There are hundreds of web sites out there that have an emphasis on music education. Unfortunately, many of the really useful ones tend to get buried in the search engines because either they are very content specific or because they are static pages that have great information but never get updated. Here is MusicEdMagic's top ten list of music education web sites that you can really use!
{mosimage}There are hundreds of web sites out there that have an emphasis on music education. Unfortunately, most of the really useful music education web sites get buried in the search rankings because either they are very content specific or because they contain static pages that have great information but never get updated. Here is MusicEdMagic's top ten list of music education web sites that you can really use!
The Music Educator's National Conference
Okay, so this one isn't buried. If you do a search for music education MENC is going to come up first. This grand old organization is the lifeblood of the music education movement in the United States. They set the national standards for music education that we all subscribe to (or should) in our classrooms. In addition, they put out a great music ed research magazine that you can get with your membership in the organization. I resisted registering with them for many years because I thought the membership fee was too high. I see now that I was wrong. The access to discussion groups and research on their web site alone is worth the fee, not to mention the magazine going along with it.
Teaching Units For Music Educators
This site is a great idea for instrumental music educators. When I first heard the author talking about his plans for the site at the Iowa Music Educator's Convention I was really excited. It sounded like something that I could REALLY make use of. The basic goal, it was said, was to have all of the various pieces of music that are cataloged in the successful Teaching Music Through Performance In Band series available with fully documented and referenced lesson plans and teaching units for use in your classroom. Unfortunately the site seems pretty much dormant and has not been updated in a long time. However, the idea is a great one. I hope they, or someone else (maybe even musicedmagic) can pick up where they left off.
K-12 Resources For Music Educators
Cynthia Shirk has done a great job over the past ten years creating a great catalog of web sites that relate to music education across all disciplines. My only major problem with the site is that there are so many links on one page that finding anything in particular is very difficult and although highly ranked the site is not updated or changed on a regular basis. However, almost any music education topic you could want can be found here. If you can't find it anywhere else, try looking here next.
Musical Notation Systems and Electronic Music Links
You could search all day on Google and not find this little gem. I didn't even know about it until the link was passed to me by a reader of musicedmagic. This site is basically a link listing, but a listing that includes great information about alternative music notation systems. Forget standard music notation, take a walk on the... strange side? Also includes some great links about electronic music formats other than just MIDI or an MP3 file.