Most of you know I am in graduate school right now, completing a masters in Music Ed. Today was homework day. Woke up, got Sophie "dressed" (more like she got dressed in Sunday clothes) and we went downstairs and did Sunday school and an online church service. Now, before you say, "Oh, you're such an amazing mom, going to virtual church, and even Sunday school!", I have to admit, I did homework while Sophie did Sunday school and online church. (Sorry. I know, I'm a heathen, but this paper isn't going to write itself...). It was an opportunity to get some things done while Sophie was busy and content.
Church only lasted 30 minutes, as Sophie got bored quite quickly. I have been keeping a close eye on weather lately, and it was supposed to snow today, so I decided we were going to go outside while we could. We got all dressed in our winter gear and headed outside for a walk. Got to the end of the street and realized it was REALLY COLD. So, we jogged back home. Sophie would run ahead of me and stop, run ahead of me and stop. When we got back to the garage, she said "Mommy, your cheeks are red and you're crying? Did you run out of breath?" (I was not crying, my eyes were watering due to the cold wind...) And yes, I'm out of shape Sophie, it's been awhile since I've been for a run. Thank you for pointing that out. I'm in desperate need of new tennis shoes, as mine have holes on the sides of both shoes. Ordered some today, so running is back in my schedule.
Did some trombone playing again. I look forward to this coming week to start (hopefully) giving some online lessons to my students, or at least providing them with some direction as to what these next 3 weeks will look like. If we can't teach, we will be providing resources and opportunities to play and collaborate.
Played some John Legend in this clip. I'm thinking about buying this app. It's kinda fun, and I could record more than 30 seconds.
Ordered groceries from Walmart, and should pick them up soon. Ordered quite a bit of groceries, but 80% of the items were out of stock, so the order ended up being really small. Here's my issue with this: there is NO need to hoard things. The government will not shut down the ability to go to the grocery store. Even if the whole country was told to "Shelter in Place", you would still be able to go to the grocery store. Stop buying large quantities of things. Just grocery shop like you normally would. Thank you. Rant over.
The project I am working on for grad school right now is a study of my students music literacy environment. One of the questions asked in this study was "Do your students read music at grade level?". We do a pretty good job tracking where our students are in their method book and how they are doing on playing assessments. To attempt to answer that question, I looked at what method book they are currently studying in and compared it to our scope and sequence (the document that tells us where students should be in their musical study given their grade in school). The results are a bit depressing.
After being sad for a bit, I thought about these next 3 weeks. If all of our students were to complete the book they are currently in (and most of them are at least halfway through or more), we would be closer to where we should be. Those numbers would look like this;
This should be the goal for the next 3 weeks at home. Finish the method book you are currently in. If that happens, this pandemic might be a blessing in disguise (at least for our band students). Without the performance pressure, we can truly work on SKILLS and TECHNIQUE. Bettering ourselves individually WILL improve our ensembles. Hope we can get our bands back soon. I miss them.
All of this being said, I'm off into the wild. Going to pick up groceries. Wish me luck.
Much love.
Steph Williamson
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