Greetings from the Great Smoky Mountains! My husband and I are taking a much needed break to relax, reconnect, and explore this week. While here, I’ve been on the hunt for new instruments and songs that I can take back to use with my clients. I figured this would be a great time to talk about diversity in our music selections.

I admit it; I live in “major” land. My songs start to sound the same after a while. I have my greatest hits and seem to stick with them on a regular basis. Sometimes

Platitudes are familiar ideas that can be said without thinking. But, when you think about them, most clichés reveal a deep and universal source.

Here’s one: Everyone alive is the child of a mother.

I can’t even describe how strange it is for me to think about. I walk around, seeing mothers – doing the shopping, driving the cars, at work with photos of their children on their desks – and the sheer volume of relationship is staggering to think about. Every one of those mothers is

It’s Mother’s Day weekend. What better time to talk about rules and procedures than when we think about the security of a home in which parents agree on the ground rules, and in which children know that there are reasonable consequences for disregarding those ground rules. Most of us remember those times in which mom became the arbiter of the rules, and we can probably all recall having heard a number of famous mom lines as she maintained order in the home.

What if everyone jumped off a

For the last six or eight months, I’ve been conducting a personal experiment. I’ll tell you about it. But first, a confession.

Deep down, I find people difficult.

To me, most people are, at least at times, unpredictable. They say one thing and mean another. They seem to like you and then they don’t. They’re there for you and suddenly, they’re not, in tiny ways and sometimes in big ways. They get emotional and over-react to stuff. Sometimes they apologize. Sometimes not.

And I also know

The two previous postings with Mary Ellen Pinzino about online professional development have addressed topics like course design and content. Now we ask Mary Ellen to address specific features of her online courses. In particular, I am interested in knowing how an online course might look and feel to the teacher taking the course.
 

Rick: How would you describe the user interface for your online courses and how easily do teachers find their way around?
 

Mary Ellen: The “online campus”

Autism Awareness Wrap-Up

Autism awareness month may be over, but the challenges, struggles, and victories that our children with autism face continue well past the month of April. I wanted to take this time to share some of the things I’ve heard from parents of children with autism and things I’ve learned that may help your interactions.

·         See what is possible rather than what’s impossible. Families of children with autism hear a lot of what can’t happen, what their child can’t

“Be ashamed to die until you have won some victory for humanity” – Horace Mann

            I have slowly reached the realization, as the years pass, that early childhood music is truly our salvation for the future of music education.  Much of what is valuable learning– or in some cases harmful learning–occurs before the child reaches school age.  In early childhood music education we avoid grades and examinations, while assisting in the development of good habits and abilities that greatly

One of the more amazing conditions that I have observed through the years has been the public (and sometimes, private) teaching community’s longstanding, instinctive, and (until recently) effective resistance to efforts to evaluate and assess individual teacher effectiveness.

Resistance Factors

Want to touch a raw nerve among teachers? Ask about merit pay. Few teachers disagree that they would like to be paid more for quality teaching. Few, though, agree that administrators can be trusted

Now, our final area of sensory concern: Vestibular.

The semi-circular canals behind your ear drum serve to let you know where you are in space. They tell you when you are standing on your head, moving in different directions (the movement on a swing, the perception of the movement in an elevator, the sway of a boat, etc.), or feeling the pull of gravity. This can impact movement for children. Children with vestibular challenges have difficulty with balance, climbing stairs, navigating

Welcome to our most recent ECMMA Blog.

Periodically, we hear from writers who wish to submit one article, or a short series of articles to the ECMMA Blog area. We now have a HOME – ECMMA Guest Room.

If you have an article or two in mind for this venue, then please feel free to email Rick Townsend, ECMMA Managing Director, with your idea.

We look forward to hearing from you!

Enjoy your ECMMA Blogs.