Is Your Teaching Mile-Wide and Inch-Deep? Discover Ways to Add Depth

Have you ever toasted a piece of bread only to open the butter dish and find just a smidge of butter left? Disappointed, yet determined, you gather as much butter as possible to scrape over the warm toast. You know it’s not quite enough, but maybe if the butter is spread thin enough, you’ll still be able to get a taste in every bite.

Do you ever feel like that in your work? You’re spread so thin but are hoping that if you can just cover more material, your teaching will be more palatable. Like too little butter scraped over too much toast, your content is surface deep and not all that delicious.

I teach preschool through 6th grade, instrumental lessons, band, and two choirs. I see my K–3rd grade students for approximately 30 hours of instructional time each school year. My 4th–6th graders, 25 hours. It would be easy, albeit chaotic, to go in a dozen different directions in order to cover as many different topics as possible; to be reviewed and repeated each year. But this would leave my students with isolated experiences that have little meaning and disconnected concepts. I want them to experience the joy, understand the mystery, and take home the excitement felt in music class. But, with so little time spread over so many years, how do I decide the most effective methods and materials to use?

Deep First, Then Wide

I believe the answer is going deep before wide. If our teaching is a mile wide and an inch deep, how does that benefit our students and help them become musical for life? If we take the time to go deep early in their childhood, I believe students’ broadening experiences later will be all the more enriching because they will have a strong foundation. Some would say that if we touch on a wide-range of topics each year, every year, then the layered effect would mean that after 5–7 years, they have had a deep elementary music experience. I do not believe this is nearly as effective in practice as in theory and why, in years past, I was needing to review what a quarter note was every. single. year. That frustrated me! I now believe that going deep with limited width first, then broadening their experiences over the years, actually develops better understanding and musicianship in children.

Get Efficient Mileage

One way in which I do this is to use one piece of quality music literature to teach as many concepts as possible. Remember that children enjoy what is familiar! For example, after a song is used as a game, it can then be used to teach quarter and eighth notes, and even later about do, re, and mi. I get triple mileage out of that one song. We know that we should teach from concrete to abstract and use the familiar to explain the new, so why do we try to teach each new concept with new material? Partly because there is so much good music out there! Isn’t part of our job to expose them to as much as possible? Possibly—but we must always be cognizant of our very limited time, and be intentional about how we use it. I can not expect my students to become healthy musicians by consistently using activities that lack substance and stand alone only for the sake of exposure. Let’s leave those activities in our sub box.

Utilize Instruments

If I have been intentional and thoughtful about the literature chosen in the primary grades, then one way I can broaden their musical experience is through instruments. I can teach them the mechanics and allow them to express the music they know through the instrument. Students are always so excited to play music they already know! Plus this way, it doesn’t have to be the latest hit to be familiar. Then I can explore new literature and concepts as I broaden their abilities and develop skills on their instrument.

Another way that I go wide is by using rhythm syllables in the classroom that will aid the technique of tonguing a wind instrument. I use the Froseth syllables (du and du-de) so that the syllables have meaning in the classroom as well as practical application on instruments. Whether it be recorder or band instruments, starting with the same rhythm syllables and melodies taught in the classroom gives the students a familiar place to begin.

I have chosen a lesson book that complements both the literature used in the classroom as well as the rhythm syllables. This means I have even been able to look to the lesson book for literature that can be used in the classroom! Students need to see that playing an instrument is a way to express music, not just to hear notation. Playing an instrument is an extension of music class, not an isolated activity that meets once a week.

It makes sense to use a lesson book that reinforces what is being taught in the classroom. If you have a preferred way of teaching note and rhythm reading to instrumentalists, then teach it that same way in the classroom. For me, I had to change the way I taught rhythm in beginning band lessons because I believe so much in how I’m teaching it in the classroom.

Just this year at our state music conference, I learned a different way to approach beginning drums. I already know that I am going to have my students do beat-keeping movements, so why not “front-load” some of those techniques in 2nd–4th grades? If some of those students decide to learn percussion, they are already familiar, and maybe even proficient with some of the left-right coordination skills. This makes beginning drums a little bit less complicated because students are applying stick technique (new) with left-right patterns (old). The beauty is that this is not in any way a detriment to those who do not become percussionists. For them, it is simply one way to show beat-movements.

Singing and Solfège

Singing is a part of music class in every grade, so connecting my choirs’ experience to music class is simple through literature. Each marking period, I use rounds and canons in the mid-upper elementary grades for assessment. I then reuse those songs as warm-ups but broaden their use by developing listening skills in my choirs.

I use solfège in my classroom, but I don’t reteach the whole scale every year because that would be “going wide” without depth and meaning. I use the solfège syllables that are found in the majority of the classroom literature, which expands each year. My students are independent at singing solfège patterns, so then in choir I can use solfège as another warm-up activity, use hand signs to teach harmony, and even teach parts of the songs being learned for concerts with familiar solfège patterns.

Connect Concepts

We have heard a lot about cross-curricular lessons over the years and how every teacher should relate their subject area to others. I think it would benefit us to do that within our subject of music! Connect concepts and material across different applications. If you are alone in your building and have to do it all, don’t work against yourself. If you are part of a team, then humble yourself, work together, and agree on the pedagogy so your students can see the connection and know you’re reinforcing each other.

According to Jon Nastor on copyblogger.com, every piece of content can be placed in either the deep or wide category, each having a specific goal. “Wide content attracts new audience members. Deep content strengthens relationships with your existing audience members.”

Most of our elementary students will only go where we lead them. So, let’s go deep with literature that is meaningful and teaches multiple concepts. Let’s go deep with techniques and strategies that can have more than one application. All of the preparation and research needed to do those things will keep us from grasping for shallow activities. And the less we have to grab a little from here and a little from there, the more we will feel like there is enough of us to spread around.