Reverberations: Teachers Teaching Teachers is a weekly, online publication available to members that publishes models of best practice from Orff Schulwerk classrooms in the form of lesson ideas, student-tested teaching strategies, articles related to classroom applications, and more.
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List of Reverberations Articles
Working Together: Children’s Literature and Elemental Music
PDF only – The spoken word is one of the foundations of the Schulwerk, so it is natural to incorporate children’s literature into the Orff Schulwerk classroom.
A Three Part Lesson in Triple Meter
PDF only – Experiences, songs, and lessons in triple meter are difficult to find and yet beat divided into groups of three is such an important skill. The Volumes are an amazing place to find elemental material for triple meter.
How to Access Music from Non-Dominant Cultures or “What Do I Do If It’s Not Written Down?”
PDF only – How do we learn enough about a people’s culture and language to honor who they are, and help them to fit into American culture without sacrificing their own cultures?
Shape Construction
PDF only – A movement game allows students to analyze other shapes carefully for differences in levels, symmetry, and usage of body parts, and enables students to brainstorm shape ideas in future creative movement experiences.
Building Canons with Building Bricks
Lesson idea based on creating a canon in duple meter. PDF only
Karga (Black Crow): A Children’s Rhyme From Turkey
Lesson idea based on a traditional Turkish children’s rhyme. PDF only
A Question of Sequence in Orff Schulwerk
PDF only – Margaret Murray explains that her criteria for the content arrangement of the Murray volumes in English were entirely based on Orff’s original German version. She only substituted the language element, and where songs were involved, found English language ones that fitted the same musical criteria as the original German.
Spring Into Spring with the Rhythmic Building Blocks
Lesson idea that explores rhythmic building blocks in duple meter. PDF only
OPUS – Creativity Provides Vitality
OPUS: Orff Programs in Urban Schools was a column in Reverberations from 2006-2010.
Exploring Meter Through Poetry and Folk Dance
Lesson idea that with strategies for indentifying meters of 2, 3, and 4. PDF only
OPUS – Let the Magic Begin
OPUS: Orff Programs in Urban Schools was a column in Reverberations from 2006-2010.
Instrumental Piece from Volume I
Lesson idea based on an instrumental piece from Music for Children, Volume I. PDF only