The Program

The Arts: Keystones to Learning
Chicago Public Schools
Bureau of Cultural Arts
Office of Language and Cultural Education

"Diane Chandler [the Director of the CPS Bureau of Cultural Arts] designed Improving Academic Achievement through the Arts (IAAA) three-year pilot program... Twenty-six [Chicago Public Schools] were chosen... to expand existing arts programs and/or implement new creative approaches to the collaboration between arts and academics... The goal of this report is the share the stories of success, provide a guide to schools who hope to set off on a similar journey, and review ways to improve the process, building on what has been learned from these pilot years... [The results offer] evidence about the contributions arts education makes to the academic development of youth."

Click pages to enlarge

My Contribution

I, Amy Novick, was the choir and general music teacher at Skinner Elementary for the 2004-2005 school year - the third year of this Arts program. In the spring I collaborated with first- grade teacher Jennifer Christensen on a project for this CPS Arts program.

1. After students wrote poems about Chicago in language arts, Ms. Christensen and I team-taught a weekly class; the goal being that the students collectively write a song about Chicago. We kept ideas and words from the original poems, but helped the students mold them into lines of lyrics with a consistent rhyming scheme and a larger structural form by using a pattern of shapes they liked.

   Rhyming Scheme:
   ABAB, AABB, ABAB, AABB

   Large Form:

2. Next we talked about the word or words we wanted accented in each line, and what melodic contours we could use to accompany each line. The students took turns adding solfege syllables beneath each syllable of text to create the contour and accents we wanted.



3. Once the solfege was complete, we entered the notes and lyrics into Finale and printed it out.

   "Chicago" Score (PDF format, 71k)

4. Finally, each student was given a copy of their song with the notes on the staff and lyrics beneath. We rehearsed it for a few weeks before walking down the street to Whitney Young High School, and recording it in their studio.

   "Chicago" Recording (MP3 format, 1.11mb)

© 2009 Amy Novick