Kimberly
Lafayette High School & James Blair Middle School
Williamsburg, VA
Kimberly is a third-year teacher at Lafayette High School and a first-year teacher at James Blair Middle School. She teaches three high school ensembles and six classes at the middle school. She received her bachelor's in Music at William & Mary, and her master's in Choral Conducting at East Carolina University.
Essential Questions:
-What did a normal day in your classroom look like pre-covid?
Pre COVID, in choir, class looks like a rehearsal. So, kids would come into class, we'd spend five minutes doing like a ‘do now’ or a bell ringer, which would give me a chance to take attendance. And then we essentially just go into rehearsal. I give them a five-minute break in the middle of class because they're 90-minute classes. And for a high schooler to kind of pay attention for that long, it's not developmentally appropriate for them. So yeah, about five minutes of kind of a warm-up, do now exercise. About 45 minutes of rehearsal, and then a five-minute break, and then another like half hour of rehearsal. I did not teach middle school before the pandemic.
-What does a normal day in your classroom look like now?
I feel like it's tricky because there is no normal anymore, in a lot of ways. Especially with the way that my division is handling it, with all of the kind of back and forth. Are we virtual? Are we hybrid? Which days are we in the building? Which students are coming in? We've really had to shift our routine, not only just for COVID but also several times throughout the year just because our platform keeps changing. If I did have to say what normal was, we spend significantly less time in rehearsal, and more time doing skill-building. So they'll still come in, they'll do some sort of warm-up or do now. This is great, especially for the kids who are joining virtually, as it gives them a couple of minutes to actually like, log in, and get pushed through the waiting room and everything. And then we'll usually start with some sort of lesson with some rhythm skills or like working on solfege or listening like oral skills, do some sight-reading. And that'll usually be like 20 or 30 minutes, and then we'll go into like, and I guess I'm talking mostly for my, for my high schoolers, and then we'll go into like an hour-long rehearsal. So ultimately, we're only singing for like, 50 or 60 minutes, rather than like 80 or 90.
With middle school, it’s tough because I’m still getting used to middle school and figuring out how these kids work, but also because the five classes I teach are split amongst three different grade levels, and then within grade level, they’re split by skill. It's not like I'm teaching five of the same class. They're all choir, but the kids are different ages, and also have different experiences behind them. With some classes, I'll still keep that general format, like do now lesson like a mini-lesson and then a what I've been calling like mini rehearsals because they're actually only 50-minute classes. It's pretty short. Depending on the class's attention span, because some classes just have very different personalities and others, or their skill level, I might spend longer on a rehearsal, or longer on like a lesson. But it’s still the same general format of warm-up and then lesson and then a rehearsal of some sort.
-What restrictions are in place for the school you are teaching at, specifically revolving around singing?
Since the beginning of the year, the state of Virginia has told us that kids doing activities that produce a higher level of aerosols, such as PE, band, choir, and theatre, need to be 10 feet apart. At the district level, they have provided us with and required us to wear singing masks, which is fun. The kids, especially my middle schoolers, kind of look like they’re wearing duckbills, and they all parade around like ducks, and they pretend to be ducks, and it's adorable. We’re also only allowed to sing for thirty minutes at a time without changing locations, so I’ll be in the classroom for one class, and then take my next class outside, and have a different class in the auditorium. It's definitely forced us to get creative with spacing and with the location.
-Is your classroom all online, hybrid, or all in person? Has that changed?
Last spring our division shut down the schools entirely around mid-March. We were virtual all last spring, and they started us off in the fall completely virtual, and we were kept that way until early February. In early February, both the middle schoolers and the high schoolers were brought back in a hybrid format. I'm teaching concurrently now, where I have what our division is calling dual audiences. So, starting at the beginning of February, they split our kids up by the alphabet. The first half of the alphabet comes on Monday and Tuesday, and the second half comes on Wednesday and Thursday. Fridays are asynchronous and meeting and planning days, so I don’t have instructional time on Fridays.
Teaching Related Questions
-How has the content you are teaching changed?
Maybe not the content itself, but we've definitely been able to focus more directly on skill-building. So, prior to the pandemic, a lot of skill-building in choir is through the literature, like through repertoire. But we've had the opportunity to kind of take a step back and really say, okay, no, this is really how the staff works, or, no, this is what solfege actually means, like, this is why it is this way, we've been able to kind of dive deeper into things like that. And I've been able to talk music theory with them a little bit, which is great. I'm like a huge nerd. I get to kind of go off on tangents sometimes without having to worry about time and keeping them from singing because they wouldn't be any way in that portion of the class. So maybe content hasn't changed. But delivery has, and the amount of focus spent on different things is has been weighted just a little bit differently.
-Has there been any positives to teaching in an online format?
Yes, absolutely. And I say that with full acknowledgment that there, at least for content, for choir, you want to be in person. But that being said, it has been super cool to be able to take that step back, and to really give my kids a foundation that will help them when we do get back in the classroom. And it's been really cool to watch them not just like use solfege as an example because I do that a lot with my kids and we sight-read a lot, but to be able to watch them actually be able to manipulate and understand what solfege is to be able to actually identify, like “Oh, this is a major chord going into a minor chord,” or “Oh, this is a 1 5 1 progression”, or, “Oh, that's an interval of a minor third.” Those are things that they wouldn't have been able to do before. Like they might have understood it kind of on a conceptual level, but now they actually understand it and can like put it into different contexts. And that's been really cool. A positive for me has been being able to simply just from like a human to human standpoint, becoming more aware of their needs, and becoming more attentive to equity.
-What has been the most difficult part about teaching music in these times?
Engagement. I feel like music is tough, but in this virtual format, it's been hard because especially in the lower level ensembles with my more inexperienced kids, you have a kid who genuinely wants to be there, and who wants to do well, and then you have the kids who guidance just shoved into class. You could be the best teacher in the world, you could be the best person in the world, and they just wouldn't care. So, I think trying to be creative about ways to hook those kids has been challenging. But also, there's the added layer of virtual schooling, a lot of kids have been falling behind in multiple classes. And when those kids are working to remediate, they're simply focusing on their course, they're not focusing on their electives. A couple months ago, I called a parent, and I was like, “Hey., I am really excited to see that your daughter is coming to class every day. She's logging on to zoom, however, I don't see any work submitted from her. She doesn't participate in class like her camera is on but it's posted at the ceiling. So, I don't even know she's there. And I just wanted to know what I could do to help her get caught up.” and the mom straight up told me, “Yeah, I want her to get the attendance. So, she's logging into class, but she's not working on choir this year. And I was like, “Okay, cool.” I definitely think there are kids like that, but you still want to reach out to them, you want to grab them in, you want them to love it as much as you do. And I think finding ways to keep kids engaged when they are going, even the ones who want to be in choir, I'm finding ways to make them excited about coming to virtual choir, when it's doesn’t look anything like it should.
-How has the pandemic shifted your approach to teaching in the music classroom?
It's definitely made me more aware of equity in the classroom, and more conscious of the differences in my students needs and their situations and a little bit more forgiving. I’m just making sure that I am making my instruction and my resources accessible to everyone. It’s also made me realize that even though it's good to take a step back and say, Okay, this is a quarter note, this is an eighth note, like you don't actually learn those things until you’re doing it in practice. It's made me re-appreciate how important it is and how much kids learn by doing when it comes to music. Music is not an armchair activity, and it's been hard to do it from an armchair this past year. So I don't know if it's actually changed my teaching, but it's definitely changed my perspective.
-How do/did you keep your kids engaged in a virtual setting?
I do feel like that's the golden question. For all teachers across content areas, I think. But for choir, I realized very quickly, that the thing these kids missed the most about not being in school last spring, when we all closed was that emotional connection. And so whether or not we were singing, giving these students a platform to be with each other, just to laugh and talk with each other was really important. Feeling like I could give them a place where they could express themselves when they are so starved for that. These kids hadn't been with their whole group of friends in six months. And so, they come back to choir, and all of a sudden they're in a virtual room with their best friends again, and I think finding ways to build social-emotional stuff into the curriculum and into classwork, letting them work in teams, has been successful with my kids.
Philosophical Questions:
- Do you think there was anything you could’ve been taught in undergrad that may have prepared you more for the pandemic?
I feel like I want to be able to say yes, but honestly, no. I mean, you can't take a class on how to teach during a pandemic. It would’ve been nice to know how to use more music technology, but ultimately, the thing that has helped me and other teachers and students be the most successful in this situation are things that you can't really learn in school, like flexibility and patience and vulnerability. Willingness to make mistakes and willingness to make them in front of your students because lord knows that happens a lot. I think just being a human in front of these kids and letting them know that you know they're struggling but we're struggling too and kind of modeling for them how it's okay to struggle. Unfortunately, there’s not a course for how to be a good human.
-Post pandemic, do you think the music classroom will go back to how it was? Will this pandemic shift how the classroom changes forever?
I'm thinking specifically about choir here. And my gut says, I don't know. I mean, I can't wait to get back to normal, and I think a lot of people feel the same way. It has shifted my perspective, and I hope that I am able to take that perspective shift with me, but I don't actually know if my classroom structure will change. I miss having rehearsals instead of class, and right now we go to class, we don't go to rehearsal.
-What has been the biggest takeaway from this year, teaching-wise?
I think I would have to say that my personal biggest takeaway is just how to be a better human to my students. I'm talking about equity, allowing them and empowering them to be themselves in whatever situation, modeling to them how to be vulnerable and how to make mistakes and how to grow. Because that's always important, but I think especially so in this past year. We've had a lot of struggling students, whether physically like they've been sick, they have COVID or you know, students losing loved ones, or like “I hate virtual school” and being open and honest with them like, “Okay, well, me too. Let’s work through it together.” I think just learning how to and developing my own skills in terms of being a good role model for these kiddos.