Student Vignettes
Casimir
Casimir was a delightful and intriguing student. Learning in our integrated SCIS class, Casimir engaged with music through the special lens of his autism. He was what one could call a savant in academic aspects, but struggled socially, having difficulty engaging his classmates in play and participating in group activities.
Goals
Based on Casimir's stated needs and my observations, I came up with a few goals for him:
- Challenge Casimir academically through musical concepts
- Increase Casimir's verbal participation, in both 1:1 and large group settings, especially through echoing and question-asking
- Increase Casimir's large-group participation, especially through leadership and jobs
- Open communication between myself and Casimir for Casimir to express his needs and wants
EVIDENCE
Verbatim email response to Casimir's father on 9/20/18, which marks some initial observations about Casimir's engagement in music class.
Hello!
Thank you so much for your email. It is encouraging to hear how much support Casimir has in music at home! He is so bright and I have been extremely impressed with his reading and writing abilities.
I have noticed an increase in his engagement when we are reading rhythms together as a class. He tends not to be verbal (we use Kodaly syllables with the rhythms such as "ta" and "titi"), but is always visually engaged and sometimes clapping along. It's great to know these are familiar to him! We have only done quarter notes and quarter rests so far, but will be progressing soon.
He does not sing, but interacts with the materials in his own way. For example, he will stand and wave a scarf rather than move in the center of the rug with it. When given an instrument, he will sometimes use it, sometimes just hold it.
It's great to know he has a connection with The Beatles - I'll definitely make an effort to integrate that whenever possible! Overall, he has been doing extremely well in class, but I am always open to any ideas you have in engaging him further.
I may be trying to have parents who play instruments come in for short presentations later in the year if you are interested in sharing as well.
Thank you again for your email!
Verbatim email to Casimir's father on 10/23/18, updating him on Casimir's progress. Note Casimir's self-motivated engagement with rhythm and improvement in participation. See picture regarding paragraph 2.
Casimir makes musical rhythms out of clay during art without teacher prompt
Hello!
Thank you so much for your note and sending Casimir's card! It made my day.
We had such a great moment in art yesterday - the kids were working with clay and, on his own, Casimir started making quarter notes, eighth notes and rests out of the clay! He naturally grouped them with 4 beats, which is really impressive, and would rearrange the notes, cue himself in ("ready go") and practice the rhythms. I'm going to try to send you a video I took later.
Casimir's participation has really increased. He still doesn't usually sing, but when we try some "vocal improv" stuff, he'll echo the sounds now. It's supposed to be more like a scatting conversation, but I'm glad he's participating in it now. He's also much more engaged in the movement and instrument portions of the class. The only thing he doesn't do is sing.
Overall, he's made a lot of progress! It is such a pleasure to be teaching him. Let me know if you have any additional questions.
One of Casimir's cards with a music pun "Have a Good Rest"
I continued to communicate with Casimir's father throughout the year, both through email and in-person. On 4/15/19, I noted in an email that Casimir's participation in group activities went down overall, possibly because we were in a circle songs unit and this required more social interaction between students.
However, I noticed huge improvements in our interactions, including:
- The emergence of a high falsetto singing voice
- A high level of motivation to participate in the rhythmic section at the beginning of class in order to have the "rhythm master" job
- Casimir's verbal expression that the grizzly bear song was too loud for him
- Casimir's drawings of subjects we sang about in music class, indicating connection-making
- A motivation to interact with me 1:1 as I began giving him math problems that related to rhythm
