General Music Today 2010 Bohannon 27 31

7/18/2019 General Music Today 2010 Bohannon 27 31

http://slidepdf.com/reader/full/general-music-today-2010-bohannon-27-31 1/6

http://gmt.sagepub.com/ General Music Today

http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/24/1/27The online version of this article can be found at:

DOI: 10.1177/1048371310361675

2010 24: 27 originally published online 12 February 2010General Music Today R. Larry Bohannon and Carol McDowell

Art, Music, and Movement Connections for Elementary Education Teacher Candidates

Published by:

http://www.sagepublications.com

On behalf of:

National Association for Music Education

can be found at:General Music Today Additional services and information for

http://gmt.sagepub.com/cgi/alertsEmail Alerts:

http://gmt.sagepub.com/subscriptionsSubscriptions:

http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.navReprints:

http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.navPermissions:

http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/24/1/27.refs.htmlCitations:

What is This?

- Feb 12, 2010OnlineFirst Version of Record

- Aug 31, 2010Version of Record>>

by jose nobre on February 27, 2012gmt.sagepub.comDownloaded from

http://gmt.sagepub.com/


http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/24/1/27



http://www.sagepublications.com/


http://www.nafme.org/

http://gmt.sagepub.com/cgi/alerts


http://gmt.sagepub.com/subscriptions


http://www.sagepub.com/journalsReprints.nav


http://www.sagepub.com/journalsPermissions.nav


http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/24/1/27.refs.html


http://online.sagepub.com/site/sphelp/vorhelp.xhtml


http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/early/2010/02/12/1048371310361675.full.pdf


http://gmt.sagepub.com/content/24/1/27.full.pdf













http://www.nafme.org/






General Music Today

24(1) 27 –31

© 2010 MENC: The National

Association for Music Education

DOI: 10.1177/1048371310361675

http://gmt.sagepub.com

Art, Music, and MovementConnections for ElementaryEducation Teacher Candidates

R. Larry Bohannon1 and Carol McDowell1

Abstract

Visual arts, movement, and music are all connected by common structural elements. The lesson described in this article

was prepared so that teacher candidates in elementary education may make connections among music, movement,and the visual arts using an elemental integration approach. This lesson used visual art to introduce the concept of

line and contour. Line and contour were then integrated into movement and music and outside subject areas of math,social studies and geography, science, and language arts. The purpose of this approach was to encourage elementary

education majors to experience the arts through a hands-on approach and to become more comfortable in using thearts in the elementary classroom.

Keywords

music, movement, art, integration, elementary education

The Goals 2000: Educate America Act, signed into law by

President Clinton on March 21, 1994, includes the arts as

a necessary component of every child’s education. With

the passage of this act, the arts are recognized as a core

academic subject.

What students should know and be able to do in eachof the four arts disciplines—dance, music, theatre, and

visual arts—are documented in the National Standards

for Arts Education (Consortium of National Arts Education

Associations, 1994).

In the sections devoted to music, visual arts, and dance,

the standards contain directives related to interdisci-

plinary instruction. Students should “make connections”

among these three disciplines as well as between each dis-

cipline and other “disciplines outside the arts” (Consortium

of National Arts Education Associations, 1994, p. 35).

Integration among the arts, as well as with other subjects

in the school curriculum, has received close attentionthrough research. Barry (2008) attributes this attention

through research to Gardner (1983; Frames of Mind ) and

Rauscher, Shaw, and Ky (1993; The Mozart Effect ), along

with reports such as Champions of Change: The Impact of

the Arts on Learning (Fiske, 1999), Transforming Educa-

tion Through the Arts Challenge: Final Project Report

(National Arts Education Consortium, 2002), and Intro-

duction: The Premise of Learning Through Music

(Scripp, 2000). Most of these research studies describe the

academic benefits of studying music, not necessarily arts

integration.

What is arts integration? Berke (2000) defines integration

as “the combining of two equal groups into a unified whole”

(p. 9). Integration represents a shift away from emphasizing

the differences between the arts and other subjects toward

making connections between them. This ability to transfer

and connect knowledge from one subject to another is essen-tial for meaningful learning to occur (Barry, 1996). For

meaningful integration to occur, educators should understand

the different integration methods. Gerber (1999) describes

three integration approaches: (a) elemental—common

components, (b) historical—events in history, and (c) the-

matic—ideas, events, or relationships. This report focuses on

the elemental approach to integration.

Visual arts, movement, and music are all connected by

the elements listed in Table 1. Each has its own sets of

symbols and technical demands, yet are all connected by

these common elements. The following table demonstrates

some of the shared qualities among music, movement,and visual art that allow educators to explore connections

between them and outside subject areas.

Additional elements may include continuity, emphasis,

variety, tension, division, tempo, dynamics, duration, and

1Southeast Missouri State University, Cape Girardeau, Missouri

Corresponding Author:

Carol McDowell, Southeast Missouri State University, One University

Plaza, MS7800, Cape Girardeau, MO 63701

E-mail: [email protected]








28 General Music Today 24(1)

technique (Barrett, McCoy, & Veblen, 1997; Crystal

Productions, 1995; Gerber, 1999).

Although most classroom teachers believe in the

importance of teaching with and about the arts, few feel

qualified or comfortable in doing so. A 3-year study byBresler (1994) found that elementary classroom teachers

who provided music instruction were not comfortable

teaching music, only a few included music as part of

their regular curriculum, and singing and listening were

the most common classroom musical activities.

The lesson described in this article was prepared so

that teacher candidates in elementary education may

make connections among music, movement, and the

visual arts using the line and contour element described

above. The objectives of this lesson were to (a) provide

teacher candidates a definition of line and contour in

visual art, music, and movement; (b) have teacher candi-dates write their names in Chinese, focusing on the line

and shape of the characters contained in their names;

(c) have teacher candidates develop a lesson plan using

one of the three arts to introduce the concept of line and

contour; and (d) have teacher candidates integrate line

and contour into the remaining two arts areas and an

outside subject area.

Teacher candidates were introduced to the children’s

book At the Beach by Huy Voun Lee (1994). The story tells

of a mother teaching her son about writing Chinese let-

ters by comparing the letters (characters) to pictures.

After reading the book, the teacher candidates discussed

the different strokes, directions, and shapes that comprise

the Chinese characters in the story. Lines in art were then

defined as “a mark made by a pointed tool—brush, pencil,

stick, or pen. A line has length and width, but width

is usually very small compared to its length. A line

often suggests movement in a drawing or painting”

(Crystal Productions, 1996). The teacher candidates

were then given Web sites (http://www.mandarintools.com/chinesename.html and http://chineseculture.about.com/

library/weekly/aa103199.htm) to incorporate technology

into the lesson. Teacher candidates found their first and last

names in Chinese letters from the www.mandarintools.com

Web site and were given paper to duplicate their names,

concentrating on the stroke, length, and width of each

line. Some letters and characters are made up of only

curves, some only straight lines, and some only zigzag

lines. But many letters and characters are made up of two

types of lines. Additional art activities could include (a)

making a vocabulary of lines (thick–thin, long–short,

curved–straight; wavy–zigzag using different tools: stick, brush, pen, pencil, crayon) and (b) making one continu-

ous pencil line that moves in all directions over a piece of

paper, even over itself, then filling in the shapes between

the lines with colored markers (Crystal Productions,

1996, p. 5).

Movement could then be incorporated into the lesson.

A line in movement would be defined as pathways of

straight–curved–zigzag, up–down, forward–backward,

right–left, in terms of high, medium, or low and fast or

slow (Gilbert, 1992). Ask the students to think of their

entire bodies as huge pens or crayons and write their

names (Arabic and Chinese) in space, thinking of thelines and pathways they would use for the letters in their

names. Their “name dances” will probably use many types

of lines because the letters are different sizes. Spelling

and vocabulary words as well as phone numbers could

also be used. Additional activities used to demonstrate

this concept could include the following:

1. Draw a design through space with your whole

body (see Figure 1 for examples).

2. Take a piece of 4-foot-long string and make

a straight pathway along the floor. Practice

Figure 1. Body Designs Through Movement

Table 1. Common Elements Among Movement, Music, Art

Rhythm

Contour

Color

Harmony

Form

Balance

Texture

Music

Patterns of tones

Shape of themelody

Sounds ofvoices orinstruments = tone color

Blending ofsounds

Differentsections ofmusic

All sounds heard

Thickness orthinness ofsounds

Movement

Organizationof patterns intime

Shape of thebody

Mood oremotionevoked bymovement

Blending ofmotions

Arrangement ofmovementsor dancesteps

All movementsvisible

Number ofdancers

Visual art

Similar visualpatterns

Visual shapes

Hue orpigment

Blending ofcolors

Volume andmass orthree-dimensionalaspects ofobjects

All shapes andcolors visible

Surface qualityof artwork








Bohannon and McDowell 29

jumping, walking backward, walking slowly

then quickly, taking big steps then little,

high movements then low, tiptoe, skip, hop,

turn, and glide. Repeat this with a curved

pathway (e.g., a circle, spiral, the letter C or

S, anything with curves) and a zigzag path-

way (e.g., sharp teeth, a mountain range, acrown, the letter Z, anything with angles).

See Table A1 in the appendix for a list of

possible actions to perform along these

pathways.

3. Choose three different instruments to repre-

sent three lines—for example, gong or cymbal

for straight lines, slide whistle or shaker for

curved lines, and rhythm sticks or woodblock

for zigzag lines. When you hear one of the

instruments, you must move in that line until

a different instrument is heard. Props, such as

streamers, scarves, stretchy bands, or balloons,could be used to trace different lines on the

floor (Gilbert, 1992, pp. 138-144).

Lines also occur in music and are defined as the shape

(contour) made by connecting the note heads in music.

Familiar melodies can be broken into parts (fragments),

which can be illustrated using line notation. After the

teacher sings a fragment, the class echoes, then tries to

identify the fragment that was sung (see Figure 2).

The class then examines the actual music notation

and discovers the melodic contour, or shape, of the

melody by connecting the lines and creating a shape to

show that sounds may move up, down, or straight across.

Other song titles that include names of people could

also be used, such as “Clementine,” “Oh, Susannah,”

and “When Johnny Comes Marching Home.” Addi-

tional music activities could include the following:

1. Present students with various visuals of melodic

curves (see Figure 3); they will vocalize on

vowel sounds, use shakers, or play glissandos

on melody bells to indicate the shape.

2. Have students match contours on a sheet by

connecting the note heads in a dot-to-dot

fashion (see Figure 4).

3. Show pictures of city skylines or mountains

and have students compose a sound piece to

illustrate the line or contour.

4. Have several children hold a long rope with

both hands, play a short melody, and have stu-dents illustrate the shape of the melodic shape

by raising and lowering hands.

Possible transfer activities about line and shape into

other subject areas may include the following:

1. Math—Discuss lines made by postulates and

theorems in geometry; discuss how lines make

up different shapes; create a child’s growth

chart; practice measuring different line lengths

2. Social studies—Create a timeline, bar or line

graph; follow the direction of the lines ona map between two different destinations;

follow the direction of river lines, the shapes

of the states, the horizon, and latitude and

longitude

3. Reading—Note movement left to right across

the page; note the different line lengths of

poems and paragraphs; write two sentences to

describe upward–downward, zigzag, curved–

straight movement; for example,

hill.

theup

walked

We

4. Science—Track the lines of weather fronts

on the weather map; track the lines of ocean

waves and tides; draw lines that show a “trail”

left by a bird, insect, bee, or animal either

walking across sand, water, sidewalk, woods,

or road; draw a tree using Y-like branches;

observe many lines in nature and add them to

Mary Had A Little Lamb

¯ — _ —¯ ̄ ̄

Figure 2. Mary Had A Little Lamb

Figure 3. Melodic Shapes

Figure 4. Connecting Note Heads








30 General Music Today 24(1)

the line vocabulary (tree bark, spider web, veins

in a leaf or plant)

The purpose of this lesson is to encourage teacher

candidates in elementary education to experience line

and shape in visual art, music, and movement. Hands-on

participation in the arts can be a powerful motivator and

learning tool (Barry, 1996). This involvement, using

common elements within the arts, may have the same

effect on undergraduate education majors.

Scott-Kassner (1995) writes that oftentimes students

move from one subject to another and are not shown any

relationships among subjects or to real life. The effects

of this type of teaching may cause some youngsters to

become disinterested in school.

An integrated approach erases the boundaries among

subjects and enhances student learning. Education in

the arts has the potential to have an impact on learning,

teaching, and the community as a whole.

AppendixTable A1. Action Words

Advance Fall Pat Slither WaitBang Fidget Pause Snap Walk Beat Flap Point Sneak WhirlBend Flick Poke Spin WiggleBounce Fling Pop Splatter WringBrush Flip Pounce Spring VibrateBump Float Prance SqueezeBurst Fly Press SquirmCarve Fold Prowl StabCircle Freeze Pull StampClap Gallop Punch StepClose Glide Push StretchCollapse Grasp Reach StrokeCompress Growl Recede StopContract Hammer Rise SwayCrawl Hop Rock SweepCreep Inflate Roll SwellCrumple Join Run SwingCurl Jump Shake SwirlCut Kick Shadow SwoopDab Kneel Shift TapDart Lean Shiver TiptoeDash Leap Shrink TossDeflate Lift Shuffle TouchDig Lunge Skate TripDip March Skip TrotDraw Melt Slam TumbleDrop Mirror Slash TurnExplode Nod Slide TwirlExtend Open Slink Twist

Source: Traugh (1989, p. 3), Nye and Nye (1957, p. 23),and Stuart (2001).

Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The authors declared no potential conflicts of interests with

respect to the authorship and/or publication of this article.

Financial Disclosure/Funding

The authors received no financial support for the research and/

or authorship of this article.

References

Barrett, J. R., McCoy, C. W., & Veblen, K. K. (1997). Sound

ways of knowing: Music in the interdisciplinary curriculum.

New York: Schirmer Books.

Barry, N. H. (1996). Integrating the arts into the curriculum.

General Music Today, 9(2), 9-13.

Barry, N. H. (2008). The role of integrated curriculum in music

teacher education. Journal of Music Teacher Education,

18(1), 28-38.

Berke, M. K. (2000). Curriculum integration: A two-way street.

General Music Today, 14(1), 9-12.

Bresler, L. (1994). Music in a double bind: Instruction by nonspe-

cialists in elementary schools. Arts Education Policy Review,

95, 30-36.

Consortium of National Arts Education Associations. (1994).

National standards for arts education. Reston, VA: MENC.

Crystal Productions. (1995). Principles of design poster set .

Glenview, IL: Author.

Crystal Productions. (1996). Elements and principles of design

posters, teacher’s guide. Glenview, IL: Author.

Fiske, E. B. (Ed.). (1999). Champions of change: The impact

of the arts on learning . Washington, DC: Arts EducationPartnership. (ERIC Document Reproduction Service No.

ED435581).

Gardner, H. (1983). Frames of mind: The theory of multiple

intelligences. New York: Basic Books.

Gerber, T. (1999, February). Art and music together in the cur-

riculum. Workshop presented at the St. Louis Art Museum,

St. Louis, MO.

Gilbert, A. G. (1992). Creative dance for all ages. Reston, VA:

National Dance Association.

Lee, H. V. (1994). At the beach. New York: Henry Holt and

Company.

National Arts Education Consortium. (2002). Transformingeducation through the arts challenge: Final project report.

Columbus, OH: National Arts Education Consortium.

Nye, R. E., & Nye, V. T. (1957). Music in the elementary school.

Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Rauscher, F. H., Shaw, G. I., & Ky, K. N. (1993). Music and

spatial task performance. Nature, 365, 611.

Scott-Kassner, C. (1995). The place of the arts in the integrated

curriculum. Florida Music Director, 49(1), 6-9.








Bohannon and McDowell 31

Scripp, L. (2000, Summer). Introduction: The premise of learn-

ing through music. Journal of Learning Through Music,

pp. 2-11.

Stuart, D. A. (2001, April). Action word list & alphabet dance.

Handout from presentation at the 2001 Midwest Therapeutic

Recreation conference, St. Louis, MO.

Traugh, S. (1989). KIDUCATION, grade 3, lesson 1. Cypress,

CA.

Bios

R. Larry Bohannon is a public school retired assistant superinten-

dent and an assistant professor of reading education at Southeast

Missouri State University in Cape Girardeau, Missouri.

Carol McDowell is a professor of music education at Southeast

Missouri State University Cape Girardeau, Missouri.






General Music Today 2010 Bohannon 27 31

Documents

Transcript of General Music Today 2010 Bohannon 27 31