Diverse Learners

Being the music teacher and seeing every student in the school means that I am differentiating my instruction every time a new class walks into the room! Not every class is the same, even within the same grade.

I taught 4th grade a game called "Pass The Beat". We stand in a circle, and each student says one word of this phrase: "Pass the beat around the room." and the last student puts their hands on their shoulders to signify a rest. There are more difficult levels of the game, where more words are replaced with rests.

• My first class could do the original version perfectly, so I moved on to two rests. They had trouble keeping up with two rests, so we moved onto a backup activity.
• My second class could barely get through the first version of the game, so we spent most of class playing the backup activity.
• My third class played the game the entire time. They made it to three additional rests, and they did not play the backup activity.

I have a fourth class coming in tomorrow, and I don't know if they will even complete the activity. BUT I have something in my back pocket, just incase. I always try to complete the activity, for example, my cooperating teacher didn't think that the third class would be able to complete the game based on their musical background. Still, I tried it with them, and they were actually the best group!