Creating Music for the Elementary Classroom

PRINT PAGE

Home>CONTINUING ED>Course Offerings>Creating Music for the Elementary Classroom

vandercook_meca

CONTINUING ED

All online MECA courses
conclude on May 3, 2020.

Questions?
Visit our MECA FAQs page.

Drop, withdraw or change using
the Add/Drop Form.

For other MECA-related questions,
contact us at meca@vandercook.edu
or 312.788.1139.

Finding material that suits your students' skill set can be a challenge, but when you create your own, you are able to tailor it to meet your students' needs. This course will show you how to create unique and flexible music for your elementary music students, including writing complementary rhythmic pieces; lyrics for original melodies; setting child-centered poetry to music, and writing pentatonic, modal and diatonic melodies over a simple accompaniment using a variety of media. Experience with a notation program (Sibelius, Finale, Noteflight) is required. Sharing of pieces is strongly encouraged.

Outcomes: By the end of this course, students will be able to:

- Write complementary rhythmic pieces.

- Write pentatonic, modal and diatonic melodies over a simple accompaniment using a variety of media.

- Create lyrics for original melodies.

- Set child centered poetry to music.

- Work with simple forms.

Instructor: Cyndee B. Giebler

Giebler_right

Cyndee B. Giebler is a composer and educator currently teaching in the Menominee Elementary Schools in Michigan. From 1992-1998, she taught classroom music, chorus, orchestra and directed an annual musical at Holy Family School in Marinette, WI, during which time she composed some of her most well-known pieces, including Away in a Manger, Gloria Deo, Il Est Ne, I Heard a Bird Sing and The Bullfrog’s Song. Prior to teaching at Holy Family, she had a private Suzuki violin and piano studio. Giebler studied composition at the University of St. Thomas in St. Paul, MN, from which she has received her master’s degree in 2004. She is active member of the American Orff-Schulwerk Association and frequently presents workshops around the country. As a composer, Giebler writes melodies specifically for children’s voices with accessible harmony parts.