What is too much work?

[Music]

I have beginning 5th and 6th grade bands in elementary. I have them take home practice sheets weekly and are due every monday. I use these sheets as part of my grading system. I sent home letters to parents explaining what the practice sheets are and how I will use them for grading. Each student should have one hour and forty minutes per week (7 days); if you count only week days that is 20 minutes per night. I explained that weekends could be used for make-up days or extra credit. Do you think that 20 minutes 5 days a week is too much? Please let me know, I am a first year teacher and I don't want to start out on the wrong foot, especially with the parents.

 

[Newbie]

Depends

It really depends on the culture of your school and if you're public or private. As a general rule, I've always heard that 5th grade should have 50 minutes of homework, and 6th grade should have 60 minutes (10 mins. per grade level). However, where I worked last year, the students had much more than that. You also have to take into consideration how much homework the other teachers give; English and math probably have a lot. Talk to the other teachers at your grade level and find out how much they're giving, and that should help you gauge if 20 mins per night is too much.

 

[Mrs. G]

Agree with Newbie

Our school district does not allow us to assign more than 1 hour of homework each night. My team works together so we don't overload them. Talk with your 5 and 6 teachers and see how much they think is reasonable. The practice time by itself it seems very realistic, but I don't know how much time they are spending on other assignments.

 

[marguerite]

extra

Here, music practice time is not considered as part of the homework time and the music/band teacher does not have to consider it when assigning practice. Music/band is considered the same as sports, an extra. If you choose an extra, you have additional homework.

Since you are a first year teacher one thing you may want to do is to check with the other music teachers in the district and see what they do. If all the music teachers are assigning in a similar fashion then you will be able to more easily field any complaints you receive. In general though I think you will find that parents of children who are taking instrumental music expect them to have practice time in addition to regular homework.

 

[Mrs.B]

I think it's fine but...

Ask the parents for feedback. They love that!

 

[PrivateEyes]

With my own children

My fifth graders taking Violin 2x per week did not have music practice sheets, although practice was of course, recommended. If they are beginning band students, they may not know what twenty minutes should look like, or what they should be practicing. Instead of time, it might be more helpful to say: Scales (5x each), Music piece (3 x each) or whatever.

My sixth graders have had music practice sheets to turn in and 20 minutes of practice per night, exactly as you have described above.

 

[TLC]

My 6th grader

This is my daughter's first year of band, 6th grade, flute. She is expected to practice an hour a week. She has 7 boxes, labeled the days of the week. She puts how many minutes a day she practices and her father or I must sign it, no initials. On days when we do not have a pile of academics she can give more time to the flute and we can always make up on weekends. I really like the idea from the poster who said scales 5X or a certain song 3X. 20 minutes is a really long time when you can barely make a note, little lone a melody! The best thing that I remember about band, (I have no musical talent) was that Mr. Burden was cheerful and band was a happy place. He always encouraged us, even though we must have been HORRIBLE! Art was my talent, but Mr. B made band a safe place to explore where our talents might take us.

 

[Music Teach]

Thanks for the Replies

Thank you so much for the replies you gave me more ideas and some extra stuff to think about. I appreciate it!

 

[M.]

Re

I do not think 20 minutes is excessive! I was in band for a year in fifth grade (a long time ago!), and we were told that 20 minutes a day is what we should shoot for, but if we had trouble doing that, that we should at least aim for at least an hour a week...so 20 minutes 3 days a week. Do you have practice rooms for your band? Do the students have recess? One of things that my teacher did when I was in band was open up the practice rooms during recess. We could practice in there. If those filled up, we could just practice in the band room, although that can be hard with everyone playing at once! The positive side to that was that the teacher was there...she could see if people were really practicing and she could help them, too.

I've heard of many schools using the practice sheets. I think it's a great idea, my only concern is that you don't really know if the child really practiced...many parents could just sign or there could be some forgery issues! I think it's great you have them, but I would also reccommend evaluating the students at their individual lesson (if you do those) on how well they play as part of the practicing.