In the world of education there is a lot of talk of technology and how it can revolutionize your teaching in the classroom. So, we go to a conference and attend a great session about some new technology. We go out and buy a new tablet or some new software, explore it and think "Wow this will make things so much easier!" Then we use the new technology once and it doesn't work quite right or it took so much time to set up it might not be worth it after all!

I think all of us have been through this in the last few years, so the trick is figuring out what technology really will work for us. Just like a teaching style, how you use technology in a classroom is a personal choice and preference. No one solution works for everyone and some technologies will work better than others for you.

With that in mind, this article will discuss some of the current useful technologies available and practical ways you can use them in the classroom. As you explore new technology, strive to be creative in deciding how you can use it. Also think about implementation. To be effective, will it require a lot of equipment up front, such as IPods for each student in the classroom, or is it something you can use in your classroom without every student needing a piece of hardware? Do not become frustrated if you try something and it does not seem to fit your teaching style. Discard it and try something else! If you want to use an iPad in the classroom, find one you can borrow for a few days, experiment with it before you spend up to $700 on something that might become nothing more than an expensive game console. Once you find something that works, use it often and let it become a part of your teaching style.

Software/Online Tools

Today, a lot of the useful technology is available online and some of it is free. Below, we review some of these tools and how they are used.

Dropbox:
Online file storage. This software is free to use and you start with 4 GB of storage. This is not necessarily a teaching tool, but more of a management tool for files. It automatically backs up your files online. If you install it on more than one computer and log in with your user name and password, it will sync all of your files automatically. If you are not online, the files also reside on your computer so you can access them. The next time your computer is online it automatically syncs the files. If you make a change on a document residing in one computer, it will automatically update the document on the other computers for which you use Dropbox.

You can also access your files from any device connected to the Internet. When you make changes to a file while on a computer other than yours, you will have to then upload the file. Once comfortable with Dropbox, you can learn how to share files from certain folders or have a shared folder among teachers.

The three of us regularly use shared folders. We have created some shared files and, when we work on a project or have pictures to share, we use Dropbox so that several teachers can see the pictures and copy them to their own computers. There is also an app available for all tablets that link to your account. (See app sidebar.)

Google Drive:
Online file storage. Google has recently made storage technology similar to Dropbox available. Previously, you had to be connected to the Internet to access Google documents. Now, through Google Drive, you may have a file on your computer to access while not online, along with access while on any computer. Modifying documents in Google is easier than in Dropbox because the documents (word files, spreadsheets, etc.) you create and use in Google Drive are a part of the Google website. They are not as powerful as Microsoft and Apple word programs but will do most of what is required. Google also constantly upgrades their programs. You do not have to buy them or install them since they are web-based.

Google drive and the associated Google docs (discussed below) can also be shared between teachers and are easier to use and edit as a team than in Dropbox. With Google drive, you can share a document or presentation with other teachers and, instead of multiple documents, it is one document that can be edited by several people at the same time. When teacher A makes a change in the document teacher B and teacher C immediately see that change if they are looking at the document. This is a great way to collaborate on meeting agendas, curriculum maps, concert programs, or other types of documents. In addition, there is an app available for all tablets that allows you to access and view these documents. (See app sidebar.)

Google Tools:
If you do not have a Google (Gmail) account, now is the time to get one! Google is a fantastic free service that provides you with some powerful organization and teaching tools. We will briefly review some of the tools provided. Remember that all of this is free and, when you sign up for a Gmail account, you automatically have access to all of these tools.

• Mail - This is a great email service. Not a lot to talk about here, but you can video chat or IM (instant message) with other Gmail customers within Gmail.
• Docs - Google Docs is the same as the Google Drive (described above). Docs is an online office suite. It provides you with a word processor, a presentation creator (similar to PowerPoint), a spreadsheet creator, and a form creator which allows you to create an online data collection form. We use this on our website to collect practice times instead of using paper practice charts. The docs that you create are automatically stored in the Google drive so they are all online with no risk of losing them if your computer crashes. A fantastic way to use these docs is for your program notes at concerts. Sometimes these program notes can be multiple pages! Because these Docs are online, they each have a unique URL (web address). Using a QR code generator you can type your program notes in Google docs, create a QR code for that doc, then put the QR code in your program. Anyone with a smartphone or iPad can then scan that QR code and read the program notes on their smart phone instead of wasting all that paper.
• Calendar - The calendar is a great planning tool that can also be shared with multiple people. You can create a Fine Arts Calendar for your department and share that calendar with departmental members. Then, all members can see the events, add events to the calendar, and see those events on personal calendars.
• Sites - This allows you to create your own website. A teacher website is a valuable tool for communication with parents and students. The Google sites have many design templates available. You can add documents to your site for parents and teachers to download. Google Sites is great, in that you do not have to be a web designer to create your own site. In addition, you can put your Google Calendar or any of your Google docs on the site. For an example, visit dhthunderbands.com, which has been created using Google sites. All of the tools listed above work on any computer, tablet or smart phone. The calendar and docs have apps available that sync with your Google account.

Website Creation:
For many people, creating a website can be an overwhelming task. As noted above, Google Sites is helpful, but another option is weebly.com. There is a free version and a pay version. If you need something simple, the free version is adequate. The only catch is that your web address will end with .weebly.com. If you choose to upgrade you can eliminate the extra tag and have more functions to use.

Google sites example: https://sites.google.com/a/dhthunder.org/dh-band-choirs/home
Weebly.com example: www.dhmsbands.com

Internet radio:
We all want our students to listen to musicians so that they have a better understanding of proper tone and technique. Students can easily access recordings through any of the sites listed below. In addition, you can use them in your classroom to play examples for your students. You cannot control the exact artist, but you have a lot of choice in musical styles. Most of these sites require you to set up an account but are all free. iTunes Radio, Pandora, Spotify, and Jazzradio.com are some of the better Internet radio sites. Except for iTunes, the other three stations have apps for smart phones and tablets.

YouTube:
YouTube is a great resource for instructional videos. Many districts have it blocked at school. When this is the case, to view the videos you must download them to a computer outside of school. An easy way to transfer them to your school computer is through Dropbox. There are many ways to download videos from YouTube and other educational sites. One is downloader9.com. All you have to do is copy the URL (web address) and paste it into a box on this website. You will then be asked to choose the type of file and size. Then place the file in Dropbox. When at school, take the file out of your Dropbox folder so it is not taking up your free storage space. In addition, all smartphones and iPads have a YouTube app that will access the same content.

Despite the garbage on YouTube, there are a lot of quality musical performances available. You can find many solo and ensemble performances there that will help students prepare for festivals. There are also many high school and college groups performing the pieces you are playing and this provides you with great materials for students to critique and analyze.

For the advanced tech person, you can create a YouTube channel for your group and post videos of your concerts and performances. This provides, not only a way for you to share your groups' performances with extended family and the world, but also a "scrap book" for your groups' performances throughout the years. If you are interested in details on how to do this feel free to contact the authors for further details (visit youtube.com/mwinslow12 to see an example of a YouTube channel). Go to youtube.com/user/mwinslow12 to see a YouTube page for a band program.

Musictheory.net:
This website has been updated in the last year and is much more useful now for classroom and individual instruction. The site offers step-by-step lessons in many music theory topics such as note names, chords, and intervals. In addition, it offers exercises for students to practice note identification, chords, intervals, aural intervals, aural chord types, aural scales and much more.

This site can be used in many different ways for instruction. You can use the lessons and exercises in a full classroom with your computer connected to a data projector and, if you have a Smartboard, students can interact with them. If you have access to a computer lab and headphones, you can take classes into the lab and have students use the exercises to practice skills you think they need, whether you have beginning or advanced students. The exercises keep track of how many questions the students complete and how many they get correct. You can have students complete a certain number of questions and ask them to turn in a small paper with the percentage correct for a grade. We have used this site for beginning band students, all the way up to AP Music Theory students. In addition, there are two apps available for iPhone/iPod/iPad that the site has created. The apps are called "Theory Lessons" and "Tenuto" (See app sidebar for details.)

SmartMusic:
SmartMusic has been highly publicized and is a great online practice and performance tool. The program provides access to thousands of pieces of music ranging from method books, to band pieces, to solo and ensemble music. Each student must purchase the program annually and then he/she can practice music at home with a metronome, a tuner, an accompanist, or other tools. The program also provides a recording tool so that students can create quality recordings with the provided accompaniment.

You can create assessments specific to your music and method books. Students have access to these and record these playing tests in SmartMusic. Then SmartMusic grades the test and sends you the audio file. SmartMusic is a quality program with many resources. It does take a lot of work to set up and you can use it in the classroom without students having to purchase it. We use it for playing tests by creating the assessments we want, then providing a computer in a practice room for students to complete the tests at their own pace during class time or before or after school. These assessments come right out of the method book being used in the classroom.

As with many other programs, there's an app for that! The SmartMusic app allows you to access the student recordings that have been completed and submitted to you. You can listen to the recordings, put in a grade and see the Smartmusic grade. The app is available for Apple and Android (See app sidebar).

Audacity:
Audacity is a great tool for editing sound files. It has some quirks, but once you get past those, it is an easy, free program to use for editing sound files and saving them in many different formats.

Social Networking:
Facebook and Twitter have become very prominent lately and many of our students use one or both of these social networking sites. These sites can become very dangerous if used by teachers in a personal way with students. Many states are now passing laws limiting teacher involvement in Facebook or Twitter. It is recommended by many education professionals to not be "Friends" with your students on your personal Facebook account. However, Facebook and Twitter can be effective communication tools with students and parents. Directors can set up public Facebook and Twitter pages that are managed by you as the director. Students only "Like" the page on Facebook and cannot Friend it. With this arrangement neither students nor instructors are allowed to access personal information from each other. Parents can also "Like" the page and get updates as you post them on the Facebook page. Twitter can be used in the same way and parents or students can "Follow" your account and updates.

Following is an example of a public Facebook page for a school choir program. This idea is best used for older students and you, as the director, will need to monitor students' and parents' comments. For further information on how to use Facebook or Twitter, please contact the authors.

Example of a Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/dhhschoir
Example of a Twitter page: https://twitter.com/dhbands

Communication with students/parents
Communication with your students and parents is always important. Webpages and social networking sites help with communication. In addition, email, of course, is easy and effective. Another possible tool for use with older students is text messaging.

There is a great website called Remind101.com. This site is free and allows you to create different groups and classes. Students in a given group text in to a number provided by the site and it automatically adds them to that group. Then, the teacher simply types in a message and hits send and it texts all the students in that group. It does not use the teacher's cell phone number. You can set it to send texts at a specific time or day in the future. There is also an app that can be used on a tablet or smartphone to accomplish the same thing (See app sidebar.).

iPad/iPod/iPhone
The iPad/iPod/iPhone craze is sweeping the world. These are great tools to use in the classroom, but it takes practice to use them effectively. It is probably not realistic to buy a classroom of students a set of iPads or iPods, but perhaps your library already owns some of these tools, or a tech teacher in your school has some you can borrow.

In the app sidebar we have listed many of the useful app, for music students and teachers, and their cost. These apps can be used in a variety of ways. If there are free apps, you can encourage your students to get them on their own iPad/iPod. If you have access to a projector in your classroom you can plug your iPad into it and mirror (show everything on your screen through the projector) the apps for class practice (You will need a VGA adapter which is available in most electronic stores).

Another option is to get some software to install on your computer which will mirror your iPad through your computer and projector, giving you the option to walk around freely with your iPad. The two we recommend are: Doceri Desktop (approximately $30) and Reflection (approximately $15). These are software items you purchase from the company websites and download on your computer. Both programs work well on Mac or PC.

The above ideas are just some available options. The key is for you to discover what works best for you. Though the iPad and Apple products are fantastic, they are costly.

Following are some ways we use apps in our classrooms.

When I (Robert Schmidt) was in my early band years, my band director often had students line up and he listened to them, one-by-one, as they attempted to tune with an electronic tuner. I followed suit, as a band director, but found that tuning with that method takes a long time, especially if you have a large number of students in the class. I spend a lot of time now without a tuner so the students learn to listen, but there are still times to have everyone practice with the tuner. Since every class has students with smartphones, many of them have tuners. I have students help me in the tuning process so that it gets us to rehearsal or performance time more quickly.

Our high school has a set of iPads that any teacher in the school may use in the library. I had the librarian install the Theory and Tenuto apps from Musictheory.net (mentioned above) onto each one. I showed the students in the classroom, first, how to use the apps, then, I sent them in sections to the library to practice theory and ear training using those apps. I made a half sheet of paper listing what exercises I wanted them to complete and asked them to write down the percentage correct for those exercises. I had the students submit the scores to me. Also, I have used this for my AP Music Theory class.

The iReal b app mentioned in the sidebar is fantastic for jazz education. It allows you to create lead sheets for any solo section in a chart. You put in the chord changes, and the rhythm section automatically creates the solo section for you. Then you can export the audio file and put it on a CD or a website for your students to practice with on their own. I have also used this app in class to project a chord progression on the board and this helps with theory and ear training.

The use of a tablet in the classroom has helped with organizing activities, taking roll quickly, organizing percussion/music part assignments, recording rehearsals and more. There can be so many uses for tablets these days, how you implement their use is up to you, based on your teaching style.

Conclusion

We hope this article has provided some helpful information for you. We encourage you to take the first step and implement just ONE new technology into your teaching this year. If you keep it simple and useful for you and your students it will be worthwhile. Technology is advancing quickly. It is an integral part of our lives and will be an important part of our teaching, if it is not already. If you have any questions on any aspect of this article, feel free to contact the authors.

Hayley Winslow: hwinslow [at] srithunderbolts.org
Mike Winslow: winslow [at] dhthunder.org
Robert Schmidt: rschmidt [at] dhms.washk12.org