Substitute Teachers: Never go to "Plan B"

For some reason, band classes give more trouble to substitute teachers than any other class. I suppose it is because most students know that the average substitute teacher knows more than they do about English, history, or math, but likely does not know as much as the students in music. Even if the substitute took band classes when they were in school, even if they were extremely talented in their band classes, it does not mean they will be successful at teaching band.  Students somehow know this and take advantage of it to sometimes disastrous results.

The easy cop-out solution to this problem is to leave a video for the students to watch, but is this really beneficial to the students?  I have a variety of music related videos in my library, but none of them relate directly to what we are rehearsing in band at any given moment.  Some of my least favorite of the bunch are historical fiction.  Each features a composer in a fictional story that involves a child about middle school age and somehow the child and composer interact to solve each others problems and they all live happily ever after.  Do the students really learn anything about music?  Probably not.

As dangerous as it might seem I prefer to leave lessons for my subs in which the students play their instruments.  If I'm lucky I will get a substitute that is a skilled music teacher who will be able to teach the students something new about the music, or give them insight that perhaps I had not.  If I'm not so lucky, the substitute will have no music skill.  In that case I instruct my students that their job when we have a guest teacher is to show-off for them how well you can play.  

If I know that I will be missing school in advance, I prepare the students for their guest teacher by running parts of a rehearsal with no conductor.   Often times when a non-musician tries to start the group they will not count properly (ie not in the tempo or time signature of the piece).  Have you ever been to a birthday party where someone has started singing Happy Birthday by counting to 4?  It drives me nuts!  So to combat this (or rather cope with it) I run a rehearsal in which I start everything WRONG.  I'll start by counting to 3 in the wrong tempo when a piece is in 4/4 time.  I'll start a piece by saying (with no particular cadence) "On your mark, get set, go!"  Each time, the students have a somewhat rough start, but listen to each other and finish the piece.  I figure, if they can play the piece well when I start them off wrong, shouldn't they also be able to play it well when someone else starts them off wrong?

When I leave the plan for the sub I tell them that they students have a variety of tunes prepared to show off how well they play and that they should ask them to play each of them and if something doesn't sound right, they should play it again.  If it sounds worse, move on to something else.  

Now here is were "Plan B" comes in.

I have had guest teachers before have the band play and then decide a short way into the rehearsal that they were in over their heads.  Often times this happens when they play something badly and the sub tells them they did a good job.  Right away the kids know that it is open season on subs!  "These kids are out of control!"  the guest teacher says to himself.  The guest teacher then decides to go with "Plan B" and whip a trusty video out of their brief case.  As soon as the video goes in, things go down hill further and further.  Why?  The minute the sub when "Plan B" the kids knew that they were in control and they took it.  Stick with plan A next time.

My 4 Steps to an Effective Rehearsal

Several years ago a parent came up to me at the conclusion of a band concert with a question. "It is amazing how much the students have learned! Some of that music seems so complicated, how did you do it!" I had to pause for a moment before answering the question. After all, I spent four years of college, plus many years of experience as a musician to learn how to take kids from opening the case at the beginning of the year to a polished performance. How could I answer "how did you do it?" in just a short conversation. Then it occurred to me. I told the parent, "I did it by teaching them one thing at a time."


In my university training I took a course called "Video Micro-Rehearsal" in which we worked on this "one thing at a time" technique. We used a 3 step process in that class in which we taught one thing at a time: set, follow-through, response. I added a fourth step to the process for the purpose of teaching good rehearsal habits to my students at that is "STOP" between the follow-through step, and the response step. Another instructor summed up the steps like this: "Tell them what to do (set), let them do it (follow-through), tell them how they did (response).

Let's look at each of the four steps of the process in turn:


Step One "Tell Them What To Do":

This seems simple enough. Before you want your band to play something, you need to tell them what you want them to play, but if you want them to actually learn something you need to go a bit deeper. Simply telling them to play the same song over and over again will not do. We could go a step closer into what appears to be rehearsal by asking them to play specific parts of a piece that may be problematic. But if we truly expect them to learn anything, we must make that instruction more specific. It is not enough to have them start at letter B and hope that any problems might fix themselves; instead we must ask them to start at letter B and properly subdivide the dotted rhythms, or articulate the beginning of each set of slurred notes clearly.

Just as I told that parent after the concert those years ago, I teach by teaching them one thing at a time. Sometimes, upon hearing my band play something that they don't know well the number of things that need fixing is a bit overwhelming. If I were to ask the students to "begin at measure 22 make sure that you play all of the B's flat, mind the piano dynamic marking at 24, listen to the background part in 27 so that you can properly subdivide the rhythms in the melody,...." they would easily be so overwhelmed that they would remember little more than "begin at measure 24" if they remembered even that. In video micro rehearsal we called this a "split set." However, if I were to work on each of the many things in that split set one at a time, not only would the students absporb each of these concepts in turn, it is also possible that some of the simpler problems may fix themselves through the repetition of the passage while working on the more complex things "one at a time."


Step Two: "Let them do it."

This is what we called "follow-through" in video mirco-rehearsal. Again this one sounds like a no-brainer. Have you ever in rehearsal told your band about some nuance in measure 216 only to then instruct them to begin at measure 227? We called this one a "broken set" we told them what to do in 216, but we never "let them do it." Music is a skill that is best learned by actualy doing it. We could lecture our bands about rhythm, tone quality, intonation, articulation, and nuance all day long, but if we never let them do it, it is unlikely they would grasp any of these concepts. Imagine coaching a football team and teaching them a play in the dressing room, but never letting them try it on the field until a game. It is unlikely they will be able to properly execute the play.

Step Three: "Stop."

Obviously the music will stop eventually, and most condcutors have a good sense of pacing so that they know when to stop. I have included this as one of my four steps for the benefit of the students. Of the four steps this is the one that they students must be most responsible for. When the conductor signals the cut-off, the students must stop, look, and listen so they are ready to hear stop four. If the stop doesn't happen, or doesn't happen quickly enough, the students will have forgotten what you told them to do it step one, or what they actually did in step two, so that step four will have very little relevence.

Step Four: "Tell them how they did."

We called this "response" in VMR. In order for this response to really do any more than a verbal pat on the back, you need to make sure that the response has some relevence to the set that you gave back in step one. If I tell them to articulate more clearly in step one, then in step four I must tell them how well they articulated, not just tell them "good job." If I tell them to observe the key signature and play all of those A's flat because we are in the key of E flat, "well done," will not suffice. I'll need to tell them "That's right, it sounds so much more like the key of E flat when we play those A's flat!"

It's this process of teaching just "one thing at a time" that gets the band from making those first unpleasant squakings in september for a musically pleasing performance come concert time.

Most successful concuctors use a process an awful lot like this whether they know it or not. I have choosen in my rehearsals to not just use the process, but teach it to the students as well. In the first week of school (and as often as is required for review during the year) I deliberately teach my rehearsal process to the students as well as their specific responsibilities during each step. When they are aware of what the steps are, they are less likely to add their own extra steps. Does your rehearsal every look like this:

1. Tell the students what to do
2. The students talk until the band director yells at them
3. The students play something resembling the direction given in step 1
4. The students stop playing and talk amongst themselves until the band director shouts at them
5. Tell the students how they did.

Teaching the students how you intend to do things can solve this and make your rehearsals more effective.

New Internet Listing

The King of the Band Geeks blog is now listed on Music Education search site Music Education Magic: http://www.musicedmagic.com/  

I hope some new readers find there way here from the Music Ed Magic page.  If you've found us this way, please leave a comment and let me know that you're here.  

I plan on posting an update soon featuring my simple 4 step rehearsal method.  

Welcome musicedmagic readers!

Why do students treat printed music as if it isn't worth anything?

I was troubled a few years ago by how disrepectfully my students would treat printed music. They would treat it as if it were just a worthless scrap of paper that could be thrown away without consequence. Why did they treat it as if it were worthless, why didn't they realize that this printed music was something special and that it is something that is worth taking care of?

The short answer is because I often gave my students photocopies of printed music and these were worthless. Students get photocopies from teachers of all subjects all day long. They know that if they loose it, its no big deal. The teacher will replace it for them.

That same year I was playing in the pit orchestra for an opera. The sheet music for this opera was on rental and was very, very old, but well cared for. When I turned to the back page I noticed that it had been signed by several of the previous performers. There wer eautographs dated as long ago as 80 years prior with locations all over the world. I realized then that there is something special about printed music; it is something worth taking care of.

I decided then that if you want the students to take care of their music, you need to give them something worth taking care of. For years I had avoided giving original copies of music to students (copyright laws or not) becuase I was afraid they would loose them. This because self fulfilling as the students realized that the copies were worthless, they would loose them carelessly. The very next year I made sure that I taught my students the value of printed music by only giving them original copies.

It is a lot of work to stay organized and keep track of all of the parts that I have given them, but it is worth it for them to learn that the printed music has value. Here's how I do it. Every sheet of music in my library has a unique number 7 digits long. The first three digits represent the box number of the arrangment (every arrangment in my library has a unique box number). The next 2 digits are a code representing the instrument. The last 2 digits represent which copy of that part it is. Before I hand out a piece of music to the band. I make a list of all students in the class in Excel and type the part numbers that each student will receieve. I print the list out and have student assistants distribute the parts according to the printout. The students understand that they will be billed for the replacement cost of that sheet music if I don't get their specific seriel number returned after the concert.

Does it work? I get nearly every page of music back from my students, and those that don't return their music pay for it. Sometimes students from my program go on to other schools where the band directors aren't so scrupulous about the copyright laws. Those students express shock that their current teacher would treat printed music with such disrespect!

Music is something special. Perhaps in 20, 30, 50, or 70 years a future student of my middle school will play something from my library and have the same epiphany that I did about the value of music when they see the pencil marks left by one of my students today. The intelectual property contained on the flimsy sheet of paper has value far beyond the couple of pennies that the physical property of that flimsy sheet of paper.

Music Publishers Association