PREPARING STUDENTS FOR LIFE PAGE 6
Reading Wonders continued from page 1
Technology
The biggest change families may notice is the robust at-home learning opportunities, which are made possible with technology, according to Ranae Case-Evenson, the district’ s director of elementary curriculum, instruction and assessment.
“ There’ s an amazing at-home connection with this,” she said.“ So all of the text and reading materials— families will have access to online. Students can have self-directed learning opportunities anywhere they have access to the online tools.”
Those opportunities include games and activities that are tied to their daily lessons, and vocabulary and spelling lists that are automatically pushed out, and even the books they’ re reading, Case-Evenson said.
“ It allows parents to be as handson as they want to be,” she said.“ Materials are at their finger tips so they can work on things at home, or if they go on vacation, or whatever the case may be.”
That said, a technology-enhanced curriculum doesn’ t mean the end of paper and pencils.
“ What’ s great, too, is that Reading
Wonders is technology-enhanced, but not technology dependent, so families who don’ t have technology at home— teachers can provide everything as a hard copy too, so they can take them home,” Case- Evenson said.“ The ways kids can learn with this are limitless.”
Already getting started
“ As a parent, I may be wondering,‘ wow, this is a big shift. Are teachers going to be ready?’ The answer is yes,” Case-Evenson said.
Not only are a host of classrooms already using Reading Wonders with great excitement, but also, the rest of the district’ s elementary school teachers have begun their professional development and will continue to do so.
Other details
Reading Wonders will cost Anoka-Hennepin $ 3.1 million, which includes materials, shipping and seven years of professional development, Case-Evenson said.
Because technology is such a strong component of Reading
Wonders, up to $ 2.2 million in technology purchases using capital dollars will be made to purchase interactive whiteboards, Chromebooks and iPads. ■
Champlin Park High School Music Listening Team wins state championship
Knowing their Tchaikovsky from their Chopin paid off in a big way for a trio of talented teens who brought home Champlin Park High School’ s( CPHS) firstever Music Listening Team State Championship.
Seniors Maria Arriola, Jacob Coenen and Kathryn LeMon spent hours and hours listening to and learning 50 pieces of classical music to prepare for the Feb. 5 competition at Augsburg College, which pitted them against 22 teams from around the state.
The contest, which partners high schools, colleges and Minnesota Public Radio, is a non-profit organization that aims to inspire students to become lifelong participants in the musical experience.
Teams were quizzed for five rounds on pieces spanning from the medieval period all the way to 2009. They had to know the music so well that they could identify the piece, composer and period just by listening to a 10 to 30-second clip.
“ You have to be able to identify them at any point in the song,” LeMon said.
During the lightning round, teams heard clips that lasted only two to 10 seconds.“ So in two seconds, you might get two chords,” said the team’ s coach, International Baccalaureate music teacher Sieglinde Grivna.
Other rounds of the competition included questions about music terms, music theory and music history, as well as a mystery round with songs that were not included in the study material, but by composers that were.
“ It’ s hard because you have composers that were born in the same era, and they take styles from each other because they’ re so significant in that time period,” Arriola said.“ And then it’ s like,‘ I can’ t tell if that’ s Beethoven copying Mozart or if it’ s Haydn.’”
To add to the pressure, spelling counts. Which is no small thing when you’ re dealing with composers named Liszt and Shostakovich.
After five rounds, a final Jeopardy-style round had the two teams with the highest points squaring off against each other.
“ During the rest of the rounds you just have to know things, but in that round you have to know them fast,” Coenen said.“ And the whole audience is watching.”
To prepare for the contest, teams were given a study guide with three CDs. The Champlin Park team chose to study using a divide-and-conquer strategy: each member took on one CD and learned it, backward and forward.
The Champlin Park High School Music Listening Team took home the school ' s first-ever state championship last month. From left to right: Jacob Coenen, Maria Arriola, and Kathryn LeMon.
And they listened. They listened in the car, they listened on their iPods, they listened while studying at home. They listened and listened, and listened some more.
Arriola joked,“ I don’ t remember what my life was before this competition.”
Arriola has been on the CPHS music listening team for three years. She recruited her good friends Coenen and LeMon this year because she thought they would make a good team. She was right: They scored 93 out of 100 at regionals in January. The team with the next highest score in their region got 85.
The CPHS team went on to score a 92 at state.
“ One of the judges said it’ s brilliant to score that close to your regional score at state,” Grivna said.“ They were so impressed.”
All three team members play in orchestra, so they already had a familiarity with classical music. But prior to this competition, classical was not necessarily their music of choice in their free time.
“ I didn’ t really listen to it a whole lot for pleasure; I listen to metal,” Coenen said.“ I definitely enjoyed it before, but it wasn’ t like I would plug headphones in and listen to Beethoven. But after this competition I’ ve been listening to it more and more.”
Arriola said she has always listened to classical music, and she thinks there’ s enough variety within it to appeal to everyone, including her peers.
“ If you say classical, maybe they’ ll think of a Mozart piece that at first seems not very exciting, but if you played the opening measures of Dvorak’ s Ninth Symphony, they might think it’ s more cool,” she said.“ But I think most people would enjoy the Romantic and early Contemporary stuff.”
For their efforts, each of the team members got medals and three tickets to the Minnesota Orchestra.
Arriola said she’ s glad she’ s participated in the competition for the past three years, because it’ s really evolved her ability to appreciate all kinds of music.
“ And there are so many years of it, a thousand years of it,” she said.“ I’ m very happy that I’ ve been able to do this. And win.”
Grivna is hoping that enthusiasm will encourage more students to participate in the event.“ They’ re going to be my prime recruiters for next year,” she said. ■
SAVE THE DATE NOW!
Dueling pianos! Great food! Much more!
REGISTRATION OPENS IN AUGUST.
Saturday, October 15
Golden Wings Flying Museum, Blaine, Minn.
• Tickets are just $ 30 per person.
• Registration opens in August.
www. anoka. k12. mn. us / AHEFShoutOut