Wind Studies

Our Virtual Beginning Band "Book"

(Value-added element of the Band Program Bundle)

Wind Studies is an innovative asset for a middle school band program.  Filling a lot of beginner book gaps and providing unlimited material for practice, this program lets the director keep all students on task while giving that one-on-one instruction, which is the key to students getting a good start on a wind instrument.

Like all other programs that incorporate the RhythmBee method, Wind Studies ensures that every member of the beginning class is in the right place while the director tends to individual needs of each player.  Organized in "Skill Sets," Wind Studies reinforces the skills taught on each page of a generic beginning band book.  For each beginning band skill set, there are twenty exercises to allow plenty of repetitions without repeating only a few exercises.  Some of the exercises are unison, and some are in ensemble format.  Some exercises are 4 measures, but most are 8 measures in length.

Wind Studies makes it possible for the beginning band to get plenty of "chop time" in every class period.  Many directors who use Wind Studies diligently find it necessary for their students to alternate between playing and saying note names or counting to the automated instruction.  Without such a strategy, the students may play so much that they can damage young chops.

That is quite a change from the normal practice of the director having to stop the band's process every time there is the slightest issue.  Whether it is minor instrument repair or correcting a student's posture, the tradition is that the entire class must stop playing until the teacher deals with that issue.  With Wind Studies, the teacher can adopt just the opposite strategy.  That is, when the teacher must address an issue involving less than the entire class, the teacher can move about the room WHILE the class continues to play.  If the class is not playing when that issue arises, the teacher will soon realize that starting the class playing an exercise frees the teacher to handle those minor issues without pointing them out as problematic to the entire class.