Now more than ever teachers need to consider the emotional state of their pupils before we jump into teaching content. These podcasts by Musical for All are a great primmer to start considering where to begin with this monumental task. In this episode, John Feierabend joins to discuss Social Emotional Learning and how this comes into play with his curriculum, such as First Steps In Music and Conversational Solfege.
“The first role is to help the children feel comfortable, and to learn to interact with each other in a social setting. They need to learn how to take turns, how to share. The teacher needs to be sensitive to the individual differences. We spend a lot of time talking about differentiation in instruction, and figuring out where the students strengths and weaknesses are so that a child who has stronger musical skills is challenged and therefore delighted and interested, and a child that has weaker skills is not frustrated because you’re throwing things at them that are out of their league. Instead, the teacher needs to be sensitive to the individual differences and needs of the students, and that’s both emotionally, socially, and musically.”
To learn more and listen to the full podcast episode with John Feierabend follow this link.