Tuesday, July 7, 2015

Article Review: "Interactive: Patatap"


Al-wali, A. (2014). Interactive: Patatap. DINA Magazine. Retrieved from http://dinamagazine.com/tech/interactive-patatap/104

Patatap is an interactive website that allows the user to create visual artwork while also creating their own arrangements of sound. Users have the ability to use any key from A-Z to create music, and the spacebar allows an easy transition into different sound sets. Patatap was created and thought up by Jono Brandel and the music group Lullatone. The purpose of this project was to introduce Visual Music to a variety of audiences. This Visual Music also experiments with Synesthesia, which is the act of having a sensory input trigger a response in a different sensory input. In this case, a sound is triggering a visual sensory response. Due to the ease of the website and the instant musical and visual feedback, this site is growing in popularity and trending amongst music lovers from all around the world. (Al-wali)

I had a colleague of mine originally inform me about this site, and it absolutely blew me away! I thought it was so much fun and so cool. Right away I thought this would be such a cool tool to use with my 4th/5th grade music students. Students love websites that they can also mess around with at home. When I first shared this site with my classes, not only the students, but the parents also were trying it at home with their children! But my challenge has become how to incorporate it in my classroom meaningfully and well managed.

With Patatap, there are a lot of opportunities to differentiate instruction, collaborate between different subjects, and teach a variety of musical skills that are found in the elementary music curriculum. I can differentiate instruction by giving the students a variety of benchmarks they would have to meet, but beyond those benchmarks, they could choose how thoroughly they want to explore the site more. For this following year, I plan to collaborate music, art, and language arts together. They could use the poetry they write in the classroom during their poetry unit, and pick certain words to type to a rhythm on the keyboard. I could then talk with my art teacher in my building to see how we could address composers and artists that both influence each others masterpieces. Then to wrap it all up, students could find a way to notate their composition, and perform it for the class. This project could be either done individually or in groups, and I would allow my students to pick how they want to tackle this project. Finally as a listener, students could anonymously write positive feedback to the performer(s) about what they liked and really appreciated from their performance and composition.

Doing a project like this for my 4th/5th grade music students will allow for the students to see how different subjects influence one another and find personal meaning in their schoolwork. In music, there are 11 anchor standards. This project would cover at least 9 of those 11 anchor standards if not more.
















Picture via http://www.nationalartsstandards.org/