Students using ACC to "play" harmony and melody!
I have set up MyTalk to help students with severe disabilities access music curriculum. This week we moved steady beat to playing harmony. I recorded a guitar I chord strum audio via my MIDI. So as I sang the song, students triggered strumming. I did a set of four strums so they actually had to trigger it twice, once for each phrase of the song. Next week they will get to try a board that has a major diatonic scale. With zoom out left off each cell will trigger one note of a scale so they can make up their own melody. I made nine cells so there is one cell per note with the octave and "finished."
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Hi there!
Sorry to not have gotten back to you sooner. I've been swamped with no pun intended since I live in Florida!
Okay, so I'll try to talk you through this. I'm sure you know what a musical scale is with seven tones and a repeated one as an octave. Well, I set up my parent board to lead to a melody board. When it opens it has a rainbow of colors with one color for each of seven cells, the octave or number eight the same color as number one, and cell number nine says "finished."
I start by naming a folder for all my sounds and pictures for each project. I recorded about a two second sample of each note. I used my MIDI but you can sing it, use a kazoo, play a xylophone or produce the scale in anyway you wish. I saved my sound as MP3 files. If you don't have a sound editing program Apple's Garageband can do it or you might want to get Sound Forge or perhaps find a free on one line if you need one. I used a Powerpoint program to make the colored background for each cell and to insert the note's name, saving each as a separate jpg. After you get each Powerpoint cell full save each individually from File- Save As- when the window pops up look down on the bottom for Save as type and look to the right for a drop down arrow. click it and scroll down until the file type shows as jpg, name your file and put all the picture into that file so you can fine it. I uploaded each picture and sound to my library and then inserted them into the melody child board. I made sure than MyTalk is set so that the pictures don't fly out. After everything is downloaded to your iPad, you are ready to play music. You should be able to play a smooth scale, "Mary Had a Little Lamb," or whatever you want within the scale you created.
I'd love to know how this works for you and how your son likes it.
My students enjoy than and also playing harmony as I sing. For the most simple version I recorded a guitar sound strumming a chord within my vocal range. Try C or D. Upload, download and play! With that one chord harmony your child can trigger and accompany you singing and round like "Row, Row, Row Your Boat."
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