This lesson will demonstrate Universal Design for Learning in a lesson for kindergartners on listening to songs. This edublog is the medium I have used to base my lesson overview, rationale, and additional prototype materials.
This is part of a unit for helping kindergartners develop skills and appreciation for listening to songs. They will know that songs have language as well as musical components, and how those work together to impact their listening experience. Part of the unit is also understanding the idea of a mind behind the creation of music. They will explore: Why should we listen to songs? What makes songs–what are their parts? My primary goals for this lesson are for students to understand that songs are made up of language and musical components and for students to recognize these components.
In this lesson, students explore lyrics, rhythm, key notes/phrases, tempo, and instrumentation as parts of a song. They start with brainstorming components of music they think are present as a group. They then listen to a song, then are asked to reflect on whether their analysis was accurate. The students explore different components by using tools that scaffold how to break a song down. The lesson winds down with a performance of understanding, where they discuss or reflect or show they can identify important lyrics, notes, rhythm, pitch, tempo and instruments.
