Prepping for Black History Month in Music Classrooms

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  Black History Month in the Music Classroom

It's as simple as the 4 P's: 

Pick resources, 

Plan how to use them, 

Prep the materials,  

& then Play!

Pick

Picking resources is key to a successful Black History Month in your music classroom.  Think through your curriculum to ensure you're meeting your standards.  Selecting the right lessons can make your classroom inclusive, too!

  • Change Sings is a wonderful book by 
    Amanda Gorman that encourages students to think about anthems.  This is ideal for upper elementary students!
  • My younger musicians love to play percussion ostinatos, so I've taken some of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s quotes and made them into melodic & rhythmic patterns.

  • For a mature & historical lesson to show how music was used to convey secret messages, check out "Follow the Drinking Gourd".  The lesson features the story, assessment, cross-collaborative elements, the song, lyrics to decode & more!

Plan

Simply put, there is way too much music created, performed, about, and/or written by Black musicians to put it all in a single month!  While there is certainly an intentional inclusion during February, Black creators are available throughout the school year.

Prep

Some materials are print 'n Go, others take a little prep such as this Cut & Compose activity for Black History Month.  Scissors and glue aren't necessarily hard to obtain, but do require a little extra thought.

Perhaps your prep will be in the form of collaboration with social studies teachers to track the path to freedom or learn about historical context for a song such as "We Shall Overcome". 

Play

Composing is great.  Studying musicians?  Important!  But there's nothing quite like honoring someone or a culture quite like experiencing the music first hand.  

In my classes, we sing & play a ton!  Orff instruments are wonderful ways to play African American Spiritual songs such as:

  1. Chatter with the Angels - Lyrics, Xylophone Orff, Voice, & Hand Drum Ostinatos
  2. We've Got the Whole World - Read Aloud, Lyrics & Chords, Writing & Math Connections, SEL Connections
  3. Follow the Drinking Gourd - Lesson plans, Lyrics, Color by Note of Harriet Tubman, Underground Railroad information, Maps & Coloring, Decoding Lyrics, Writing Prompt, Word Search, Assessment & Answer Key
  4. Swing Low, Sweet Chariot - Lyrics, Xylophone (Orff), Drum, & Voice Arrangement
  5. This Little Light of Mine - Lyrics, 3 Part Voice & Orff Arrangement, Color-coded Boomwhacker Sheet Music
  6. Spirituals: Swing Low & This Little Light - PDF combination of Swing Low & This Little Light with an assessment.

However you celebrate, do so by educating yourself so that children can receive the best education with inclusivity in mind.

Musically,
Jaime

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