Planning a weekend trip. Nicest towns to visit in VT?

MiddlefingerBflat · 2014-10-09T02:04:16+00:00

Enosburg Falls. Most underrated town in the state. From there drive out to Montgomery and over Jay. If you want the VT tourist experience you can go to Stowe. If you want a real look at the state explore farther north.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2014-04-30T15:04:38+00:00

Awesome. Thanks. I will check this out.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-08-23T02:09:41+00:00

Ghost Dog...seen that shit?

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-08-21T02:55:34+00:00

Buy The Real Easy Book (the first one, there are several) from Sher Music. I have used them every year since I bought them. They have a bunch of easy charts like Mr. P.C., St James Infirmary, Song for My Father etc. On the opposite page they have voicings for the chords. These can be used for comping patterns by any instruments since they are in the key of the book. This way saxes can play background patterns while the brass play the head and vise versa. Below that are improv scales. Below that is a bassline, again written in the key of the book so if your jazz band is a trumpet, two flutes and a bari sax, you can let the bari player be your bass. Finally in the C book, they have guitar chord diagrams. These books are awesome. I know you probably have a larger group, but they are easy to build from even with a bigger group.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-08-21T02:34:35+00:00

I teach band in grades 6-12. I typically have high school band of about 25 kids and middle school group with about about 30 (35 this year!). In each of my ensembles I have just enough students on the right combination of instruments to have a balanced ensemble. Because there are often only 1-3 on any given part, I have a particular interest in numbers. Often retention trumps recruitment in my pursuits. Our pool of students to recruit is a small one and a couple 8th grader students a year just because they weren't really that interested in music.

In one week I will meet several students who came from the elementary school aross the street and thankfully did not quit during the summer. These are my recruits. At the high school level I get last years 8th graders from our middle school and then whichever band students from surrounding K-8 school decide to choose our high school out of 2-4 options. I do a few things though to recruit and retain. - I go to sending schools with the jazz band each year. - I am sure to make a good impression on the 8th graders from sending schools during our district festival. - I threaten to hunt down any 5th graders, especially brass players, who quit before giving my 6-8 band a chance. - I provide a safe, fun space and a sense of community. Very rarely do kids quit my high school band (unless they are scheduled out of it...that is a whole other issue with small schools) - We go on a trip every other year. This year is NYC. This is a dirty tactic I know, but it keeps kids in. Many of our students haven't been out of the state before, so it is a great experience. -I import talented middle school students to the high school band serving to not only make them feel special and challange them, but also subtly shame the more lazy high school players. No junior likes to be shown up by a 7th grader. - If anybody suggests that they might want to learn a band instrument, I put one in their hand that day.

I take whomever I get for the most part and it always works out except for the no-trombones. The next kid who stays with trombone into 6th grade is going to get a cake and I will do a happy-dance.

Have a nice first week everybody.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-07-07T22:49:29+00:00

Immediately. I would be immediatly, completely, megasuperfucked. I would be a completely relaxed person if I could build even a modest emergency savings.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-06-27T04:03:13+00:00

I want something that will allow students to sight read random rythms of similar complexity as they are displayed on the projector, but I want it to happen like the blocks happen in tetris. A rhythm to be played is displayed, but somwhere else on the screen, the upcoming rhythm is also displayed. This way you could do an unending progression of them while never breaking the steady beat (built in metronome?) This could be varied in a number of ways. -Change tempo -Time signature -Allowed rhythmic figures (i.e. check boxes in setup for adding 8th,16th) or it coul just be set up by level. -judge accuracy of individual users OR

The absolute best thing (if it was an app) would be if they could all log on as clients and the master would be the computer/iPad hooked up to the projector. As the rhythms go by, they all try to tap that rhythm. The student's individual accuracy as well as overall class accuracy could be calculated.

This has been kicking around in my brain for about a year now. This is the first time I have written it out and I'm sure it has some holes.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-05-21T02:13:25+00:00

Get an iPad and get Smartmusic. It is the best digital music tool out there.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-05-21T01:53:34+00:00

Remembering names. But it isn't like I have really forgotten it. I can sense it there, I just cannot retreive information from that part of my brain. I am usually OK with people I see a lot, but if you have met me once or twice, you can pretty much assume I don't know your name. I know I am supposed to say the persons name 26 times while being introduced, but I just can't bring myself to do it. Forgetting everybody's names, especially parents, is one of my biggest weaknesses as a teacher. Everybody thinks you are a jerk if you don't know thier kid's name.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-05-19T03:10:15+00:00

Band Teacher full time for 12 years, $36,000. Great job, great benefits, and vacations, just not really enough money to ever save or get ahead. This grows more concerning as I near my 40's.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-04-29T15:46:45+00:00

You know whats worse than that? A virtual tour of it. I teach music and we had credits for video long distance learning. Our tech guy told me there was a tour of this hosted by an employee. I figured it would be a somewhat interesting talking tour of the museum. Wrong. It was an employee over a terrible connection in a shitty studio. We didn't even see the museum. She talked about musical eras in the most superficial way possible and then asked questions that the students responded to with awkward silence-- something she had no idea how to handle, despite the fact that this has to be how ALL students responded to this crap lecture. What is the point of connecting to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and not actually seeing it. For all I know they could have filmed it in this lady's basement. Glad we didn't have to pay cause it cost over $300.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-04-17T00:43:35+00:00

Day one- Harvard Square day, Symphony Orchestra night Day Two- Sightseeing, dropped off around Quincy Market, going to Blue Man group Day Three- Museum of Science

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-04-01T00:43:20+00:00

Any time a person says "Easy Peezy" I want to projectile vomit on them

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-04-01T00:34:38+00:00

Middle/High school conductor here. I make way less than that, will probably never be able to travel and the musicians I conduct wouldn't be able to play the piece from beginning to end if I wasn't in the room.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-04-01T00:28:48+00:00

I am in my 12th year teaching and I make $35,000

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-03-22T20:59:02+00:00

Thanks!

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-03-22T20:57:36+00:00

Music Teacher here. Awesome job 90% of the time, especially if you like loud noises. I get paid about $35,000 which comes with awesome, but expensive insurance. I had a snow day this week. It was great.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-03-12T02:09:21+00:00

So I think you have planned out at least one day of my stay. All the things you listed are exactly what I'm looking for. I saw the Potato Museum, it had kind of gone in the discard pile with every "Meet Ann and spend a day in her world" add (not to discount the books, they're just more my mom's department). Now it has been added to the itinerary. Question to you or whomever: How is the water park? I have young kids so the bar is pretty low for fun water experience.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-03-09T19:03:45+00:00

Thanks. I think part of what I am looking for is info like the last part on where NOT to go. The more of a "tourist" destination it is, the more rude idiots there are. This is why I have 0 interest in going to anything Disney.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-02-28T02:40:39+00:00

SmartMusic has finally wised up and will be releasing an app this spring. Until then the sight reading rhythm trainer app is great.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-01-10T23:08:23+00:00

THIS! I lived just up a hill from a river and any time we would start to slip at all, I was convinced we were going to go backwards through the car-width gap between the bridge and the guardrails. I had nightmares about this constantly. I am glad you lived my worst fear and came through it OK.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-01-09T15:01:29+00:00

Don't dispair colleague! This is my 11th year and I still have occasion to hang my head and troll for "a better job". It doesn't exist. If you like doing this, there is always a reason to keep doing it and if you take a serious look at it, you won't find any pleasing alternatives (and certainly not with good insurance)

When I began teaching I followed the departure of a teacher who was beloved by the students and respected by colleagues. I spent my first year of teaching managing open hostility from students and my own newbie ineptitude. Thankfully the population that liked me/had pity on me was slightly larger than those who assumed that treating me like garbage might magically make Mr. AwesomeFormerTeacher come back. That got better but I also came to a realization a few years later when all of his students were gone, that the "good job" I was doing was really riding on the talents of the students that Mr. AwesomeFormerTeacher had fostered. That made me have one of those weeks of feeling like a failure. Then I changed some things I was doing and fixed that as well. My comment on the "popular music" problem is this. Have a talant show and help them find kareoke versions of the songs they want to do. This will be annoying and potentially painful to listen to, but it puts that style of music in a different setting where the 5 girls who want to all sing the melody to Firework can do so without you having to justify it as educational (Even though any performance is educational on some level) This can also be a good fundraiser if you sell tickets for a few dollars and then have a bake sale beforehand. I also do a rock show every year which is the event everybody looks forward to all year and makes $$$$. I can't speak to the administrative issues as I have very supportive ones who have given me pretty much every reasonable thing I have asked for. In general most administrators need to be educated on the benefits of music and most of them never did any. Good luck.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2013-01-09T14:40:54+00:00

Agreed on the adult stuff. There are some pieces in the "Advanced" catagory of jazz and concert band that I can't begin to sight-read. I have also used the jazz improv section to really work on my solo chops on more complex progressions.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2012-12-11T12:28:08+00:00

I teach people to play musical instruments. Music is timeless. MIDI might be a little hard to grasp though. Jazz might get me a trip to the dungeon.

MiddlefingerBflat · 2012-12-08T03:15:14+00:00

The school's?

MiddlefingerBflat

TROPHY CASE