Emily Fitzpatrick's Showcase
Music Education & Professional Development
Throughout my time in the Master of Arts in Educational Technology (MAET) program at Michigan State University, I have done a lot of creating with technology and educational principles in order to help my students, myself, and my colleagues. Here, you can view samples of my work from the MAET program and from my classroom. The Music Education Showcase includes a unit plan, a lesson plan, and web spaces that I use in my teaching of junior kindergarten through fourth grade music. The Professional Development Showcase consists of a webinar published for other educators, a web space about student misconceptions, and videos about understanding. Click on the project titles or images to access my creations.
Music Education Showcase
Vocal Technique Unit
This unit was created through goal-directed instructional design with a focus on including principles of Universal Design for Learning. I have implemented it with fourteen classes of third grade students and have enjoyed seeing students make connections between the many singing voices they hear around them each day and what is considered to be proper vocal technique. |
Online Course Module
I give my fourth grade music students a taste of learning online with this hybrid unit on jazz music. I created the unit using the course management system Haiku. Over four lessons, my students get an introduction to jazz music while learning to navigate an online course and interact with peers in discussion forums. They are also given opportunities to work with the course more from home. I was commended on this particular project for creating an online presence as a teacher within the course design. The course title, "Jazz with Strazz," is a tip of the hat to my maiden name, Strazzinski. |
"We've Got Rhythm" Web Space
Second, third, and fourth grade students benefit from this web space I created all about the concept of rhythm. The space includes a non-conventional slideshow about rhythms, an infographic relating rhythm symbols to fractions, embedded music for echoing rhythms, and more. Concepts of Universal Design for Learning are used throughout the site so students can use the space at home without teacher assistance. |
Class Website
I created a class website my first year of teaching, but have been changing it as I have learned more about web design through the MAET program. Over time, I have worked to make it more accessible and user friendly so parents of my 600+ students will be more likely to use the resources I provide there. It has become less cluttered, easier to navigate, and more visually appealing, but it will continue to be a work in progress! |
"The Very Hungry Caterpillar" Song and Lesson Plan
This song uses some of the words most commonly read by young readers, uses simple intervals for young singers, relates different numbers of pitches with numbers used in the song, and connects music to the story "The Very Hungry Caterpillar" by Eric Carle. The lesson plan provides more connections to the story, including a Slideshare with images from the story and use of a "Very Hungry Caterpillar" puppet. |
Professional Development Showcase
Universal Design for Learning Webinar
Along with classmates from my Technology and Leadership course, I organized and helped to produce a webinar on meeting the diverse needs of students with assistive technologies, especially through the idea of Universal Design for Learning (UDL.) Using Google Hangout, TitanPad, and Twitter, we facilitated a live discussion with experts on assistive technoloy and UDL from Michigan and New York. |
Understanding Understanding
A main topic in the course on Approaches to Educational Research was discovering students' misconceptions before they can get in the way of constructing knowledge. A group of classmates and I investigated people's misconceptions about Christopher Columbus and his voyages. Using a variety of technological tools, we compiled our findings into a web space including an in-depth video with our research. |
How Can I Help Slow Learners?
Using Storybird, Screencast-o-matic, and iMovie, classmates and I illustrated points from Chapter 8 (How Can I Help Slow Learners?) of Why Don’t Students Like School by Daniel T. Willingham. Main points include that intelligence is malleable and the importance of praising process rather than intelligence. |
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Why Students Have Difficulty with Abstract Ideas
This video was created using iMovie and a mix of stop motion and live action imagery to discuss construction of knowledge and degrees of understanding based on Chapter 4 (Why is it so hard for students to understand abstract ideas?) of Why Don’t Students Like School by Daniel T. Willingham. Implications for the classroom include providing a lot of examples with new concepts, comparing and contrasting, and asking deep questions like "why" and "how." |
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