Multiple Means of Engagement

Multiple Means of Representation

Multiple Means of Action & Expression

Access

Options for Recruiting Interest

• Begin by having students sit away from instruments, and demonstrate the part they will be playing. This will engage students and allow for teacher modeling. 

Options for Perception

• Point to a picture of a xylophone as the students play, tapping along with them. Singing the pitches while pointing will also help students who rely on auditory information. Hold up a card to cue the different parts of the song (stairs, door, song).

Options for Physical Action

• Those students that cannot physically hold two mallets and play can either play with just one mallet, or play the drum part throughout.

• Students who are unable to perform on instruments can be assessed on their singing throughout the story.

• Students can demonstrate low to high movement with their hands or feet through movement and gestures, with no instruments involved.

Build

Options for Sustaining Effort & Persistence

• Utilize more than one instrument part: in Mortimer, students play the up and down melody on the xylophone half the time, and then strike the drum to open and shut the door the other half of the time. All students sing throughout as well. This gives the student three separate parts to try and excel at.

Options for Language and Symbols

•  Review what the staff is, and what it means when the notes go up or down. Point out that the shape of the notes on the staff matches the shape of the melody we hear. 

• Review the names of the parts of instruments: mallets, bars, pegs, etc.

Options for Expression & Communication

• Pair students up to help each other move from low to high and vice versa. Students can take turns playing the instrument and then giving constructive feedback in their own words

Internalize

Options for Self-Regulation

• Start with an easily accessible goal (“move your mallets from the big bars to the little bars”), and then help them pace themselves to improve (“now, try to move your mallet when my voice moves: do, re mi…”). Praise each achievement in this process.

Options for Comprehension

• Point out the story cues that tell us the instrument part is coming (“Mortimer’s father started going down the stairs…”) in order to give students time to prepare to play

• Compare steps and skips in music to walking- which is the bigger move?

Options for Executive Function

• Slowly, piece by piece, encourage the children to play both the xylophone and drum parts throughout the story, by adding in the drum once the students are steady on the first part. When adding in new instrument parts, explain how they fit with what the students already know, and give students practice time.