Overall Octavo Teaching Self-Evaluation:

SCORING RUBRIC

NAME:

On a scale of 1 to 5, 1 being the least successful and 5 being the most successful, how would you score yourself
in each category below?

Lesson Planning Self Inst

eval Eval

Clear and appropriate objectives using active verbs and highlighting specific musical concepts 5
and/or skills

Clear and appropriate assessment. Assessment did not mirror exact wording of objectives listed 5

Clear teaching sequence, lesson plan scripted out in detail 5

Clearly indicated parts of lesson taught aurally vs. parts in which students were taught through 5
literacy (reading notation with rhythm syllables/counting, solfege on staff, etc.)

Lesson plan provided adequate sequential scaffolding of learning taking into account that students 5
may be inexperienced in sight reading notation or new to choral singing

On a scale of 1 to 5, 1 being the least successful and 5 being the most successful, how would you score yourself
in each category below?

Octavo Teaching Self Inst

eval Eval

Evidence of clear preparation- Knew plan well, clear teaching sequence, logical scaffolding for a 5
beginning singer, clear when aural teaching versus literacy teaching were taking place

Good use of vocal and/or piano modeling as support for student singers 4

Speed & clarity of speech- Good pacing, economic use of time, efficient use of words 4

Checks understanding, monitors & adjusts to meet student needs, uses positive reinforcement 5

Confidence/leadership, eye contact, professional demeanor 5

Instructor Comments:

Written SELF REFLECTION

 •View your video of the octavo teaching and read/watch the comments you were given

•Write a reflection on your octavo teaching using the prompts below

1. What expectations did you have going into this experience?

I expected that I would have a few issues with technology as it was my first experience teaching
over zoom. It wasn’t as bad as I expected though and worked fairly well. I also expected to follow my
lesson plan better, but as it was happening over zoom, it wasn’t easy to organically use everything I had
written in my plan, which was a little frustrating because I had some good ideas and scaffolding
techniques that I wish I had been able to use.

2. What kind of feedback did you receive after teaching your octavo? Did you agree with the feedback given?
Why or why not?

Some of my classmates said that I should have either modeled more, used the piano more, or
found a way to teach the melody with more contour instead of teaching the melody with the flat rhythms.
I do agree with these suggestions. I was teaching the melody aurally, but I feel that I could have done
more modeling by singing and playing, especially if my students weren’t experienced singers. As I taught
the lesson, those ideas kind of went out the window and I went with the flow instead of following my plan
for modeling. If I could do it again, I’d do more modeling for the melody and try teaching it with a scale
or the melodic contour of the melody to make it clearer.

3. What improvements did you make to your lesson plan from its first version to the final version to improve
your teaching?

I changed everything that had to do with a whiteboard to handrawn images that I inserted into my
presentation. I also changed the wording of my objectives and assessments in the plan itself, as well as
changing the method of counting the rhythms from numbers to ta’s and titi’s. I feel it worked better for
teaching by reading and for the dotted rhythm I had in my piece. I also had to change my method of
checking for understanding with the rhythm syllables and the solfege. I was going to look over all their
octavos physically in class quickly before moving on, but instead I had to do a thumbs up thumbs down
kind of thing since I couldn’t see their pages without doing something time consuming and difficult over
zoom.

4. What do you think went well, or what do you think you did the best when teaching your octavo to the class?]

I think my scaffolding techniques for the rhythm was really good and helped it to make it easy to
transition from review of the rhythms to reading the rhythms and then actually applying it to the octavo.
I took the time to plan out what visuals I would need in order to make it an easy transition and I think it
was definitely worth it. I think I did a good job of giving enough feedback and by keeping the whole class
involved, not just my audible student. It was tricky to gauge understanding the way I wanted to, so I had
to resort to thumbs up or down, but I think it worked well. I feel that I spoke with intention and didn’t
fumble with my words as much as I have in the past, which is definitely improvement for me!

5. What do you feel did not go as well that you should continue to improve upon in the future?
 My teaching of the melody didn’t really go as planned. I wanted to do more call and response to
model the singing, but because of the lag over the internet, I made the decision on the fly to opt out and
instead have Justin sing it instead. I made comments after his singing, but I think it would have been nice
to actually use modeling for that part. I also think my transition to the melody part could have been a bit
smoother. In addition, I think my time management could have been a bit better. Maybe I didn’t need to
spend as much time on the rhythms. I might have been able to get to the part in the music where there’s a
split.

6. How do you feel about this experience afterward compared to how you felt beforehand? Did it meet your
expectations?

I was pleasantly surprised at how doable it was to teach a song over zoom. I don’t know exactly
how well it would work with extreme beginners, but it seemed to work relatively well. I was impressed
with how easily I could adapt my lesson and have it still make sense. I was nervous about teaching over
zoom but now that I’ve done it, I don’t think it’s as awful as I expected and would probably feel more
comfortable teaching over zoom again.

7. What applications can you make to your future teaching (whether or not it includes teaching this choral
specialization)? What did you learn from this experience?

I learned from this lesson how to effectively teach different aspects of choral music by using aural
teaching and literacy teaching. I had never thought about it before and I definitely think it’s important to
teach vocal music both ways. Students should be able to read music but should also be able to learn from
call and response or vocal modeling. I will definitely take this to my future teaching endeavors. I also can
now feel more prepared about teaching over the internet should I ever have to do that in the future.

6. What grade would you give yourself and why?

I would give myself an A for this lesson. Probably around a 94 or 95 because though I could have
done some things differently or better, the main points were made and I feel that a student could follow
my plan and actually learn the rhythms and melody from the way I taught it.