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Curriculum
When started my first elementary music job I was handed a K-5 set of music text books and CDs and was expected to know what to do with them. I felt completely lost! I did not know what concepts each grade needed to learn or what sequence to teach them. The students and I had a lot of fun surviving the first year of my teaching together but I knew their must be a better way. Then the Kodaly Method entered my life. I took Level One after my first year during the summer and it completely transformed my teaching. Instead of going unit to unit I instead starting scaffolding my teaching upon prior knowledge of the students and my students started to excel! I am still learning how to effectively but Kodaly gave me the tools necessary to be an effective teacher. I thought I would share some resources that have made my teaching more effective and my lesson planning more efficient.
An American Methodology
This is what I like to call the Kodaly Bible. If you are at all interested in Kodaly, this is the ultimate book. It has what concepts to teach in what grade, songs and activities to teach for each concept and a song index that is amazing! This has save me an unlimited amount of hours planning at my desk. Get this book! Even though it is expensive it is totally worth it!
Yearly Plans
The Kodaly Bible 2.0. This probably was more helpful my first few years of teaching than "An American Methodology" but I still needed both! Yearly Plans shows you what concept you need to teach for each grade, the month you teach it in during the school year and when to present, prepare and practice the concept. It gaves visual learners the mind map to see how everything fits within the year. I even color coded mine. GET THIS BOOK!
Sail Away
"Sail Away" is directly used with the "American Methodology" book. It has 155 American folk songs to sing, read, and play. There are so many good songs in this book and it's cheap! It's a staple in the Kodaly world!
150 American Folk Songs
150 American Folk Songs is another staple in the Kodaly world. It also pairs with "An American Methodology" and has many great folk songs that can immediately taught in your classroom.
American Folk Song Website
Holy Names University has made an amazing FREE online resource to find Kodaly songs. They are searchable by concept which really helps with lesson planning.
First Steps
John Feierabend has many books available a reasonable prices to teach students different concepts. They are very well organized, making lesson planning much easier!
The Book of Canons
"The Book of Canons" by Feierabend is a fantastic resource for rounds and canons. I enjoy this book because it complies the rounds by subject matter (ex: Nature, Latin, seasons) and also ranks them by difficulty level. The difficulty ranking really helps when planning rounds by grade level.
Conversational Solfege
John M. Feierabend has amazing resources for the elementary classroom. His method is unique and bring a different perspective when teaching folk songs.
Directions to literacy Teaching the Older Beginner
This book is a great resource if you have just started at a school and the musicianship skills are lacking. It helps give activities that are age appropriate to get your students caught up to grade level. I have used this in my 6th grade general music class when I taught at a middle school for two years and it really helped my lesson planning.