11/16/2016
Topic:
Students with Disabilities
Joshua Nelson
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I have a student in my guitar class whose right hand fingers did not completely develop, and so he only has five small stubs on his right hand. His parents spoke with me on Orientation Night, and they were really hopeful that he could learn the guitar. Of course, I told them that we would be creative and do everything we could to help him to be successful. When he started class, I asked him to try plucking the strings with his finger stubs and let me know if it hurt or if it was uncomfortable. He told me that it didn't hurt at all, and he immediately got excited! From that moment on, he worked harder than many of the other students in the class and learned exercises several pages ahead of where the rest of the class was. He is now one of my strongest guitarists.
Of course, we have had to be creative on a few things. Finger picking is challenging for him, but he and I worked together to develop a special system for him by using the stubs that he has on his right hand and rotating his wrist in a pattern, we are able to allow him to finger pick with the rest of the class. It took a lot of work for him to learn it, but he was determined and was eventually successful! Also, because the stubs on his right hand are so short, he cannot grasp anything in his right hand, therefore, playing with a pick does not work. However, he and I have been experimenting with a few devices that will allow us to attach the pick to his right hand so that he can play with a pick.
It has been fun and very rewarding working with this student, and the bottom line is that we have to be creative and offer as many solutions to a problem as possible. |
1/13/2017
Topic:
Tools and Strategies
Joshua Nelson
|
I use a website called Sightreadingfactory.com to help visual learners who struggle with sight reading. This website randomly generates short sight reading examples at various levels of difficulty. One of my students with an SLD was so intrigued by our work with this website in class that he went home and began practicing with a free version of the site, and when he returned to class, he began requesting to work with the full version of the website at least once a day. His sight reading skills have improved dramatically, and since he enjoys using the website (he sees it as a kind of "game" to get the sight reading examples right the first time now), it has helped increase his motivation in class. The great thing about the website is that students can press a button to play the example correctly after they have attempted it so that they can see if they performed the example correctly the first time. If not, they can easily identify their mistakes and correct them. |
1/13/2017
Topic:
Assessment of Learning
Joshua Nelson
|
I have a guitar class in which many of the students progress at different speeds. Also, I have a few students who joined the class late in the semester and are therefore at a different place in the curriculum than the other students. I assess all of the students in this class on a weekly basis, and I allow both the students with disabilities as well as other students who progress at different speeds to work through the curriculum at their own pace. Just yesterday, I was very proud of one of my students with an SLD because she successfully performed a very difficult exercise in our book without writing the notes down. This student had previously not been able to even perform music on one string in first position, but because I allowed her to progress at her own pace, and I offered scaffolding and assistance to her as needed, she is now starting to progress very quickly, and she is no longer frustrated because she isn't being pressured to learn more quickly than she is able to learn. |