Orchestra Responding Unit—Proficient Level

NAfME Teaching with Primary Sources Curriculum Units for the 2014 Music Standards 

Throughout this unit, students will explore the ideas of how music can tell their own personal story, determine the story and intent a composer wants to convey through a piece of music, and decide how to express a story through their own ensemble performance using musical choice and the elements of music. Students will be challenged to continually ask the compelling question “What story are we telling?” Students will also explore the idea that a story can be programmatic and suggestive within particular music, or it can be completely subjective within other pieces of music. By the end of this unit, students will have a deep understanding of the richness that music brings to our lives through the varying stories it tells, how it influences their own musical choices and understandings, and how it influences the purpose of a performance of their own ensemble. Students will ultimately rediscover how music tells their own individual story, and that music is part of who they are.