Meaningful Music Learning for Home, Hybrid and School: Maximizing Create, Respond and Connect (While Performing at Home)
August 5 Workshop with Nyssa Brown
We are very excited to welcome Nyssa Brown of Music Ed Forward whowill be doing a digital workshop in August on what our classrooms may look like this fall. If you haven’t gotten a chance to watch her webinar (http://musicedforward.com/webinars/fall2020 ), we highly recommend it. Nyssa has years of classroom experience and a great way of looking at how we teach to help us choose a path forward for our particular communities.
About the workshop from Nyssa:
“Should we be teaching the same thing this fall as we did in spring? What do our kids need now? How can we engage their hearts, minds, and musical skills? This workshop will highlight flexible, meaningful learning that can be done in multiple learning environments. Contextual, strengths-based learning as well as a focus on connection will be woven through the sample learning activities. Come think creatively and flexibly as we prepare to welcome our students back to music learning!”
Nyssa Brown is an international music education consultant working with schools interested in transforming students, teachers and communities through music education. With a speciality in curriculum design, conceptual learning and responsive facilitation, Nyssa empowers learners of all ages to build on their current knowledge and envision new possibilities. Nyssa has 16 years of experience in both the elementary and secondary music classrooms, as well as teaching and leadership experience at the team, school, district, state, national and international levels. In the recent development of the National Core Arts Standards, Nyssa served as a Grade 3-5 sub-committee member. Ms. Brown served as Music Education Coordinator for Minnesota’s Perpich Center for Arts Education and coached teachers in over 100 school districts across the state of Minnesota. She was one of ten finalists for 2004 Minnesota Teacher of the Year and received a prestigious Milken Educator Award in 2004 from the Milken Family Foundation. Passionate about teaching in a global context, Nyssa taught at American School of the Hague in the Netherlands, The American Embassy School in New Delhi, India and in both Namibia and South Africa, through a fellowship offered by the Eastman School of Music’s Umculo: The Kimberley Project. Nyssa is a faculty member of the Kodály Levels Courses at Indiana University and the University of St. Thomas. She has also served as an adjunct professor at the University of St. Thomas and Augsburg College. Nyssa also studied in Hungary at the Kodály Institute’s summer seminar. She released her first CD in October, 2000, “Packwood or Paradise.” Ms. Brown graduated from the Hartt School of Music and Hartford College for Women in 1998 with a BMus in Education and a BArts in Women’s Studies. She completed her Master of Arts in Music Education at the University of St. Thomas, 2008. Her Kodály certification was earned at Brigham Young University in 2001, and she has completed Levels 1 and 2 of her Orff training at University of St. Thomas.
AUGUST 5TH, 2020
9AM-NOON, FROM THE COMFORT OF HOME VIA ZOOM
November 21: Cocktails & Kodály
January 16th: Cocktails & Kodály
Hoping to start the new year off right with your students? Save the date for our next Kodály and Cocktails: Cheers to a Joyful Second Semester!
January’s event will be hosted by NWKE Member-at-Large Kelly Larson on Saturday, January 16th, 8-9:30 PM.
Bring your own beverage, and come visit with other music educators to share ideas and to encourage one another. Our question for discussion is: How do you persist in finding joy in teaching and bringing joy to students in an online setting?
Come for as much or as little time as you can to get some new ideas and enjoy chatting with your local colleagues! Also feel free to bring your own topics of interest for conversation.
No need to pre-register or RSVP – just mark your calendars and save the Zoom link and password to access this informal conversation! We hope to see lots of you there!
Saturday, February 20th: Coffee & Kodály
This month, join NWKE President, Heidi McIlroy on Saturday, February 20th, 9:30AM-11:00AM to talk about Out of the Box ideas that have worked for teaching this year. Bring your cup of coffee or tea, unique ideas (if you have them!) and pick up something new to try this spring!
Come for as much or as little time as you can to get some new ideas and enjoy chatting with your local colleagues! Also feel free to bring your own topics of interest for conversation.
No need to pre-register or RSVP – just mark your calendars and save the Zoom link and password to access this informal conversation! We hope to see lots of you there!
March 4-6: OAKE Virtual Conference
Saturday March 13th: “Teaching with Truth”
9:00AM-12:00 PM (Virtual via Zoom)
Our systems are built upon structures that were never designed to incorporate all into the fold. As educators rise to the call of embodying anti-racism in their practices, we must take a step towards understanding the foundations of a culturally-responsive model to grow our own understanding of how to truly teach all students.
Join educators Kaity Cassio Igari, Melyssa Stone, Ursula Sahagian Mills and Drew Olsen as they facilitate a training to begin an honest and reflective pedagogical conversation about embodying these principles in the music classroom.
Saturday May 22nd: Annual General Membership Meeting
9AM – 10AM, Video Conference
If you’re a member of OAKE, we’d like you to join us! We will be talking about board elections and our new diversity, equity and inclusion plan at this meeting. Non-Members are welcome to come observe the meeting.
(Video Conference Link)
You should also watch your mailbox for the NWKE board elections ballot!
This ballot will ONLY be sent to OAKE members, so be sure to double check that your membership hasn’t lapsed if you want to be able to vote.
NWKE Board Openings
Nominations are closed for elected positions, however, we also need a new treasurer! Treasurer is a position that is appointed by the president. If you’re interested in the position of treasurer, please fill out this application form: Treasurer Application
NWKE Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Plan
Over the course of the past year, NWKE has been hard at work devising an “Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Action Plan”. The aim of this plan is to ensure equitable and inclusive decisions are made within the chapter. Each year this plan is open for review and revision and the current board can make changes as necessary. We hope this will positively impact and shape the future for the NWKE chapter and its members. Thank you all for your patience while we worked on this important task. And a big thank you to all of the NWKE Inclusion and Equity committee members as well as Ayva Thomas, who help consult along this journey.
We will be discussing this plan at our membership meeting tomorrow, but it’s also attached below so that you can read it before the meeting. We welcome feedback from our members: there is a form linked below that you can use to give us any feedback that you have on the plan.
Click here to read the NWKE DEI Action Plan
Are you passionate about equity and inclusion?
Creating the plan above is only the first step in moving NWKE in the right direction. We are looking for new people to help us apply these principles in our organization next year! You don’t even need to be an OAKE member: if you’re interested in helping out with diversity, equity and inclusion work with the NWKE board, please email nw.kodaly@gmail.com to let us know!
The NWKE board for 2020-21 was President Heidi Mcilroy, President-Elect Bryan Van Pelt, Secretary Elizabeth Anderson, and Treasurer Katie Lehman.
The NWKE Historian 