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PLANNING FOR MUSIC UNDERSTANDING

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Big Ideas

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1. Big Ideas are the foundation on which teachers of a discipline

(such as music) use to plan for student learning and understanding. Big
ideas are related to enduring understandingwhich can be thought of the
most important disciplinary take away ideas students leave with as a result
of their learning. All teaching and learning should be focused on big ideas and
enduring understandings. Read and use the following information to help you
plan:

Summary Sheet 1.1: Merriams functions of music. This

summary of Merriams Anthropology of Music identifies key music
functions that occur in societies and cultures around the world. Each
one of these functions is a big idea in the discipline of music. Under
each function are different features of the function that can serve as
enduring understandings. Use this as a basis for identifying and
selecting big ideas/enduring understandings for your unit.
Summary Sheet 1.2: Age-related themes based on big ideas in
music. This summary is taken from Silver Burdett and Ginn Music
Series text and shows how Merriams ideas (plus other ideas in music)
can be turned into themes for grades K-8. Use this as a resource for
thinking about how to use big ideas/enduring understandings in your
unit in age-appropriate ways.
Chart 1.2: Key considerations to use in thinking about big
ideas/enduring understandings. These ideas will help evaluate
each learning experience you plan in relation to the units overall goal;
plus help you assess individual components of plans in relation to all
components. Use these as you plan and after you are finished as a
checklist for assessing quality.
Template 1.1: Structuring your unit-big idea. Use this template
for planning unit big ideas/enduring understandings.

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Summary Sheet 1.1: Merriams Functions of Music.

The Functions of
Music

From Merriam, A. P. (1964). The

anthropology of music. Evanston, IL:
Northwestern University Press (pp. 209227).

The function of human expression

provides a vehicle for expression of ideas and emotions (e.g., love,
social protest songs)
musicpart of social movements in which individuals seek to express
emotion, social and/or political pleasure, displeasure
personalindividual feelings (grief, joy, fright, reveries, etc.)
The function of aesthetic enjoyment
involves contemplation of music musical expression/ forms in terms of
beauty, meaning, and or power to evoke a feelingfull response /
experience
matter of philosophical consideration in the history of Western
civilization
contemplating and responding feelingfully to some musical form or
event
The function of entertainment
engages a persons attention in something that agreeable, amusing, or
diverting
listeners responses
a part of industry, capitalism
The function of communication
music is not a universal language, but is shaped in terms of culture of
which it is a part
within specific cultures, what music communicates is imprecise

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when music communicates, its meaning depends on the extent to

which individuals within the culture have shared experiences regarding
idioms and what is intended to be communicated
any mood or emotion conveyed by music also depends on the contexts
in which it is experienced.

The function of symbolic representation

music symbolizes or represents something (e.g., this piece embodies
brotherhood.
Symbolizes cultural values, or other group/individual values, abstract
ideas or occasions which hold affective meaning (e.g., national
anthem, protest songs, theme songs, jingles)
The function of physical response
music is used to accompany dance, other moving activities
music elicits, excites, and channels behavior
The function of enforcing conformity to social norms
music of social control, used to direct warning to erring members of a
society or indicating what is considered proper behavior
songs for children, including traditional folk or specially composed
songs devised to reinforce the values and ideas that parents, schools,
and society wish to instill in young children
The function of validation of social institutions and religious rituals
music that emphasizes the proper/improper in a society, music that
tells people what to do and how to do it e.g., order of music in a
religious service, fraternity songs, club-like groups
The function of contribution to the continuity and stability of culture
music is a summative activity for the expression of values, a means
whereby the central beliefs of a culture are exposed
musics existence provides a normal and solid activity which assures
members of a society that the worked is continuing in a right or proper
direction (e.g., passing along songs from one generation to the next;
traditional songs (Christmas, Chanukah) sung over generations
The function of contribution to the integration of society
draws music together
invites, encourages, and requires individuals to participate in group
activity

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Summary Sheet 1.2: Age-Related Themes Based on Big Ideas in
Music.

THEMES
America
Makes
Music

From
Home to
World

Expanding
Boundarie
s

Gardens of
the Earth

The Power
of
Performan
ce

The Joy of
Celebratio
n

human
expression

symbolic
representatio
n

Potential Big Ideas

(using Merriams Functions)
continuity
and stability
of culture

continuity
and stability
of culture

integration of
society

human
expression

symbolic
representatio
n

human
expression
communicati
on
entertainmen
t

symbolic
representatio
n
aesthetic
enjoyment

communicati
on
entertainmen
t

physical
response

social
institutions
and religious
rituals
conformity to
social norms

Enduring Ideas Understandings

Dependent upon the idea chosen and learning experiences that are designed

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Chart 1.2: Key considerations to use in thinking about big
ideas/enduring understandings.
Key considerations to use in thinking about big ideas/enduring
understandings
Questions for Big Ideas/Enduring
Understandings
Does the big idea have many layers and
nuances, not obvious to the nave or
inexperienced person?
Does it yield optimal depth and breadth
of insight into music?
Do you have to dig deep to really
understand its meanings and
implications even if you have a surface
grasp of it?
Is it (therefore) prone to
misunderstanding as well as
disagreement?
Are you likely to change your mind
about its meaning and importance over
a lifetime?
Does it reflect core ideas as judged by
experts?
Can themes be generated?
Can you uncover important, longlasting ideas /use skills through inquiry
and exhibition of understanding (not
cover information or acquire skills)

Self-Evaluation
Checklist

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Template 1.1: Structuring your unit-big idea. Use this template for
planning unit big ideas/enduring understandings.
Unit Planning
Big Idea

(Big Ideas/Enduring Understandings)

Enduring Understandings

Brief Summary of Unit (Including Context)

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Essential / Generative Questions

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2. Essential/Generative Questions are

the key questions that drive teaching and learning in any subject matter.
Essential means that meaningful learning in music is not likely to happen if
the most important, crucial and indispensable questions are not asked and
then pursued by students. Generative means that long-lasting learning in
music is not likely to happen if teachers do not create, or produce questions
that create a need to know something about the important ideas in music
or create a learning problem where learners want to know more. In MTL we
combine these two ideas. If a question is essential it can also be generative.
Read and use the following information to help you plan:

Article 2.1: What is an essential or generative question? This

article provides information on designing your unit based on essential
or generative questions that emerge out of big ideas.
Chart 2.1: Key considerations for planning essential or
generative questions. These ideas will help you evaluate your work
in creating questions that should guide your unit and focus teaching
and learning.
Template 2.1: Structuring your unit-Essential/Generative
Questions. Use this template for planning your units questions

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ARTICLE 2.1: What is an essential or generative question?

What is an Essential or
Generative Question?
Adapted from Grant Wiggins, Co-Author of Understanding by
Design

What is an essential question? An essential question is well, essential:

important, vital, at the heart of the matter the essence of the issue. Think of
questions in your life that fit this definition but dont just yet think about it
like a teacher; consider the question as a thoughtful adult. What kinds of
questions come to mind? What is a question that any thoughtful and
intellectually alive person ponders and should keep pondering?
In Understanding by Design we remind readers that essential has a few
different connotations:
1. One meaning of essential involves important questions that recur
throughout ones life. Such questions are broad in scope and timeless by
nature. They are perpetually arguable What is justice? Is art a matter of
taste or principles? How far should we tamper with
our own biology and chemistry? Is science
What is music?
compatible with religion? Is an authors view
Why do people
respond to music?
privileged in determining the meaning of a text? We
may arrive at or be helped to grasp understandings
for these questions, but we soon learn that answers to
them are invariably provisional. In other words, we
are liable to change our minds in response to reflection and experience
concerning such questions as we go through life, and that such changes of
mind are not only expected but beneficial. A good education is grounded in
such life-long questions, even if we sometimes lose sight of them while
focusing on content mastery. The big-idea questions signal that education is
not just about learning the answer but about learning how to learn.

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2. A second connotation for essential refers to
key inquiries within a discipline. Essential
In music education,
questions in this sense are those that point to the
Merriams Functions of
big ideas of a subject and to the frontiers of
Music are key doorways
technical knowledge. They are historically
for creating inquiries into
understanding music.
important and very much alive in the field.
If a person truly
What is healthful eating? engenders lively
understands music, s/he
debate among nutritionists, physicians, diet
is able to show his/her
promoters, and the general public. Is any history
understanding using all of
capable of escaping the social and personal
these functions.
history of its writers? has been widely and
heatedly debated among scholars for the past fifty years, and compels
novices and experts alike to ponder potential bias in any historical narrative.
3. There is a third important connotation for the
term essential that refers to what is needed for
What skills do we need to
learning core content. In this sense, a question
express ourselves
can be considered essential when it helps
musically?
students make sense of important but
What ways have people
complicated ideas, knowledge, and know-how
invented to describe
music?
findings that may be understood by experts, but
not yet grasped or seen as valuable by the
learner. In what ways does light act wave-like? How do the best writers hook
and hold their readers? What models best describe a business cycle? By
actively exploring such questions, the learner is helped to arrive at important
understandings as well as greater coherence in their content knowledge and
skill.
A question is essential when it:
1. causes genuine and relevant inquiry into the big
ideas and core content;
In MTL, we say
2. provokes deep thought, lively discussion,
that Essential /
sustained inquiry, and new understanding as well
Generative
as more questions;
questions lead to
3. requires students to consider alternatives, weigh
more learning and
evidence, support their ideas, and justify their
create a need
to know for
answers;
students.
4. stimulates vital, on-going rethinking of big ideas,
assumptions, and prior lessons;
5. sparks meaningful connections with prior learning and personal
experiences;
6. naturally recurs, creating opportunities for transfer to other situations
and subjects.
Here are some subject-area examples
that are essential or generative:
How well can fiction reveal truth?

In Musichere are some

examples
How do we decide what is a good
piece of music?
What do we need to do to create a
convincing and emotionally moving
composition?
What are the different ways
humans have used to represent
musical sound?

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Why did that particular species/culture/person thrive and that other

one barely survive or die?
How does what we measure influence how we measure? How does how
we measure influence what we measure?
Is there really a difference between a cultural generalization and a
stereotype?
How should this be modeled? What are the strengths and weaknesses
of this model? (science, math, social sciences)

Note that an essential question is

different from many of the questions
Typical teacherly questions in
teachers typically ask students in class.
music
The most commonly asked question
What instruments are in the brass
type is factual a question that seeks
family?
the correct answer. For example, in a
What pitches are used in the main
history class, teachers are constantly
theme?
asking questions to elicit recall or
attention to some important content
knowledge: When did the war break out? Who was President at the time?
Why, according to the text, did Congress pass that bill?
Such questions are clearly not essential in the sense discussed above.
Rather, they are what we might call teacherly questions a question
essential to a teacher who wants students to know an important answer.
Is such a leading question bad? No. There are all sorts of good pedagogical
reasons for using a question format to underscore knowledge or to call
attention to a forgotten or overlooked idea. But those questions are not
essential in the sense of signaling genuine, important and necessarily
ongoing inquiries. Teachers have to be careful not to conflate two ideas:
essential to me in my role as a teacher and essential to anyone as a
thinking person and inquiring student for making meaning of facts and ideas
in this subject.
Essential / Generative Questions are the keys that drive teaching committed
to long-lasting learning and meaningful curriculum design.
Being able to answer them (in both multiple and compelling ways) shows
(deep) understanding.

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Chart 2.1: Key considerations for planning essential or generative
questions. These ideas will help you evaluate your work in creating
questions that should guide your unit and focus teaching and learning. Use
these as you plan and after you are finished as a checklist for assessing
quality.
Key considerations for planning essential or generative questions
Questions for Designing/Planning
Strong Essential Questions
To what extent do the questions
produce, originate or generate
additional questions leading to
new learning experiences?
generate learning that is
spiral-like and dynamic
feeding off itself in everexpanding ways?
propel learners to want to know
more, to seek out new
knowledge or develop and
refine skills?
create a need to know for
students?
take into consideration student
interest
have the capacity to solve a
musical problem?
sustain student interest over
time?
engender multiple pathways for
exploring content?
develop individual skills?

Self-Evaluation Checklist

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Template 2.1: Structuring your unit-Essential/Generative Questions.
Use this template for planning your units questions
Unit Planning

(Essential/Generative Questions)

Big Idea

Enduring Understandings

Essential / Generative Questions

Potential Pathways (that the questions might be pursued)

Potential learning problems

Potential skills

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Exhibitions of Learning

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3. Exhibition of Learning is basically an outline of

the desired results you hope to see as a result of your planning and students
engagement. It comes about by planning backwards. To design your unit
backwards means that you start with what John Dewey called the end in
view. Having the end in view provides you with a sense of where you want
the students to end up and the range of potential things they might show
and tell as a result of the learning experiences you plan. Both backward
design and exhibitions of learning begin with disciplinary big idea and the
essential questions that drive the whole teaching/ learning process. Having
an end-in-view also provides you with flexibility in your day-to-day teaching
and planning. Why? It does not tie you down by having to teach or cover a
specific lesson within a specific time allotment. Rather, it allows you to keep
your eye on the big idea and the extent to which students are understanding
those enduing ideas.
An exhibition is simply a display or show of evidence that student ended
up where you wanted them. Read and use the following information to help
you plan:

Article 3.1: What is an exhibition? This article provides

information on the purposes and rationale for using exhibitions.
Article 3.2: Representing: elementary to the exhibition of
learning. This article provides samples and examples of student
exhibitions taken from a school in Connecticut.
Chart 3.1: Key considerations for planning student exhibitions.
These ideas will help you evaluate your work in designing an
exhibition. Use these as you plan and after you are finished as a
checklist for assessing quality.
Template 3.1: Structuring your unit-Elements of an exhibition
of learning. Use this template for planning your units exhibition.

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ARTICLE 3.1

What is an Exhibition?

What is an
Exhibition?

An Exhibition is a demonstration of mastery on many levels. When students

prepare and present portfolios (collections and presentations) of their own
work to a public audience, they are demonstrating mastery of more than the
traditional academic skills. The process that culminates in the exhibition
teaches students to present themselves articulately and powerfully and to
work independently to a high standard.
Authentic Achievement and Exhibitions
Authentic achievement is intellectual accomplishments that are worthwhile,
significant, and meaningful, such as those undertaken by successful adults,
writes researcher Fred Newmann. For children, we define authentic academic
achievement through three criteria critical to significant intellectual
accomplishment: construction of knowledge, disciplined inquiry, and the
value of achievement beyond school.
Exhibitions provide a comprehensive view rather than a limited slice of
student achievement. Driven by and always responding to essential questions
and individual student interests, exhibitions demonstrate that real intellectual
work has no right answers that trump other responses. While
demonstrating competence according to state, local, school, and personal
standards, exhibitions are unique, personalized work products, representing
each individuals growth, interest, capacities, response to challenge, and
effort.
As researcher Jodi Brown Podl wrote in Anatomy of an Exhibition, Students
must assume responsibility for their own learning. A well-structured exhibition
often depends on a student-directed classroom. The students must be willing
to find the answers themselves (even if the teacher already knows them).
Discovering meaning takes persistence and patience. So much of school feels
like an intellectual charade to the students. When they are given the chance

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to do difficult work, students are surprised at the pleasure that comes from
real intellectual achievement.
Fig. 1
Qualities of "Authentic Performances"
Structure and Logistics
Are more appropriately public; involve an audience or panel.
Do not rely on unrealistic and arbitrary time constraints.
Offer known, not secret, questions or tasks.
Are more like portfolios or a season of games, not one- shot.
Require some collaboration with others.
Recur-and are worth practicing for and retaking.
Make assessment and feedback to students so central that school
schedules, structures, and policies are modified to support them.
Intellectual Design Features
Are "essential"-not needlessly intrusive, arbitrary, or designed to
"shake out" a grade.
Are "enabling"-constructed to point the student towards more
sophisticated use of the skills or knowledge.
Are contextualized, complex intellectual challenges, not "atomized"
tasks corresponding to isolated "outcomes."
Involve the student's own research or use of knowledge, for which
"content" is a means.
Assess student habits and repertoires, not mere recall or plug-in skills.
Are representative challenges-designed to emphasize depth more than
breadth.
Are engaging and educational.
Involve somewhat ambiguous tasks or problems.
Grading and Scoring Standards
Involve criteria that assess essentials, not easily counted but relatively
unimportant errors.
Are graded not on a curve but in reference to performance standards
(criterion-referenced, not norm-referenced).
Involve demystified criteria of success that appear to students as
inherent in successful activity.
Make self-assessment a part of the assessment.
Use a multifaceted scoring system instead of one aggregate grade.
Exhibit harmony with shared schoolwide aims-a standard.
Fairness and Equity
Ferret out and identify (perhaps hidden) strengths.
Strike a constantly examined balance between honoring achievement
and native skill or fortunate prior training.
Minimize needless, unfair, and demoralizing comparisons.
Allow appropriate room for student learning styles, aptitudes, and
interests.

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Are attempted by all students, with the test "scaffolded up," not
"dumbed down," as necessary.
Reverse typical test-design procedures. A model task is first specified;
then, a fair and reliable plan for scoring is devised.

Excerpted from Exhibitions: Demonstrations of Mastery in Essential Schools, Published:

2007 by Jill Davidson. Available at http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/237; Presenting
Themselves with Power and Passion, Published: 2008 by Heidi Lyne. Available at
http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/344 ; and Performance and Exhibitions: The
Demonstration of Mastery, Published: 1990 by Kathleen Cushman. Available at
http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/123

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ARTICLE 3.2
Learning

Representing: Elementary to the Exhibition of

Representing:
Elementary to the
Exhibition of
Learning
Published: 2007 by Laura Baker
http://www.essentialschools.org/resources/343

Greenfield Center School (GCS) students have a long history of engaging in

meaningful projects as the culmination of their studies. Once students have
completed these projects, they own their learning; they understand it deeply
and can explain how it relates to themselves as well as to their community.
In addition, we believe that these presentations raise standards. Projects are
presented to audiences as authentic exhibitions. These presentations can be
to peers, parents, the entire school at our weekly All School Meeting, or
community audiences. In each venue, our job as educators is to make sure
that students reflect upon how they have grown and what they have learned.
Over time, we have refined this work to be more reflective of essential
understandings that connect each classrooms studies to the schools
mission. The pillars of our mission help students develop challenging
academic skills in the service of empathy, equity, sustainability and
participation.
Representing
The process of showing ones understandings begins with the practice of
representing work, which commences in kindergarten and occurs regularly in
all content areas. At GCS representing means translating ones learning into
a different medium, and then reflecting in writing or orally on this translation.
For example, when second and third grade students studied water, they
divided into groups for a variety of field trips. One group went to a local
sewage treatment plant. They returned to the school and with blocks
recreated the process of cleaning water that they observed. Then they
explained to the rest of the class how the system worked to clean and re-use
water.
Literature assignments typically ask students to represent their
understandings as we work to develop perspective, empathy and
understanding of self in relation to others and to location. Primes
(kindergarten and first graders) create story boards to show the beginning,

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middle and end of a story. After reading stories together and being taught the
parts of a story, students work in pairs to record the storys components.
They use rolls of paper so that they can have as much space as they need to
draw and write the summaries.
As part of their literature work, third and fourth graders have focused on
understanding character. After reading books in literature groups and
discussing character traits and how they are evident in literature, each
student was assigned to read a book independently and create a character
mobile to describe the main characters. One student used a Lego bed as a
symbol for patient, a play on words for the quality of patience. In
addition, a Band-Aid was suspended from the hanger because the character
fixed things, and a ripped piece of paper with a round hole in it was used to
note that the character was running in circles with so many more options
around him. Representing helps students leave concrete ways of thinking to
explore more abstractly.
Social studies and science themes always end with representing knowledge.
Students build a village in the Colonial era, or make a replica of a period
home. Middle school grades represent their notion of the earths formation by
making three dimensional reproductions or terrariums. Students often create
poster presentations that have an artistic rendering of what they have
learned. They might create videos, claymation productions, plays, or mosaics.
Sharing
The process of representing is not complete until students share their work.
Presentations can occur in the context of the classroom, or to peers in other
classrooms. They can take place during the weekly All School Meeting, to
parent and school community audiences and to other audiences authentically
interested in the students work.
Presentations to peers can be either the final venue of sharing or practice for
a more daunting audience. Authors circles are a common way of sharing
writing with peers and receiving feedback. Students must be taught how to
provide feedback that is both helpful and positive. They learn to make
comments like, I loved the way you described the feelings of the character. It
would have helped me if you talked a little bit about the place in which it
occurred. Again, at GCS, kindergarteners begin this type of sharing with
peers about their writing, the books that they choose to read, or the
constructions they make during independent project time. Students learn how
to think about their work, how to explain it, and how to provide feedback.
Often, when students complete a piece of work they know will go to an
audience of great import, they first will share it with their peers for critique. In
order to provide the best feedback, students return to the requirements of
the assignment and the manner in which it is to be presented. For instance,
when students completed their math fair projects, they presented to their
peers several days before the actual fair. Each student gave feedback to

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three peers using an evaluation sheet, the same sheet that parents would
use the night of the fair. Presenting to peers allowed for honest feedback in
time to make changes before the event. Polished exhibitions are
performances; good performers rehearse.
All School Meeting
All School Meeting is a weekly gathering of the entire school, led by students,
comprised predominantly of their sharing of work. Students exhibit finished
pieces, talk about the process of creating the work, explicitly acknowledge
the many drafts that have gone into good work, and take questions and
comments. All School is a time when students share their representations.
However, not all representations are shared at All School Meeting, and not all
sharings are representations. All School is also a time to read student writing
or to raise important issues. For instance, during the All School Meeting on
December 8, 2006, a variety of sharings occurred:
Primes (kindergarten and first grades), read two books they had
created as part of their literature study of George and Martha. They
showed the Story Grammar Marker rope they used to deconstruct
the parts of the story and explained all the components. Then they
read and displayed their illustrated pages of each of those
components. Of course, as is expected, the entire school celebrated
their success and murmurs of appreciation permeated the room. Many
students remembered their own experience as Primes and what it felt
like to share this kind of learning.
Two students from Upper Primes and Middles (second and third grades)
read their published books, comprised of stories they wrote and took to
final draft, along with illustrations. These books are based on the
students experiences, such as one book about a pet dog named
Mozart.
Upper Middles students (fifth and sixth grades) shared projects that
they had created as part of their EcoFair. The three projects exhibited
at All School Meeting were created in quite different media. One was a
poster board which explained the plight of the Florida Everglades and
the actions that can be taken to protect it. A second project showcased
a professional looking calendar with original photography that is being
sold locally to raise money for endangered species. The third featured
a large sand and water table that replicated local rivers and the
erosion that has taken place.
Uppers (seventh and eighth grades) offered a skit showing the issues
related to fair trade chocolate. After that, they taught the school about
fair trade practices, discussed how to look for fair trade symbols, and
took a pledge to eat only fair trade chocolate.
Each presentation ended with questions and comments, a practice students
use each day at morning meeting. The questions are usually about the
process students underwent as they completed their work: How long did it
take you? How many drafts did you do? How much did you practice? What did
you like best in this process? Did you learn anything surprising? The

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comments are appreciative, empathetic, and offer thoughtful insights and
critiques, reflecting common practices of the classrooms.
To Parents and the Schools Community
The Eco Fair is just one example of presentations to parents. This fair was the
culminating piece for the Upper Middles three-month study of ecology. Each
project needed to show Awareness, Interconnectedness, and Responsibility.
Parents came during the afternoon or the evening to look at the presentations
and to ask questions of the students. A list of questions was supplied by the
students as a guide for this process. Upper Middles had taken advantage of a
peer critique prior to the parent event. Such exhibitions of work to parents
and others in our school community occur regularly. Seventh graders act out
Romeo and Juliet each year using Elizabethan modern language. Seventh and
eighth graders lead debates that include their parents about issues relating
to fair trade or child labor.
To a Community Group
Some of the most authentic audiences for our presentations are community
groups interested in the results of our students work. Each year, as part of
their data study, our fifth and sixth graders conduct a survey for the town and
analyze the data graphically and in writing. The survey results are presented
at town meetings and, this year, in a private meeting with the mayor. Not
only do the students take their work very seriously when there is an audience
like this, but our work provides a real service and saves the town from
expending money to conduct this research. In 2006, students surveyed over
400 people in the town about actions they have taken or would undertake to
conserve energy. In collaboration with the Greenfield Energy Commission,
students collected, collated and analyzed the data and presented it at a town
forum and in a special meeting with Mayor Forgey. They were able to answer
all questions and were asked to leave their findings with the commission to
use as part of the official report.
In addition, each year middle school students present to aspiring teachers at
a local college. They evaluate the importance of project-based instruction and
long term studies, bring evidence of their thoughts, and create a presentation
that lasts one hour. Each year this class gets feedback that is incredibly
supportive.
To an Evaluative Panel
Having an outside jurist motivates Uppers to invest even more fully in their
work. It also opens doors that are sometimes closed at this developmental
stage for self reflection and insight. For Ambitious Projects, students are given
wide latitude and asked to explain how their project shows ambition, passion,
and perseverance. Projects must be prepared using both an artistic medium
and writing. Some students explore mathematical concepts and theories that
stretch them. Others study a particular type of music and write a symphony.

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Two years ago a student rebuilt a Model T, documented the process with film,
and drove the vehicle in the school parking lot. Murals have been painted to
represent the poetry of Maya Angelou, dramatic monographs have been
written and acted to show the point of view of historical characters. Students
are judged on their presentation as well as the evidence of ambition, passion,
and perseverance. Members of the community, parents of students who have
graduated from the school, and teachers from high schools which the
students will attend are the judges. There is a time for these evaluators to
give verbal feedback at the exhibition, and all students are given written
feedback as well.

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Chart 3.1: Key considerations for planning student exhibitions. Use
these as you plan and after you are finished as a checklist for assessing
quality.
Key considerations for planning student exhibitions

GRASP

Questions for Designing/Planning

Strong Learning Exhibitions for
Students

Some Ideas

To what extent can students articulate:

Goals of the unit (project)
Generative (Essential) questions and
indicate how they use various
strategies for answering them

Design, teach, explain, inform,

create, persuade, defend,
critique, improve

What role will each student play in the

exhibitions?
What is each students job?
How is individual and group
accountability provided for?

Advertiser, illustrator, coach,

candidate, eyewitness,
newscaster, editor, news show
host, politician, critic,
performer, musicologist,
composer, improviser, music
videographer

Who is the audience for the exhibition?

What is the context?
What scenario should occur?

Another class, Board

members, neighbors, pen pals,
travel agent, jury, celebrity,
historical figure, community,
school board, local
government

What requirements (standards) must be

meet?
How will you create a clear picture of
what success looks like using:
Student and teacher constructed
criteria?
Authentic learning tasks or
situations?

Criteria guidelines, web or

concept map,

What kinds of processes and products of

learning must be on display to indicate
understanding of the Big Idea, and
exploration of the generative questions?

Process journal, blog, diary,

advertisement, video, game,
script, debate, rap, banner,
cartoon, scrapbook, proposal,
brochure, slide show, recital

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Template 3.1: Structuring your unit-Elements of an exhibition of
learning. Use this template for planning your units exhibition.
Unit Planning

(Elements of an Exhibition of Learning)

Learning Goals: What are the desired results you hope to see in students
work?

Music Content
List appropriate National Standards in Music Education

Enduring Understandings

Knowledge

Skills

Essential / Generative Questions

(Guiding the unit and focusing
teaching/learning)

Dispositions

Evidence of Learning: What evidence will students gather, organize and

use in their exhibitions to show they understand the big idea?
Evidences gathered from student
work and final products shared at
exhibition

Student Self-evaluation

Standards of Quality: What criteria are you using to help students meet
the units learning goals and assess the quality of their work?

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Learning Experiences

Planning Units and Projects for Musical

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30

4. Structuring Learning Experiences can

take many forms and use many different teaching approaches. The main
teaching approaches we stress in MTL are facilitative and coaching oriented,
plus we suggest using a minimal amount of direct instruction. We also
encourage you to be innovative, experimental and creative in your planning,
plus be very critical of the design of your work using both principles of
curriculum making in music and criteria considerations for individual planning
components. Read and use the following information to help you plan:

Chart 4.1. Four essential principles for curriculum making in

music. These ideas will help you evaluate the strength and scope of
students learning in your overall plan. Use these as you plan and after
you are finished as a checklist for assessing quality.
Chart 4.2. Key considerations for planning curriculum-learning
experiences. These ideas will help evaluate each learning experience
you plan in relation to the units overall goal; plus help you assess
individual components of plans in relation to all components. Use these
as you plan and after you are finished as a checklist for assessing
quality.
Template 4.1. Structuring learning experiences Use this chart as
template for constructing your actual teaching/learning plans.

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Chart 4.1. Four essential principles for curriculum making in music.
Four essential principles for curriculum making in music
Questions for Assessing Strength and
Scope of Learning in a Music
Curriculum

How comprehensive is your students

musical learning? To what extent are their
experiences fully inclusive of the three
fundamental musical engagements
Performing
Creating
Listening-Describing (including
description of expressive and cultural
contexts)

How balanced is your students learning?

To what extent is their equal opportunity to
engage in performing, creating, listening?

To what extent is your students learning

sequenced or organized so that they will be
able to exhibit their understanding of the
enduring understandings and
essential/generative questions found in
musics big ideas?
What evidence will need to be organized
and collected within different aspects of
students learning for their exhibitions?

To what extent have you created learning

experiences based on relevant contexts
that are meaningful to students?

CBSR

Self-Evaluation Checklist

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Chart 4.2. Key considerations for planning curriculum learning
experiences.
Key considerations for planning curriculum learning experiences
WHERE
Questions for Designing/Planning
Strong Learning Experiences for
Students

To what extent do students know:

where they are going and why (reason for
learning the unit content),
what they already know (prior knowledge),
where they might go astray (likely
misunderstandings), and
what is required of them at the exhibition
(show and tell built on unit goals,
performance requirements and evaluation
criteria)?

How will you create a need to know using

students interests?
How will you hook & hold their interests by using
engaging and thought provoking
experiences (issues, oddities, problems,
challenges) that point toward big ideas
(through inquiry, research, problem-solving,
and experimentation),
guiding questions, and performance tasks to
be shown at the exhibition?
How will you honor their different styles,
interests and abilities?

What learning experiences will help students

explore the enduring understandings and
essential/generative questions found in musics
big ideas?
What instruction (including mini-projects,
coaching sessions, direct skill acquisition) is
needed to facilitate students learning for their
final exhibitions?

How will you guide students to revise, reflect

and refine in order to dig deeper into the core
ideas?
How will you guide students in revising/
reflecting /refining / rehearsing their work based
on feedback and self-assessment?

How will students provide evidence of their

Self-Evaluation
Checklist

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understanding though final performances,
processes-products in their exhibitions?
How will you guide them in self-evaluation to
identify the strengths and weaknesses in their
work and set future goals?

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Template 4.1. Structuring learning experiences
Unit Planning

(Structuring Learning Experiences)

Unit (or
Project)
Phases

Indicate, write down and organize the

following components and elements:

Getting
Started

How you will start your project/unit taking into

consideration WHERE and CBSR.
What you will do to access prior knowledge, identify
interests, create a need to know, introduce
essential/generative questions based on the big idea;
generate ideas for student exploration, inquiry, research,
problem-solving.

Carrying Out
Teaching for
Student
Learning

Sequence (or order) of learning/teaching activities

(lessons, mini-projects, coaching sessions, etc.) that will
help students explore (inquire about, research, problemsolve, and experiment) the big idea, answer the
questions.
Teaching strategies for scaffolding students learning,
including revising, reflecting and refining student work.
Evidence that will count as learning and How you want
students to gather and organize that evidence for their
exhibitions.
Rough guide or timeline as to how long a specific activity
will take and how long the entire unit will take given the
total number of learning experiences.

Closing
Exhibiting
Student
Understandin
g

Requirements of what students need to show and tell at

their exhibitions (include evidence and
performance/process product, self-evaluation, future
questions).

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PLANNING TEMPLATES

Planning Units and Projects for Musical

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Unit (and Project) Planning
PART 1
Unit Planning

(Big Ideas/Enduring Understandings)

Big Idea

Enduring Understandings

Brief Summary of Unit (Including Context)

PART 2
Unit Planning

((Essential/Generative Questions)

Big Idea

Essential / Generative Questions

Enduring Understandings

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Potential Pathways (that the questions might be pursued)

Potential learning problems

Potential skills

PART 3
Unit Planning

(Elements of an Exhibition of Learning)

Learning Goals: What are the desired results you hope to see in students
work?

Music Content
List appropriate National Standards in Music Education

Enduring Understandings

Knowledge

Skills

Essential / Generative Questions

(Guiding the unit and focusing
teaching/learning)

Dispositions

Planning Units and Projects for Musical

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Evidence of Learning: What evidence will students gather, organize and

use in their exhibitions to show they understand the big idea?

Evidences gathered from student

work and final products shared at
exhibition

Student Self-evaluation

Standards of Quality: What criteria are you using to help students meet
the units learning goals and assess the quality of their work?

PART 4
Unit Planning

(Structuring Learning Experiences)

Unit (or
Project)
Phases

Indicate, write down and organize the

following components and elements:

Getting
Started

How you will start your project/unit taking into

consideration WHERE and CBSR.
What you will do to access prior knowledge, identify
interests, create a need to know, introduce
essential/generative questions based on the big idea;
generate ideas for student exploration, inquiry, research,
problem-solving.

Carrying Out
Teaching for
Student
Learning

Sequence (or order) of learning/teaching activities

(lessons, mini-projects, coaching sessions, etc.) that will
help students explore (inquire about, research, problemsolve, and experiment) the big idea, answer the
questions.

Planning Units and Projects for Musical

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Teaching strategies for scaffolding students learning,
including revising, reflecting and refining student work.
Evidence that will count as learning and How you want
students to gather and organize that evidence for their
exhibitions.
Rough guide or timeline as to how long a specific activity
will take and how long the entire unit will take given the
total number of learning experiences.
3

Closing
Exhibiting
Student
Understandin
g

Requirements of what students need to show and tell at

their exhibitions (include evidence and
performance/process product, self-evaluation, future
questions).