Week 3

I continue to be amazed at the wide range of new technology we are encountering during this class.  I shouldn't be, but I am.  I know that technology in general tends to increase at an exponential rate and there is no reason why music instructional technology should be any different.  Dr. Bauer's brief explanation in Music Learning Today (2014) of the concept of DAWs was a good short summary, but it was really helpful to have the much more detailed explanations in the lynda.com video segments.  Those segments certainly cover the material in great detail - at times it almost seemed too much - but when one stops to realize it is geared to the person with no prior knowledge of such systems, it makes more sense. 

The process of learning to use Soundation was a lot of fun.  Although it took a little bit of time to figure out how everything worked, once I got going it really became enjoyable.  I have wanted to make use of GarageBand for some time now but have been prevented by not having Apple machines available in my classroom.  A cloud based program like Soundation opens a lot of new possibilities to give students more chances to explore their musical creativity.  In fact, tomorrow we are starting a program we call Spring Break Music Camp.  We will have 30-35 students ranging from 8 to 16 involved in a variety of musical activities.  I loaded links for Soundation on our computers this afternoon and that will be one of the fun musical activities for the week.

I am finding the PLN to really be a source of a lot of interesting information.  As we all share the various new things we are finding, it is becoming obvious that we are a lot more knowledgeable together than any of us could ever be on our own. While there is some duplication as more than one person will post the same things at different times, overall it is helping make us aware of many new apps and websites that we hadn't known about before.  My phone is constantly beeping with new incoming messages from Google+ as I have the chance to learn about something new.  It makes for interesting days.



Bauer, W.I., (2014). Music Learning Today: Digital pedagogy for creating, performing and responding to music. New York, N.Y.: Oxford University Press.