Emotional Disability Domain
Aamon A. Richardson
I chose this domain because I want to better relate to my students and my career as a music teacher. Also, I want to improve in classroom management, and I have learned from our course how behavioral and emotional challenges are intertwined. Students come into class with a load of emotions, and everybody feels different things on different days. It's important to know how others are feeling in situations, so it's ok to ask "how do you feel?"
After reading the article "Music Teachers and Music Therapists: Helping Children Together." by Allyson Patterson, I found the role of music educators and music therapists are different, yet the most important goals of the two are the educational growth and development of the student. The article is about the relationship between music educators and music therapists, discussing their participation in special education services. The article shares the process of incorporating music therapy in schools through various protocols such as IEP meetings, checklists, and observations to name a few. It is beneficial to know how music can impact students' behavior and improve their lives in areas outside of music. I learned some responsibilities as a music educator, such as considering students' nonmusical skills and how they can be supported through music.
By connecting emotionally to our crafts and careers as music teachers, it can help to rear our students in the provision of structure for engaging with emotions as they arise. For example, feelings of sadness, anger, contentment, and angst can be addressed by students through social-emotional learning and music to regulate their emotions.
I explain to students musical concepts like timbre, also known as tone color. Students who struggle with emotional challenges can use tone colors in their regulation. For instance, I can differentiate solfège singing with the color spectrum and ask students to identify syllables or note names with colors. Next, musical ideas can be scaffolded into building a concept of emotional and behavioral management through the Feelings Thermometer.
According to Virginia Department of Education, federal and state regulations define emotional disability as:
...a condition exhibiting one or more of the following characteristics over a long period of time and to a marked degree, which adversely affects educational performance:
- An inability to learn which cannot be explained by intellectual, sensory, or health factors;
- An inability to build or maintain satisfactory interpersonal relationships with peers and teachers;
- Inappropriate types of behavior or feelings under normal circumstances;
- A general pervasive mood of unhappiness or depression; or
- A tendency to develop physical symptoms or fears associated with personal or school problems.
When determining a student’s learning disability in this domain, special education teams must make a correspondence to the behaviors over a long period of time. Like other students with differences and disabilities, identification can range from mild to moderate or severe.
Conclusively, when students in this domain function
with their families, school communities, and societies, they can in turn connect to fun
activities like the Skittles: Kindness Game which uses rainbow skittles in a Q&A format. I sometimes have my students lead the game to have discussions about kindness, as this is one of their
favorites.
Feel free to watch some educational videos below which deal with managing, regulating, and identifying emotions.
The Boundaries Song - "That's a Boundary"
I use this song in the beginning of my elementary classes to help regulate our emotions before teaching the lesson.
Yo Gabba Gabba - "Hold Still"
A fun and colorful experience for younger students to differentiate feelings through music and dancing.
Yo Gabba Gabba is such a good throwback to shows with a little less going on constantly and has some good songs like the one you presented. I also enjoyed learning about the skittles game and wondered which grade performs the best with this and if there are any adaptations you recommend for littles versus some of the older kids.
ReplyDeleteFor the skittles game, my 2nd graders do better with leading this game as they are able to share their experiences through genuine discussion. When considering the youngers kids, I would substitute words for "kind" with "nice", and "show respect" and for the older ones, they can complete an exit ticket to write their responses out. A simple worksheet for them to complete which includes lines to support their writing is effective.
DeleteManaging emotions is such a huge part of teaching students today. I really liked some of the games, songs, and check-in activities you presented that allow students to start the conversation about how to figure out what they are feeling, how to work through that emotion, and how we can keep others' emotions in consideration. I'm curious what activities could be utilized for older students, as well as how students of all ages can learn to better maintain interpersonal relationships.
ReplyDeleteAnother activity I did with my older students was coloring in Wassily Kandinsky's "Composition IX". Students first learned about him, then some of his quotes. He related color to the keyboard, also, he connected musical elements to lines and shape. He related music and art to human emotions.
ReplyDeleteI think students can better maintain interpersonal relationships when lessons are deemed highly effective. This style of teaching allows students to take risks, such as posing spontaneous questions, yet lesson-based, all in a seamless and solid fashion. Give students time to talk with each other in class and model a warm-tone when speaking to them. Also, because music is a universal language, feel free to allow students to develop and consider social-emotional skills when teaching musical concepts. I recommend you read "Music Education and Social Emotional Learning The Heart of Teaching Music" by Scott N. Edgar.
Lots of helpful ideas, thanks. I will definitely use these video with my grade 3 and half of grade 4. My Grade 5 would not respond kindly to these videos, unfortunately, but there have been a lot of other great suggestions for older students.
ReplyDeleteYou're welcome, I glad you found them to be helpful. Happy teaching.
DeleteFor Maria: It was nice to read about the connection educators have with music therapy again (I also wrote about this in my blog post this week)! I have multiple students with emotional disturbances, and I completely see where you’re coming from—the kids seem to feel innately safe emotionally in the music room. They feel comfortable talking and sharing their emotions.
ReplyDeleteI’ve used an activity called "The Soundtrack of My Life." Students connect their emotions to different songs and dissect why they connect certain music to different emotions. They analyze tonality, instrumentation, harmonic progressions, etc. and decipher why certain songs have a certain mood, and why they feel like THEY connect to a certain song.
This project reminded me of your skittle project. Thanks for a great post!
You're welcome. Yes, I was happy to learn about music therapy and how I can incorporate music in aiding nonmusical skills. I will look into "The Soundtrack of My Life" activity, I am interested in hearing how my students dissect their connection with music.
ReplyDelete