Teacher/Conductor’s Name: Morgan Higgins

Prior Knowledge/Skills (What do students already know and can do?): Students know their
warm-ups and what each one does. Students already know all of their songs. They are able to
sing independently on 3-part or 4-part music much of the time. With more difficult harmonies,
they can require some additional assistance.

Rehearsal Objective (What will your students be able to do as a result of this rehearsal with
you?): Students have songs memorized, and almost concert ready. Students notes in their
harmonies will be secure and snaps should be solid. Students will be able to sing parts
independently. This rehearsal is a final preparation for our concert this evening (2/12/19). Get
students to a point where they feel ready and confident about their upcoming performance.

Assessment of the Rehearsal (How will you know if your students can do what they need to?):
Assessment will be conducted through observation. Are students able to sing song in its entirety
without help from me in terms of both voice and piano? Are words fairly secure with some help
from conductor? Are snaps and music both feeling secure for “The Longest Time”?

Relevant Contextual Factors: This is the first “Explo” (elective) period for the 8th graders and
the first period of the day. Energy is usually somewhat low and it can be difficult to keep
students’ attention and keep them engaged, but they are old enough that they do fairly well. This
morning, we had a before school rehearsal at 7 am to get students prepared for the concert. There
is one new student in the class and she does have some disabilities. She chose not to partake in
this rehearsal and listen as she came only 3 days prior to our concert. There are 23 students in the
class between the ages of 13 and 14 (15 females, 8 males). This group is extremely high
achieving and works very hard. They are talented and have a desire to perform well while having
fun. They get along with me well and like to be silly (you will see some of them walk by/say hi
even though I told them not to).

Modifications/Accommodations need: Students are off book and are able to sing music
(mostly) from memory. Additional instruction can be given verbally, but this is mainly
reminders. Any additional modifications or accommodations are not needed.

Instructional materials, resources & technology: Music (The Longest Time by Billy Joel,
Waving Through a Window from Dear Evan Hansen, and This is Me from the Greatest
Showman). Pencil and/or highlighter. Computer, Piano (digital/upright), recordings of
accompaniment, accompanist (Emily Freeman).

Personal Improvement Objective: I have done fairly well with the 8th graders so far but this is
my second day with them. I would like to improve my classroom management skills, continue to
improve my piano skills, and better my conducting. The conducting is especially important to
me. I also just want to get comfortable in front of the older students. I don’t think there is any
aspect that I would not like to improve upon but those areas specifically will be those that I work
on the most in the coming weeks.
Rehearsal Plan (A step by step plan for the rehearsal – with timing – that leads to your
objective)

*prior to starting the video, 8th graders were helping get 6th and 7th graders to class after our
morning rehearsal and then we had to listen to the intercom announcements. The announcements
were ~8 minutes long today because it is Black History Month and our principal had a lot to talk
about. Hence the length of the video being approximately 10 minutes shorter than our class
period.*

*This was also an interesting day because we had 2 snow days the week before and all lesson
plans for this week had to be changed considerably to get ready for the concert. A good way for
me to practice flexibility and changing plans on the fly.*

Time Activity Purpose of Activity Sequence Assessment

1-3 min. Announcements Let students know
At the beginning No assessment
what is going on that
of class, give necessary.
day and what is students
upcoming. announcements
verbally.
8 min Tuesday Warm-Ups Warm up students to Complete a For vocal warm-
sing and work on series of vocal ups: are students
developing skills as a warm-ups, using good
musician. including (Ah- diction,
Oh, My-Oh-Me- matching pitch,
Oh, Chester good vowels?
Cheetah, Zinga Listen and give
Zinga Zu, feedback. See if
Bottles of Pop, students are
Do Do-Re-Do). fixing when
We don’t have given
enough time to correction.
do all of our
usual warm-ups
as we had so
much time taken
for
announcements.
10-15 Concert Run Singing through Sing through Listen and
min Through songs. Check each song and observe. Are
memorization and give students students singing
concert some feedback their part
etiquette/preparedness. on what they can successfully
improve on for with little or no
the performance help from the
 that night. piano? Are
(Longest Time, students using
Waving, This is good diction and
Me). vowels? How is
memorization?
10-15 Practice Time for Provide students Sing through the Listen and
min Solos additional rehearsal song once to observe. How
time to practice their practice. If more can I help make
solos for our concert time is needed, students feel
in the evening. allow it as more
possible but get comfortable
through all /confident for
soloists in the the performance
class. later?