Rhythmic Building Blocks for Elementary Music
This is a little different from normal episode outlines -
This is a topic a really enjoy. It’s one small piece of the pedagogy process that opened up a lot of doors for me when I learned about it. I thought it would be nice to talk through.
As we’re wrapping up the year, this can be a nice avenue to explore for the first time, or to revisit if it’s already a well-loved favorite for your students.
We’ll talk about what rhythmic building blocks are,
What are Rhythmic Building Blocks?
Short fragments of rhythm
2-beats (normally)
Constructing Rhythmic Building Blocks:
How are they created?
Where do they come from?
“Elemental” speech patterns
What is a natural rhythm to derive from the text? What is a natural rhythmic extension of the meter?
Traditional Building Blocks:
Ta ta
Ta-di ta
Ta-di ta-di
Ta ta-di
Ta (rest)
Elementaria (Keetman): monkey, elephant, alligator, anteater, snake
“Untraditional” Building Blocks
Keetman’s building blocks are useful for
Simple duple meter
A beat, a beat subdivision, a beat without a sound
What about the other durations we work with?
As the meter changes and the rhythmic set of our repertoire changes, our naturally-derived speech patterns also naturally change
Planning Binder 3rd Grade taka-di - Bubblegum Bubblegum
Bubblegum bubblegum (taka-di ta-di)
How many pieces (ta-dimi ta-di)
Sticky sticky bubblegum (takadimi taka-di)
So sticky (ta ta-di)
Pop! (ta rest)
Purposeful Pathways, book 3, compound meter - Birds of a Feather, p. 58
Notation and Building Blocks
Before notation is introduced:
Thematic text and an image
Thematic text and graphic notation
After standardized Western notation:
Thematic text and stick notation
Rhythm syllables and stick notation
Stick notation
Already with these options, our brains can shoot off several different directions.
What’s the purpose of the activity?
What will move students from the known to the unknown?
What information do we get from letting students choose their building blocks?
How might we use them?
We could break this category down by several different categories
Medium: Movement, speech, singing, playing instruments
Skill: Improvisation, arranging, sight reading, etc.
Pedagogy: Imitate, explore, label, create
For our purposes, because this is specifically a Schulwerk term we’ll explore it with that lens.
Imitate
I speak a pattern, you speak it back
I clap a pattern, you clap it back
I speak and clap a pattern while stepping a steady beat, then pause and let you speak and move as the echo
I speak a pattern while tiptoeing, stepping, or sliding to the rhythm, you tiptoe, step, or slide the echo
I speak a pattern with thematic movement, you echo with movement and speech
I play a pattern on an unpitched percussion instrument, you echo
I play a pattern on a barred instrument or recorder (single pitch) and you echo
I play a pattern on a barred instrument or recorder using two pitches and you echo
Explore
Students create their own movements for each card
(This is the length of the two steady beats, the key is not to make the movements too elaborate)
Arrange for body percussion as a class or with a partner
I give you a pattern with body percussion, you echo the same rhythm but improvise changes to the body percussion
We use the same pattern on the board but each student group comes up with different dynamic interpretations
I play a combination (single pitch), you play a the same pattern with an improvised toneset
This is improvisation, but the pedagogical focus here is rhythm, not pitch. The rhythm stays the same.
Label
I speak a rhythm combination with thematic text, you echo on rhythm syllables
Create
I speak a rhythm combination, you improvise a different rhythm back with speech
I clap a rhythm combination, you clap a different improvised combination back
In a small group, students arrange cards to create a B section to the known song. Students in their group choose if they’ll perform their B section with speech, body percussion, movement, or a combination.
In a small group, students create a rhythm combination and assign a body percussion combination to their order. The teacher or a student leader walks around the room as the class sings the main song. When the song stops, the group the teacher is in front of performs their rhythm for the class.
In a small group, students arrange cards to create a B section to the known song. Students arrange their rhythms for barred instruments or recorder using a known toneset, then write down their melody in graphic notation, solfege syllables, or the 5-line staff
Kodaly Pedagogy and Rhythmic Building Blocks
There are equally endless possibilities for Kodaly-inspired educators. We’ll only touch on a few here, but we can use our imaginations to think of options.
Many Kodaly educators break down the practice phase of learning into different areas of focus:
Reading / Writing
Partwork
Inner hearing
Memory
Form
Improvisation
Logistics the classroom:
My highest recommendation is that this happens within the context of repertoire, not as an isolated exercise.
Modeling appropriate options for exploration and creation is key. Start with the whole class first, then break into small groups.
Scaffold options - we don’t jump straight to thirteen options with movement and instruments. Scaffold the choices and model each step.
I could go on and on about all the possible ways to think about and use rhythmic building blocks. I have a whole list of other considerations and learning pathways we didn’t get to.
