

March 6 - Class cancelled

  1. Today an introduction to Music Ace, a software package that can be used to teach basic musical concepts, especially to younger children
  2. Also planned, an introduction to SONAR and the start of our first project in that program. This project will introduce some important concepts on working with a sequencer program as well as some methods of inputting notes and data (See #5)
  3. Due: March 13 . Read Chapter 7 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of the chapter
  4. Due: March 13 . Read Sections 3 and 4 in Technologies Strategies for Music Education. Again, we are now focusing more and more on how to use these technology tools in teaching and this book is an excellent resource for "how-to" ideas
  5. Due: March 14 . Submit SONAR and MIDI versions of the Bach chorale distributed in class. The first half of the score should be input in real time, the last half in Step Record mode.

March 4

  1. This week, we will continue to work on projects as well as go back and look again at the Triton and and MIDI
  2. One important item for today - how to put the Triton in SEQ mode and load GM Setup. This allows the Triton to be used as a multi-timbral instrument capable of receiving and processing MIDI information on all 16 MIDI channels. (The instructions on how to do this should be located on the plexiglass music stand found on your workstation in the lab)
  3. We'll also take a quick look at SONAR, our next application to study
  4. During the week we will also start looking at several pieces of software whose specific purpose is to teach some aspect of music. From now on we will focus more and more on how to use computers to teach music (Technology-Assisted Instruction)
  5. Due: March 14. (Many of you have already completed this assignment, but we never put an official due date on it.) Submit an MP3 version of an audio file created in Audacity which you could use as a ringtone on your cellphone. Tell me when you're ready to create the MP3 versioin of your project so we can do this part of the project together

February 29 - Lab

  1. Work on projects
  2. Note: The due date for anything due today has been pushed back to March 7

February 28

  1. No new material planned to make up for the lab missed on last Friday's snow day
  2. Due: March 6 . Read Chapter 6 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of the chapter
  3. Due: March 6 . Read Sections 1 and 2 in Technologies Strategies for Music Education. It's time for use to start to focus on this book to see how to use these technology tools in teaching

February 26

  1. No new material planned to make up for the lab missed on last Friday's snow day
  2. Note: All project due dates have been push backed a week due to last Friday's snow day

February 22 - Lab (Snow day, school closed)

  1. Working on projects

February 21

  1. Working on projects
  2. Due: February 28. Read Chapter 5 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of the chapter

February 19 -- Tuesday is Monday. No class

February 15 - Lab

  1. Today in lab, there will be time to work on your PowerPoint assignment (see #5 in this list) and/or your ACID assignment (see #3 and #4 in this list). Also, we'll start working with Audacity to see how you can edit audio files on your computer
  2. Due: February 21. Read Chapter 4 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of the chapter
  3. Due: February 21. As part of the ACID exercise described in #4, write and e-mail me a brief description of a scene from an imaginary movie for which you are going to write a music soundtrack in ACID
  4. Due: February 29. In ACID, write a music soundtrack for the imaginary movie scene you have submitted. The music track should be at least 30 seconds and can contain sound effects (birds, water, traffic, etc.) which you can find on the Web or take from a CD using techniques we'll cover in our work with Audacity. See how everything ties together :)
  5. Due: February 29. Create a PowerPoint presentation about yourself. The presentation should contain at least 5 slides and, if you want, can include multimedia (graphics, photos, music). If you are familiar with PowerPoint the slideshow can be about a composer or style of music instead. The focus of this exercise is how to use PowerPoint so you don't spend too much time gathering / creating content
  6. Don't forget -- Tuesday is Monday next week. No class next Tuesday, February 19!

February 12

  1. This week a little more with ACID, an introduction to PowerPoint, and editing digital audio
  2. We'll start working on your ACID, PowerPoint and ringtone assignments. More about these in class, then on this page
  3. Don't forget... No class next Tuesday. Next week, Tuesday is Monday

February 7

  1. Today we work on ACID and talk a little about PowerPoint. We'll do more of each in the lab session tomorrow
  2. Due: February 8. Bring the music you'd like to use for a ringtone to lab tomorrow. This can either be a CD or an high-quality MP 3. (Bring a CD if you don't have too much experience ripping music from a CD
  3. Due: February 12. Read Chapter 3 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of the chapter

February 5

  1. Seeing we didn't have lab last Friday, we'll catch up on what we were going to do that day this week.
    • We'll look at an example PowerPoint presentation and get you started with that program
    • We'll start working with ACID, and with digital audio and Audacity

January 31

  1. Due: February 1. As preparation for editing digital audio, pick some music from a CD that you think would make a good ringtone and bring the CD to lab February 1
  2. Due: February 5 . E-mail me five concepts and skills you'd like to learn in this class. In this message also include what kind of computer you own. Include make, model, processor type, memory, hard-drive size, attached peripherals (CD-ROM, printer, scanner, etc.)
  3. Due: February 5 . Read Chapters 1 and 2 in Teaching Music with Technology and e-mail me your answers for 3 questions from the end of each chapter. In Chapter 1, choose from the first 7 questions only
  4. Due: February 5. As a preparation for working with PowerPoint, put together some information about yourself for a 5 slide presentation

Last update: March 7, 2008