CORE Percussion Instruments Activity

I think percussion, instruments, plus all separate instruments. primitive, dwellers and striking would be important for a student to understand this paragraph.

I think primitive, dwellers, and percussion would be vocabulary to directly teach. For this article, and especially if the end assignment had a writing expectation, I would use a GLAD input chart to teach vocab and use a lot of realia pictures to best support my students.

I teach a very young grade so my brain thinks about every single word I read with students. Just looking at the first paragraph alone, I see 8 words that I would discuss and possibly break down or find models at least to demonstrate meaning for students.

This paragraph has great context clues for helping the students understand what a percussion instrument is. The paragraph gives a definition and examples.

For my students I would pull out the words Primitive, dwellers, percussion, amplify, and rhythms. I say rhythms because it can be confused with other words which will confuse the idea of the passage. I really like the word Mapping idea because it give the student a complete understanding of the word.

For the word primitive, the students could think of other words that sound similar and see if their meanings have a connections, such as primate. They could also look up the meaning of the words or roots of the words to find their meaning.

Percussion is tier 2 words that has multiple meanings. It can mean both the act of striking the instrument or the actual instrument.

After finding the definition I would show students pictures/examples of percussion instruments. Then I might borrow some examples from the music room.

Percussion is VERY different than someone that only plays the drums. There is a common misconception that percussion is only drums.

Before reading a passage such as this, I would bring in some examples from our music teacher and show a few video clip examples. Otherwise, the passage is as exciting as reading about a sunset and having never seen one.

This lesson would start with various musical instruments. The students would play the instruments to The Freeze.
A list of instrument types would be on the board. The question would be asked, “Do you know what type of instrument you are playing?”
I would add pictures to the types of instruments, asking for the students to help me place the pictures in the appropriate place on the graphic organizer and ask the question again.
Depending on reading level I may sound out each letter of the word “percussion,” discuss the word’s syllables and affixes.
I would show students how to find the meaning of the word in the dictionary.
I would model to the students thinking about and then writing a new sentence using the word, “percussion.”
I may have the students say or write their own sentence about a percussion instrument then share it with their neighbor. I would ask for volunteers to share their sentences.
I would ask the students if they would like to build a percussion instrument and then we would build it.
When we were done we would discuss why the instrument meets the definition of “percussion instrument.”

The concept definition map would be a good word learning strategy.

I also agree with the word percussion being an important word to understand the article. Other words in the first paragraph include – instruments, cymbals, and xylonphones.

I feel there are several phrases in the first paragraph. Primitive, cave dwellers, percussion instruments, and even add some of the individual instruments listed are words they generally don’t see in everyday text.

Context clues are available to reader through author’s word choice

Amplify has meanings beyond music so I believe it to be Tier II

Revisiting this word throughout the day as it fits or teacher can make it fit - we are at recess so it is acceptable to amplify your voice, during fire drill we will not amplify our voices, etc. and during Science, use cups of different materials to test which make the best amplifiers…

Also show amplification (affix)

Students may know amplifier if they are a fan of musicians, etc. so a video clip here

WORD PLAYs = WORD STAYS (in the brain)

In the first paragraph, I immediately noticed the words: primitive, dwellers, and percussion. The last sentence is great for context clues to help identify the word percussion. It talks about drums, cymbals, and xylophones, all things that are hit or banged together.

Adding in arts integration, students could bring something from home that could be a drum. Examples are empty boxes. They could decorate the box. Students could look around the room and find things that fit the definition of drum such as their desk which they like to tap on and also the metal hollow chair leg. Could discuss how the two have different sounds.

For my primary students with special needs, I would use a concept picture sort. Students would compare instruments and non-instruments. I would include pictures of tools and non-tools. The tier-two words instrument and tool are important to understand the text. I would help them develop their understanding of percussion by exploring real drums, Tupperware, pans, or other objects to beat, scratch, and use objects against to make different sounds.

I would guide students to use context clues for the meaning of all these words, then use morphemic analysis for each word. I love studying Greek/Latin roots with kids because they can be so powerful for vocabulary analysis of so many words.

This paragraphs provides two clear examples of context clue types – definition and example.

In the first paragraph, primitive can be taught using contextual clues such as cave dwellers. Also comparing the phrase primitive cave dwellers to modern city dwellers demonstrates modern as an antonym to primitive.
I also was wondering if primitive was a Tier 2 or Tier 3 level word. Another comment was made suggesting that in the lower grades, it would be considered Tier 3 which makes sense.
Overall I think this is such a rich passage for vocabulary development. I also think it speaks to letting children “act out words” to help build understanding.

Primitive, dwellers and percussion are all Tier 2 words that my students would need to be pretaught. These do not have enough context to support my students in understanding primitive or dwelling. Percussion may have enough in context clues if they could read instrument.

I think prevalent, culture, hollow and shell are important. I would use a cognitive content dictionary for this whole article and include photographs.

I think prevalent, elements, possess and hollow should all be explicitly taught.

Resonant is a tricky word, however there are context clues that could be taught in this paragraph such as the words deep and rich.

Some of the tier 2 words that I found in this paragraph are: prevalent, commonly, culture, elements, hollow, kettle. These words can be taught first reading the passage and giving a short explanation and then after reading go into a deeper meaning

The words I would use to teach to my 3rd/4th graders would be; prevalent, culture, elements, and shallow. To teach these words I would show pictures when applicable and to use them in sentences to show the meanings of the words. I would also show photos of the different types of drums which would help students put the text into perspective.

Students can connect meanings of shallow, hollow shell, metal vs. wood by looking around the classroom for items that could be a drum such as the desk and metal hollow chair leg. Having students bring something from home that could be a drum and then decorate it at school could help them connect to “Every culture has developed its own type of drum.” It would be interesting to see the similarities and differences in the “elements” of the items brought from home. Using hollow tube and stretching a balloon over one end could help students Understand “strtched tight over the drum shell”
Vibration is an interesting word. If you have access to a tuning fork students can feel the vibration. I have a hypervolt that vibrates to help tight muscles. Google drum sounds to play different sounds drums make. Integrating the arts is another strategy to help students understand many of the tier 3 words, but also some of the tier 2 words.