Assignment 8

1. (a) A melodic instrument is any instrument that can produce a melody. Examples of instruments that play melodies are the piano, electronic keyboards, xylophone, recorder, melody bells, resonator bells, glockenspiel, metallophone and tone chimes.
(b) A harmonic instrument can play harmonies or drones as accompaniments to songs. Examples of harmonic instruments include the autosharp, the q'chord and the guitar.
(c) Rhythmic instruments can play the rhythmic accompaniments to songs. They are divided into woods, metals and skins. Examples of percussion or rhythmic instruments are rhythm sticks, claves, woodblocks, maracas, sand blocks, guiro, cymbals, traingle, tambourine, jingle bells, hand drum, bongo drum, and conga drum.

2. One musical concept that can be gained by playing instruments is that children can better identify contrasting melodies. Another musical concept gained is that children can increase their ability to hear repetition and contrast of musical ideas. Another musical concept children can gain from playing instruments is being able to work in ensembles and listen to others sounds and incorporate it with their own. Finally, another musical concept to be gained is the understanding of dynamics by the differences in the way they play various instruments.

3. Activity: Playing the xylophone while reading the historical story "Pocahontas" depicting the Native American Pocahontas and early American civilization. The xylophone will express the various sounds made by the dwarfs along with the sounds of the environment.
Musical concepts:
.Students will be able to learn the proper way to play the xylophone through teacher instruction and repetition throughout the story.
.Students will be able to recognize various sounds throughout the story and interpret them through the playing of the xylophone.
Non-musical concepts:
.Students will better their reading abilities.
.Students will better their reading comprehension.
.Students will learn the history of Pocahontas and how she affected U.S history.
Musical skill:
.Students will learn how to play an instrument, the xylophone.
.Students will be better at interpreting sounds made by the xylophone.
Non-musical skill:
.Students will be able to read, follow along and comprehend the story.
Procedure:
The teacher will first provide all of the students with their own xylophone. The teacher will then review the proper way in which to play the xylophone. The teacher will continue the lesson by introducing the story "Pocahontas" and will read it to them once through. Then the teacher will have the students name the various sounds they heard while she read. Once the sounds of the characters and the environment are described, the teacher will assign certain students to play the xylophone for the various sounds. Then the teacher will read the story to the children and have them play their assigned sounds when they come up within the story. In addition to playing the xylopohone, the teacher can add to the lesson by having them sing along with some of the sounds in the following repetitions of the story.