Retreat Workshops

Music Project – Composing a Song with Your Students with Debbie Ambrose

Bring music into your teaching in a new way by learning how to compose a piece of music with your students!  In this retreat’s focus project, participants will learn about how content-rich musical composition can be used to motivate students and deepen their understanding by composing music themselves.  NO formal music skills are required for this!

We will start with an overview of how Debbie has linked music to the classroom, listen to some examples of things she has done with students and then begin composing.  We will spend the rest of our three mornings composing a short, large group piece while we discover each participant’s skill.  This will truly be a collaboration where individual talents are discovered and utilized.

About Debbie:

Debbie  works as an elementary teacher for the Exeter, NH School District.  She has worked with students composing original music for various events and curriculum related projects and enjoys bringing the arts into the classroom whenever possible and practical.  She is excited to be collaborating this coming August with The Inspired Classroom  (www.theinspiredclassroom.com ) for this year’s summer arts retreat!  Debbie is a graduate of Emerson College in Boston where she studied Psychology-Education and minored in Theatre Arts and Theatre for Children.  She produced and directed a seasonal musical production in the North Andover, MA schools for over ten years which raised money for their enrichment council.  She has led children’s musical play classes and theatre arts workshops for kids.  Debbie has also taught vocal performance and musical theatre performance privately.    She has been active in the Miss America Scholarship program and is a former Miss Massachusetts.    Debbie is a singer and a songwriter.  She also plays guitar.   She has toured with an original cabaret act, performed in dinner theatre, and done some work in jazz clubs, on The Spirit of Boston, and other general business vocalist work.  In recent years, Debbie has been singing with her parish music ministry and as a praise and worship leader  for various events throughout the Diocese of NH.  She has also been composing Contemporary Christian music and is near completion of her first album.    Debbie lives in Exeter, NH with her husband John, her two amazing teenagers, Emily 16, and Matt 15, and her two dogs, Bonnie and Clyde.

We have featured Debbie in posts at The Inspired Classroom before.  Check it out:

Music and Literacy

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Historically Speaking: The Art of Teaching History Through Storytelling with Lori Cotter

Do you remember loving to listen to family stories, or perhaps a grandparent or other relative who told tales of days gone by? Make your classroom come alive with local history and genealogies that tell the social history of their home town.  Introduce your students to the art of storytelling and the power of human survival. You just might be “spellbound!”

• Teachers will learn how to become an effective storyteller in the classroom, find good material through reading and research, get to listen to examples of favorite stories, become inspired to use examples, understand that students can control their own learning after hearing stories, and be able to teach students to become good storytellers themselves.
• Teachers will create their own lesson idea through the share time at the end.

About Lori:

Lori White Cotter, B.S. M. ED presently teaches 8^th grade English at Hampton Academy, a middle school, in Hampton, NH. She has been an educator for 32 years, ranging from kindergarten to high school levels. She has published her first book, “Toppan’s History of Hampton: The Early Settlers” (2009 Association of Historical Societies of New Hampshire Award Recipient) based on the stories collected from her great -great -great grandfather. Lori lives in North Hampton with her husband, Ron. She has two boys, Christopher, 25, and Casey, 20. An avid historian and amateur archeologist, Lori looks forward to bringing her love for the past into your classrooms through storytelling, the forgotten art.

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The Art of Math – with Amy Mitchell

The beauty and wonder of math will be explored through hands on natural and artistic experiences. Activities learned will naturally lend themselves to differentiated instruction and a feeling of success for all!