C.R.E.S.C. Middle School:
“CUMULATIVE RHYTHM EVALUATION SYSTEM to assess COMPREHENSION”
The C.R.E.S.C. evaluation system has been around for a long…. time. These tools that I have attached (and other similar materials) can be found at the www.rhythmmasters.org website. There was a period in music education when there was a real threat to make all related arts classes take Mid-Terms and Finals, which would constitute a significant portion of each music student’s final grade. Directors were looking at theory curriculum and studying or doing “term papers” on composers as possible ways to fulfill this requirement. State administrators felt that physical evidence and on-file documentation would be necessary for “accountability” purposes.
There is nothing wrong with complementary studies on composers and theory, but who could afford the time? Band programs back then (as they are now) were constantly “scrapping” for every instructional minute they could get their hands on. There was never enough time to keep up with concert performances or prepare students for solo & ensemble, honor band auditions, and other obligations expected of them.
I initially created this assessment tool for high school. My thought was if we had to deviate from our “normal” curriculum, let’s figure out a way that might more directly benefit our programs, like READING RHYTHMS. I wrote a “pre-test,” “mid-term,” “post-test” evaluation tool, and a fourth tool that directors could use in class to show the students how it works and what to expect when taking the “exam.” Protocols and a formula I used kept the difficulty levels of the four tools written even throughout the tool and within each section that the test evaluated. It would be administered to students individually by the music directors within each school’s program. There was a score sheet where that teacher would mark any missed rhythms or hesitations between measures. The student’s final grade could easily be calculated with this score sheet. The school director could keep the physical score sheet on file, and each student’s progress throughout the year would easily be evident and verifiable. The tool had a potential grade range of over 100%, so it would be difficult enough also to be used as a tool for initial “chair placement” in an ensemble. If a student lost full credit in three consecutive measures at any point in the evaluation, the exam would be over and the student’s grade calculated from that point. In this way, the teacher would not have to sit and listen to the performer “struggle through” the entire range of the tool if it was obviously beyond their ability level.
I am not attaching any of the additional materials I wrote, but only the basic four high school evaluation tools I created. Although (for a while) it looked like final exams were going to be mandated at the state level, somehow our music programs “dodged the bullet,” and our state administrators selected some other area or group to “pick on” and mess up. My goal was to get the tool ready and field test it, just in case. I spent a lot of time working on these tools and still can see a lot of possible applications that might be useful to a director and their program. Feel free to use them if you think they might help. As always, your feedback and input would be greatly appreciated.
Sincerely,
Rich Moon
“Habits 15” Unit Overview:
Three years before Scott Rush and I began working on the first (blue) “Habits of a Successful Musician” high school method book, we began working on a middle school book. It was a follow-up “year #2” book designed to coincide with repertoire with a counting-based emphasis. Its format was “cumulative” in nature having all of Scott’s warm-ups on the same page ordered sequentially at the beginning of each unit. It followed a “rhythm vocabulary” unit format similar to the “Rhythm Masters” series (with some modifications) which is displayed to you on the attached sheets (PDFs) below. Some other unique features included leveled rhythm categories of “cadet”, “mastery” and “honors” throughout each unit which could also be combined. This also allowed directors to differentiate student performance levels and at the same time promote different degrees of “independent part playing” challenges. Each unit also included a “Composer’s Corner” section. This featured a duet, trio, or quartet arrangement(s) of famous works by well-known composers. The rhythm vocabulary of each unit was highlighted in the first part of each arrangement and represented in the others reinforcing the featured rhythms presented in each unit. Each part was individually “leveled” sequentially and all parts were written in every book. The director could have everyone play part one (which featured the melody) or break the ensemble into two or more parts. These could be played by the full ensemble or as duets, trios, or quartets featuring individual students.
There were other unique features included in the “Habits 15” (titled for the 15 units the rhythm vocabulary was broken down into) including “Reading Key Signature” studies and other “Extras”. As an addendum, four middle school “C.R.E.S.C.” rhythm reading assessment tools were created. These are the four tools that are featured in this middle school section. Our thought was to give directors the option of using “pre”, “mid.” and “post” rhythm evaluation tools to measure their student’s sight reading skills throughout the school year. The fourth tool could be used during band class to get the students used to the format and minimize their score improvement based on experience using the tool itself. Each tool is different in its rhythm content, but you will notice the difficulty levels are fairly consistent and the same measures in each tool, coincide with the rhythms being featured in the same units throughout the entire book. This helps the director target weak areas when planning out their rhythm curriculum, or to target specific rhythms one might be using in future repertoire.
Scott and I spent almost three years writing this version of the “Habits” book and at the last minute (at Mid-West), the summer it was to go to print, GIA pulled the plug on it. The reason given for their “cold feet” was that (at that time) Scott was a high school director and I was an elementary music teacher. They were nervous about their marketing and not having an established middle school director on board as one of the authors. Scott, “on the fly” pitched a new book that he claimed we had been preparing based on the curriculum, warm-ups, and sight reading etudes he was using with the Wando program. They said “Great! Let’s do that instead” and then three years after that, the “Habits of a Successful Musician” (as you know it) appeared. Later they brought in Jeff Scott and Emily Wilkinson to initially do their middle school “read” book and then all of us collaborated on the “yellow” method book for middle school. As things worked out, it was probably the best call GIA could have made. Scott and I were planning on just resubmitting our original middle school “Habits” book, however, with the success of the original high school version, GIA insisted that we follow the exact same format. I personally felt that that were a lot of advantages to the original middle school book, one of the biggest, not needing to turn pages several times to get to the different “warm-up” sections. Who knows, maybe GIA will bring some of them back at some point in time.