Incredibox to the Rescue

Learning Resource Type

Classroom Resource

Subject Area

Arts Education

Grade(s)

4, 5

Overview

This classroom resource offers a series of lessons from LeslieAnne Bird uses the free site, Incredibox, to help students create their own compositions. It culminates in a DJ Party performance. She provides links to a set of Youtube videos by The Little Kids Rock that makes the process easy. This series of lessons work best with classes that have 1:1 devices.

Arts Education (2017) Grade(s): 4 - Music

AE17.MU.4.4

Use standard and/or iconic notation and/or recording technology to document personal rhythmic, melodic, and simple harmonic musical ideas.

UP:AE17.MU.4.4

Vocabulary

Rhythm
  • Conducting patterns in
  • Syncopation
Melody
  • Pitch set: Do, Re, Mi, Fa, So, Ti
  • Treble clef reading (La, So, Mi, Re, Do)
  • Middle C through High B
  • Create melodic sequences
  • Half-step
  • Whole step
Harmony
  • Canons
  • Chord components
  • Chord progression (I, V)
  • Crossover bordun
Form
  • Phrasing: antecedent and consequent
  • D.C. al coda
  • Fine
Expression
  • pp through ff
Other
  • Age-appropriate audience and performer etiquette
  • Orchestra instruments within the 4 families
  • Age-appropriate pitch matching (A3-E5)

Essential Questions

EU: Musicians' creative choices are influenced by their expertise, context, and expressive intent.
EQ: How do musicians make creative decisions?

Skills Examples

Performing
  • With limited guidance, perform simple chord progressions on pitched instruments.
  • Play a variety of classroom instruments with proper technique.
  • Use the head voice to produce a light, clear sound employing breath support and maintaining appropriate posture.
Creating
  • With limited guidance, improvise or compose a 2-4 measure musical idea, a pentatonic melody, or a rhythm pattern using age-appropriate note values.
  • Create vocal harmony using rounds, ostinati, canons and partner songs.
Reading/ Writing
  • Use notation and/or recording technology to document personal musical ideas.
Responding/ Evaluating
  • Describe the way sound is produced by various instruments and the human voice.
  • Listen, identify and respond to music of different composers and world cultures.

Anchor Standards

Anchor Standard 2: Organize and develop artistic ideas and work.
Arts Education (2017) Grade(s): 5 - Music

AE17.MU.5.4

Use standard and/or iconic notation and/or recording technology to document personal rhythmic, melodic, and two-chord harmonic musical ideas.

UP:AE17.MU.5.4

Vocabulary

Rhythm
Melody
  • Pitch set: Do-centered diatonic
  • Treble clef reading (choral octavos)
  • Grand staff
  • Bass clef
  • Accidentals
  • Major scale
Harmony
  • Part singing/ playing
  • Chord progression (I, IV, V)
  • Arpeggio
  • Descant
  • Level bordun
Form
  • Rondo form
  • 12-Bar blues
Expression
  • Vibrato
  • Tremolo
  • Reggae
  • Blues
  • Timbre: soprano, alto, tenor, bass
Other
  • Age-appropriate audience and performer etiquette
  • Age-appropriate pitch matching (Ab3-F5)

Essential Questions

EU: Musicians' creative choices are influenced by their expertise, context, and expressive intent.
EQ: How do musicians make creative decisions?

Skills Examples

Performing
  • Improvise over standard folk songs using the pitch set: La, So, Mi, Re, and Do.
  • Improvise melodies in a major diatonic scale by singing or using a pitched instrument.
  • Compose melodies and accompaniments to songs, poems, stories, and dramatizations, using AB, ABA, and rondo forms.
  • Perform pre-written musical ideas.
  • Perform harmonic accompaniments using Orff instruments, Boomwhackers, electronic sources, or by any other appropriate harmonic instrument.
  • Notate simple rhythms and melodies within a specified meter and tonality.
Creating
  • Create a 12-bar blues song using appropriate chordal structure and lyrics.
  • Explore and identify musical instruments from different historical periods and world cultures.
Reading/ Writing
  • Write an original blues song.
  • Identify elements of music including tonality, dynamics, tempo and meter.
  • Identify patterns of whole and half steps in a major scale.
  • Compose 4 or 8 measure pieces using appropriate notation.
Responding/ Evaluating
  • Review and refine a composition.
  • Evaluate a performance, using appropriate vocabulary to describe strengths and weaknesses of the performance.
  • Listen to, identify, and respond to music of different composers, historical periods, and world cultures.
  • Identify terms related to form.
  • Recognize and identify longer music forms such as 12-bar blues, sonata form and theme and variations.
  • Identify vocal timbre as soprano, alto, tenor, or bass.
  • Write short self-reflections about his/her composition and the creative process.

Anchor Standards

Anchor Standard 2: Organize and develop artistic ideas and work.
Arts Education (2017) Grade(s): 5 - Music

AE17.MU.5.14

Perform music, alone or with others, with expression, technical accuracy, and appropriate interpretation.

UP:AE17.MU.5.14

Vocabulary

Rhythm
Melody
  • Pitch set: Do-centered diatonic
  • Treble clef reading (choral octavos)
  • Grand staff
  • Bass clef
  • Accidentals
  • Major scale
Harmony
  • Part singing/ playing
  • Chord progression (I, IV, V)
  • Arpeggio
  • Descant
  • Level bordun
Form
  • Rondo form
  • 12-Bar blues
Expression
  • Vibrato
  • Tremolo
  • Reggae
  • Blues
  • Timbre: soprano, alto, tenor, bass
Other
  • Age-appropriate audience and performer etiquette
  • Age-appropriate pitch matching (Ab3-F5)

Essential Questions

EU: Musicians judge performance based on criteria that vary across time, place, and cultures. The context and how a work is presented influence the audience response.
EQ: When is a performance judged ready to present? How do context and the manner in which musical work is presented influence audience response?

Skills Examples

Performing
  • Sing a varied repertoire with accurate rhythm and pitch, appropriate expressive qualities, proper posture and breath control.
  • Sing intervals on pitch within a major diatonic scale.
  • Perform melodies on recorder while reading standard and/or iconic music notation.
  • Perform, on instruments, a varied repertoire with accurate rhythm and pitch, appropriate expressive qualities, proper posture and breath control.
  • Sing partner songs to create harmony.
  • Sight-read and prepare a performance.
Creating
  • Demonstrate appropriate use of legato and staccato in a song.
  • Create a personal playlist and explain why each piece was selected.
  • Improvise, compose and arrange music.
  • Use technology and the media arts to create and perform music.
Reading/ Writing
  • Read, write, and perform rhythms in 2/4, 3/4.
    • 4/4. and 6/8 meter signatures using whole notes through sixteenth notes, including dotted notes.
  • Read, write and perform diatonic melodies and the major scale on the treble clef staff.
  • Identify tempo markings such as allegro, presto, largo, and andante.
  • Identify ledger-line notes A, B, and C above the treble clef staff.
  • Identify whole and half steps of the major diatonic scale in printed music.
  • Recognize the difference between major and minor tonalities.
  • Write program notes to accompany performances.
Responding/ Evaluating
  • Discuss melodic and harmonic elements used in a piece of music.
  • Explain how a performer performs a piece of music differently when he/she knows the social, cultural, or historical background of the piece, (e.g., How does knowing the history of the American Civil Rights Movement affect the performance of "We Shall Overcome?"
  • Demonstrate appropriate audience etiquette at live performances.
  • Write performance reviews of performances.

Anchor Standards

Anchor Standard 6: Convey meaning through the presentation of artistic work.

CR Resource Type

Lesson/Unit Plan

Resource Provider

Teaching With Orff

License Type

Custom
https://teachingwithorff.com/lesson-incredibox-to-the-rescue/

Custom License Type (URL)

https://teachingwithorff.com/about/

Accessibility

Video resources: includes closed captioning or subtitles

Comments or Notes

Although this lesson works best with a 1:1 device ration, it can be modified for use in groups or even whole class composition.

Approved Date

ALSDE LOGO

This site may contain links to other websites or content belonging to or originating from third parties or links to websites and features in banners or other advertising. Such external links are not investigated, monitored, or checked for accuracy, adequacy, validity, reliability, availability, or completeness by us. WE DO NOT WARRANT, ENDORSE, GUARANTEE, OR ASSUME RESPONSIBILITY FOR THE ACCURACY OR RELIABILITY OF ANY INFORMATION OFFERED BY THIRD-PARTY WEBSITES LINKED THROUGH THIS SITE.
Alabama Learning Exchange © 2002-2023 by Alabama State Department of Education is licensed under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International

Design by Adaptive Theme