Submitted by Patty O., Arkansas
Idea posted November 8, 2005
I have used "Ode To Composers" from Music K-8, Vol. 16, No. 2 with my sixth graders with success. We played a game that they really loved and which reviewed our studies on the Western musical style periods.
Materials: Tag board, small magnetic tape strips, and two magnetic white boards (or one divided in half).
Tag Board: On the tag board, print out names and dates of the composers (birth and death). Cut into strips, and put a small piece of magnetic tape on the back. Make two copies of each strip, one for each team.
Game: Divide students into two teams. Pick a team leader. Each leader goes to the white board. Together, we put up the Western music time periods and dates - like a time line, with enough space underneath each title to make a list. Each team has its own timeline and its own strips with the composers' names on them. The team leader distributes the strips evenly to all team members. It is a race to see who can put the names/dates under the appropriate category. Teams could ask me questions. Seldom do birth/death dates align with the style periods, and that is where it got interesting! Mostly, I advised them to go by the majority of years. If they died in 1902, probably they were influenced more by the Romantic period than the Modern...but not always! This later led to a discussion. At the end, we observed that there were no composers in the Middle Ages and discussed why not. We noticed that Byrd was active during the Renaissance and was the only one representing that era. We then discussed why. It was so great to see my students becoming literate about style periods and composers' names.