Soundtrack of My Life: Distance Learning Activity for Middle School General Music

As we all dive headfirst into distance learning, I am finding it difficult to craft meaningful assignments for my general music students. Students in a performance-based course like band and chorus can simply practice at home—and often have the individual drive to do so—but how can participatory courses like general music be replicated at home without access to classroom percussion instruments, African drums, and ukuleles? And even though I’m looking forward to sharing online resources and interesting videos with my students, I don’t want that to be the totality of their general music experience for the rest of the year.

I’ve decided to assign long-term projects to my students, such as the following “Soundtrack of My Life” from my book Music Mosaic . The curriculum outlined in the book is student-centered, project-based, and focused on popular music in the United States. It begins with a self-analysis, asking, “Why do I listen to the music I do?” and stays firmly oriented to personal identity and individual artistic intent from September to June.

This particular project tasks students with creating a personal soundtrack by selecting music to represent the elements of their lives: family, friends, hobbies, etc. First they will organize their thoughts on paper and then they will make a digital playlist by summarizing their selections in a Google Slides file and inserting a high-quality video file for each song choice (music video, movie clip, live performance, etc.).

The self-reflective nature of this project lends itself well to at-home work, and will keep your students engaged even as they work alone without the oversight of a teacher. And even more importantly, they’ll be preparing a final product that can be presented to you and other students in the class via an online platform like Google Classroom, maintaining the personal connections that are currently missing in our lives. I know my students so much better after reading their projects.

“Engrave this upon your heart: there isn’t anyone you couldn’t love once you heard their story.” – Mary Lou Kownacki

Click the image below to access the full PDF activity .