My kid will be starting as an elementary ed major this Fall and minoring in music with the possibility of getting certified to be a music teacher in the future. Is that a thing? She might even switch her major to music ed next Spring when auditions roll around again but isn't entirely sure. P.S. She's been in choir for 7 years, participates in solos and ensemble, love performing and has even made it to state honors choir. Music is a part of her life no matter what. Thanks 👍

I have a bachelor's and master's in music performance and am thinking about going back to school to eventually become an elementary school music teacher. What would I need to bridge the gap between the performance and ed? Is it just teaching credits or would I have to get another master's? Tried to Google it myself but there doesn't seem to be a clear answer. Am in NY if that helps. TIA (:

I am currently in my final year at a top conservatory studying performance (trumpet). I am deciding if I want to continue my Masters here with two more years of trumpet performance, or if I want to get a music ed degree with certification (NY). The Masters in Performance would be at the same school; the Music Ed degree would be at a close-by school also in NYC.

Outside of financial/tuition reasons, I’m having trouble choosing. On one hand, I love playing in orchestra (and chamber), and hope to professionally freelance and win a job in an orchestra. But I’m also trying to be realistic. I don’t necessarily want to teach…My passion has always been performance. But it doesn’t seem like a bad idea to get certified and a masters in music ed. I think I’m scared that I won’t win an audition for a while and will need to make money/have a stable job; I figure why not spend the two years getting certified while still being able to stay in NY, take auditions and lessons, freelance, etc. (I worry that in a Music Ed Masters I wouldn’t be able to find the time to practice though…)

Any thoughts? Advice? Thank you all!

Hi yall! I’m graduating with a degree in performance this May and I’m currently working on getting my teaching certification. Since I am not a music ed major, I won’t be getting student teaching or job opportunities through the school. I was wondering if anyone has advice for entering the field in my situation. Thank you so much!

I'm a general music teacher and students' homeroom teachers have been consistently picking up and dropping off students late, either eating into my lesson time or into my passing periods/prep time. At first it didn't really bother me that much but it's been getting on my nerves lately. Is there a way to address this to the other teachers without sounding like a complete a-hole?

Edit to elaborate: I mean dropping off late as in like, almost 20 minutes late, to a 45 minute class period.

Hello, I am a student at the University of Akron! I have an assignment coming up at the end of the month, where we are to give a lesson to students about some sort of beginning instrumental process. I would like to use recorder, but I don't know anything else on what I should do. I don't need to use recorders neasecarily, any ideas would help!

My beginners are getting to For Pete’s Sake in EE today(first time for 1st and 2nd endings). I usually write this on the whiteboard, but bought this shirt over the summer. I love this lesson, because I always start it the same way:

“Am I a monster?”

I am a private piano teacher. I have always been fascinated by instruments of all types and music in general. I want to start music exploration workshops for my students to learn about other instruments and get to see and potentially play some (that I can get my hands on). I just wish I knew a bit more than my scrapped together knowledge.

If I wanted to learn the things a music Ed major or band/orchestra teacher or instrument technician learned but didn't need any of the credentials or certifications, where should I look? Ideally videos and self study type materials?

Hi all,

I'm in the middle of brainstorming an idea of an "oddities" trio made up of bassoon, horn, and oboe to recruit in middle schools around my Metro area. The idea of the group is that we would go to a school that's trying to get kids to switch to these instruments, and a do bunch of fun stuff with them with the focus on education and interaction.

One of the portions of our presentation may include "Easter Eggs" found in the music they hear. For example, the Jaws Theme and New World Symphony. I'm looking for some other ideas that fall into this category that middle school aged students would recognize.

Thanks for any help!

Hey guys, looking for recommendations for new speakers for the classroom. I would like to be able to plug it into my computer vs Bluetooth, both options in one would be ideal. I also have a microphone system connected to my old ones some how, so I would need those to be connected as well. Gonna ask my tech person but wanted some thoughts/ideas before moving forward. Thanks!

So, I’m doing a training on copyright law compliance, and specifically, I’m at the part covering arranging. (The following example is hypothetical, as I don’t want to self-incriminate). Basically, what I’m hearing is that it would be illegal for me to arrange or perform “We Will Rock You” by Queen for my 5th grade class, unless I purchased an existing arrangement or got legal permission to arrange and perform it.

Furthermore, changing the character of the pics is illegal, so if I performed “There will never be another you,” in a jazz context, but played it in minor, that would be illegal unless I secured permission first.

Some of this is completely bewildering to me. It feels like remaining compliant requires me to never arrange anything, because the process of obtaining permission would take too much time for it to be worth it. Those of you who arrange tunes for pep band and younger bands, how do you guys keep compliant?

Hi all! I’m a musician, as in an independent singer songwriter, and I sing in church. Over the past 6 years I’ve been volunteering to lead the youth choir at church so I’ve started to learn about music education a bit just for them. My day job is a baker, and aside from high school I didn’t do any higher education in music because I never intended to teach. I was in marching band and punk bands lol I took up aftercare for some extra income and they asked me to put together a music program since I play guitar. It’s been a few months and I’m enjoying it, but I don’t know if I want to be a full time music teacher. Now they’re asking me to do a summer program.

My question is do I need further education in order to do small programs like this or even private lessons? Do I have to go back to college and get a degree or are there courses I can take that don’t require going back? I really don’t want to go back to college 😂

I need help. I teach middle school choir. It’s like pulling teeth trying to get them to sing every day. I feel like I’ve tried everything. Incentives, restorative conversations, positive feedback, etc.

How I can I motivate my students to want to sing?

EDIT: After some reflecting I decided a restorative classroom discussion will be helpful. I think reviewing our social contract and acknowledging how everyone’s feeling in the last quarter of the year is a good strategy to build community and hopefully, eventually, motivate them to sing more just out of respect for everyone else in the class.

My High School band right now is 7th grade-12th grade, and I’ve been wanting to remove 7th from high school band. Because we have so few students in the school, I won’t have enough for a 7th grade band only, so I was thinking of combining 6th and 7th grade into one “ intermediate” band class. We start our beginners in 5th grade. I was wondering what I would work on in that 6&7 class. If I continue to work out of a book, then the students who move from 6th to 7th wouldn’t be doing anything new aside from Christmas and Spring concert music. This is my first year teaching, so I’m a little lost.

I love the intuitive understanding that BBC's Alphablocks and Numberblocks give kids for letters and numbers. And I want to find something like this for music or solfege. Something playful, with stories, that's not too full of big words but that teaches the concepts of keys, sharps and flats, the notes or note names without being too "teachy". Any recommendations?

I have been trying to work with more music my students find interesting and move away from some of our Western-Classical focused curriculum.

Unfortunately, I’m a bit of a music nerd and I don’t often listen to much popular music. The only rap I know is older stuff that I would get fired for playing in class.

My end goal is to have students write rap lyrics of their own. I have a pretty good structure for this that involves thinking of words related to a topic and finding unrelated rhyming words.

Does anyone have good examples of rap music with a typical 2 bar rhyming scheme that would be appropriate AND interesting for a 6th grade class?

I don’t mind if the artist is questionable, I’m really focused more on the song itself in a vacuum.

I teach 4 grade level choruses in MS and had 3 of them in rehearsals today. I couldn’t resist messing with them a bit….especially since I’m always after them to make sure they read EVERYTHING on the page before they start their work.

Hello! I am currently student teaching for my undergrad in music ed, and I am in my elementary portion of student teaching. I am much more comfortable and confident teaching secondary school band, so elementary general is very new to me. My cooperating teacher is amazing, but I like to hear ideas from as many sources as possible. I was assigned to come up with 2 lessons or games per grade level (k-5) for next week (about 10-15 minutes each). We are focusing a lot on solfege and our current EQ revolves around how music can bring people together, it is also testing season so anything I could use to tie into that would be cool too!

Hi! I’m set on going to school for Music Ed, I have dedicated so many of my years to this and I don’t wanna turn back now. That being said, my mom hates this idea. The only other thing I am interested in is Political Science/Law or Literature. Would it be beneficial at all to go to law school after I get my Music Ed (probably BA) degree? or to Double major in something like Public Relations,PoliSci, Public Policy?

it's been almost 20 years since I graduated college and even longer since I played any instrument.

I have always loved band and secretly always wanted to be a band director, but my life took me in a different direction. I am worried that I may not have enough of a music background or experience to earn a degree. I feel like I have many strengths related to teaching (I spent 5 years teaching English aboard) and potentially being a band director, but I am in no ways a musician today. When I was a student I was a decent trumpet player, but nothing noteworthy, so I am curious whether this is necessary something that I should be worried about.

Basically my question is, what is the easiest (and cheapest) way to earn a second bachelor's degree in Music Education and what's the shortest amount of time it typically takes?

So I was hired in January for a small, rural Title I school district teaching K - 12. My middle school music class is about 12 students, grade 6 through 8. I have been teaching rhythm and even had them try some African drumming stuff (which did not go too well.) I am now trying a percussion ensemble - Grade 1 - to teach them how to play together in anticipation of having a real band next year.

However, none of these students can really read music at all, even with learning basics of rhythm. They are incredibly unregulated all the time (an issue other teachers have talked about) and I cannot take the time to work on individual skills nor smaller group work without the class devolving into chaos.

I am really stuck at this point. We only have 7 weeks left in the school year and was hoping to present something for the school at the end of the year. This has proven to be my biggest challenge.

Any ideas on how to proceed or maybe pivoting to something else?

I am at a regional school library system and have been asked by my member districts to explore a sheet music library. Before I start worrying about a warehouse for storage space, I wanted to see if anyone is using a digital music option?

My research turned up broader education solutions like MusicFirst and NoteFlight that could maybe work, but the availability of music is unclear with them. I also saw more hardware dependent solutions like forScore for iPads and the eInk PadMu. And digital catalogs like J.W. Pepper.

Anyone using any of these options in schools for bands?

I'm looking for a small mixer that can handle a (1) standard corded mic for practicing solos, a (1) wireless mic, to amplify/protect my voice, and hook up to my computer to play backtracks. Does such a thing exist?

Hello everyone! I just got accepted into Berklee College of Music with a $22,000 annual scholarship (yay!!). I am very grateful, however, I am also very much broke - I come from a low-income family, from a poor country. I wanted to know if there are any international outside scholarships available that could fit my profile - F18 Intl Vocal/Jazz/Songwriting. I know it's not realistic at all but I would like to try my hardest still because I don't want to regret losing such an opportunity!! Thank you!!

Hi everybody! New music teacher here. K-5 I’ve been at this job for about two months now, and these kids haven’t had a music teacher all year until I arrived, so I knew it was going to be a battle in every aspect. I’m working on it.

Do any of y’all have advice on how to break out of the “Shut up” loop? The kids are talking, I ask for everyone to be quiet, we almost get there until one student tells another to “shut up” (usually very loudly) and then we’re right back into everyone talking again! It feels like it never ends unless I get scary or someone else intervenes.

Any strategies on getting out of the loop?