The Power of Music

This weekend will be very full.  Tomorrow Javier and I are seeing the matinee of Camelot downtown, and Sunday I'll be going to Suzy's for our once-a-month get-together with Kathy.  So I've spent the first of my Friday afternoon looking for examples of different types of music for my ESL 132 class, whose first chapter from the book is on The Power of Music.  The first two activities in the book are identifying music or instruments as in a marching band, a square dance (!),  a Chinese traditional instrument and singer, and a country singer with a guitar, and then they have to give examples of artists or songs for Classical, Country, Rock, and Jazz.  I've put the most obvious choices on my iPad.  Here's the menu:

Classical--Beethoven's "Ode to Joy" by the London Symphony Orchestra and Chorus
Country--"Lyin', Cheatin', Woman Chasin' Honky Tonkin,' Whiskey Drinkin' You"  sung by Nancy Wood     (because Loretta Lynn wasn't available)--We know it's country from it's title!
Rock--"Burn It Down" by Linkin Park
Jazz--"What a Wonderful World" by Louis Armstrong

They don't have a pop category, but since that's what the students like most of all, I got "Because You Loved Me" by Celine Dion.

I'm doing this for my students but also for me.  It's hard for me to stop.  I want Rhapsody in Blue and Seventy-Six Trombones

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eBQWsBiM5YY

or at least John Philips Soussa:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lg3Dz-eMG3g


But I know that if I plan the next week's lesson on Friday night, it'll take me much less time than if I wait until Sunday night when I've forgotten where we stopped.

So...I need to read ESL 140's efforts at retorting to a self-justifying sensationalist reporter with some of the vocabulary from the unit on Untruth and Consequences.  I also need to listen to the assignment leaving a telephone message that my two sections of ESL 142 and my one section of ESL 132 are supposed to complete before 6:00 PM on Monday.  And I need to check my e-mail from my students and eventually respond to their wonderful letters. 

This morning I sent in an appreciative letter to the Professional Development Staff, who work behind the lines, along with my Flex credits from the past year--some of them over-due.

I need to start the piece on "Helping Students in Distress," which I want to be written up in terms of problem solving situations.

But this is what causes me to fail as a teacher.  I want to stop and get illustrations for each of the instruments mentioned in "76 Trombones."  I want to include The Composer Is Dead in our lesson on the Power of Music. 

I get carried away--way too far away.

So I'm going to force myself to do one of the following:

Plan Lessons for next week.
Write up the situations for Helping Students in Distress.