After working at a DJ and Karaoke store for 7 years, can’t say I have ever seen anything like this before!!! This is such an interesting way to create sounds with technology.  Definetly check out this video!

According to: http://caret.iste.org/caretadmin/news_documents/StudentLearning.pdf

The answer is YES!

According to the Center of Applied Reasearch for Educational Technology, the use of technology in classrooms increases student “development of higher-order thinking skills,” can increase test scores, better prepares students for the workforce, better research and organizational skills, and a higher level of intrest in contents that the technology is being used in.

This website is a such a fun way to get your students involved in learning about music. Not only can the play music matching games, but they can use this as a resource to learn about music. I think the “Create your own rhythm band,” section is neat too. I haven’t seen anything like this before on other websites, and is really fun to do for all ages.  I think interactive websites like this are good to show your students, because it motivates them to do music because it can be fun!

Here is an article that I found, that discusses and includes studies regarding technological effect of the classroom and learning. Quoted from the article, Dr. Marshall mentions, ”Overall we found strong evidence that educational technology complements what a great teacher does naturally.” Which makes perfect sense to me. Technology is something that can be used to enhance lessons, enhance learning. However, as technology is used to enhance learning, classes should not depend on technology to get through to students. It is a good teacher that creates the efficient learning, and it is the technology that makes learning a step higher!

Here is another website that I found for music students to use. This website would be a fun and helpful way for elementary level music students to learn. The website offers all  kinds of different games, including note recognition, instrument learning games, aswell and an online digital string tuner.  With this website, students can learn at their own pace, and simply for the fun of it.  Through use of interactive websites like this one, students can develop their music skills faster, and can have an oppertunity to learn outside of the classroom.

Today I just found about this program called SmartMusic. This is probably one of the coolest technologies that I have found this year, simply because I can apply it a wide a range of different music classes to teach.

Smart Music is great for students, parents and teachers! Let’s say as a teacher, I want to give my students something to practice during the week. Through smart music, I can send them an assignment to practice, and after the students practice it, they can send me a recording of them practicing the music.  Another cool feature of Smart Music, is that while the students are practicing, the software will give the students immediate feed back, letting the know if they miss a note, rhythm, or make any type of error. I think that is such an amazing feature, because a lot of time when students practice, they never get any feedback. Which once the students can play the music correctly, they immediately know that they did a good job! Then, once the students get’s the music ready to the best of their ability, they can then send to the teacher a midi file of the playing.

This program is so neat, not only does it help the students while they practice, but it also allows for the teacher to more accurate assessments much more often, without spending a lot of  class time  doing so. It also give the students a way to show their parents what they are doing in band, let’s let me showcase their work, and keep their parents more involved overall. Students can send the recording of them playing, to anyone!

Make sure to go to the website and watch the video aswell!!!