This project is part of the Black History Month celebration because it supports a Black teacher or a school where the majority of the students are Black.
Students at the small, urban, public school where I teach are required to take one year of general music. Therefore, I work with students who have a wide variety of musical experiences and skills, but it also means that they each come to this class with VERY different ideas of what music is and with wide-ranging levels of confidence in what they can do musically.
In order to give my students the opportunity to experience and create their own music collectively, I am developing a world drumming program at our school. As is common everywhere, our school is poorly funded and in our school district, the arts are a low funding priority. So I'm asking that you donate towards this proposal to purchase four drums to add to my growing classroom collection. I currently only have enough to work with a few students at a time, but I'm completely confident that entire classrooms of students (as many as 30 in each class) will benefit from the cooperative, collaborative, community-building experience of a drum circle. In other words, the more drums, the better!
In the time spent daily in a drum circle, students with previous musical experience will become leaders and those with learning or developmental differences will contribute fully at whatever level of performance possible. Transforming my classes into performance groups will make the common teacher-centered classroom model seem obsolete as students realize that they have the power to lead and organize. And working towards public performance will offer students the chance at working towards a goal and being proud of their accomplishment--an experience far too uncommon for many of the students at our school.
As our students prepare for post-secondary education, whether it be college or otherwise, I continue to deliver my mantra: "It's not always important WHAT you're learning, but you should never turn down the EXPERIENCE of learning. It makes your brain stronger, faster and more agile." When they ask "why do we have to learn this," I sometimes tell them that we're learning this now so that you can learn faster later. I've found that practicing a musical instrument is an exercise in the art of focus and an excellent metacognative exercise in which students think about HOW to learn more efficiently. And ultimately, that is the kind of experience I want to offer my college-bound students.
Daily, we discuss how this kind of focus and intensive rehearsal can help them in math or English class. In rehearsals, we recognize that planning ahead and preparing before we practice often yields better results. I even tell my students that this is the kind of thinking you have to do in college: strategic, intensive and reflective. We encourage our students to consider continuing their education after high school, but without practicing focus and dedication now, many risk losing momentum after graduation. Furthermore, this experience will help my student continue developing important personal and interpersonal skills such as confidence, self-control, respect, communication, empathy, and trust.
Donating toward this proposal will make it possible to purchase an additional 10" (high-tone), two 12" (mid-tone) and one 14" (lower-tone) tubano hand drums to add to our growing classroom set of instruments. We will begin class next fall using whatever instruments we have collected at that point, but funding this proposal now will put four high-quality drums into my students' hands which will be used for years to come.
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As a teacher-founded nonprofit, we're trusted by thousands of teachers and supporters across the country. This classroom request for funding was created by Mr. Kendall and reviewed by the DonorsChoose team.
