“Poetry Meets Percussion” with Clay Fissel

Clay Fissel teaches elementary general music in Dalton, Georgia. He holds a bachelor’s degree in music education from Lee University. Clay is currently completing his master’s degree at Anderson University with a research focus on children’s literature in the Orff-Schulwerk classroom. He has completed three levels of Orff-Schulwerk Teacher Education. 

Dear ACEMM,

The spark grant money for “Poetry Meets Percussion” was used to purchase three Remo kids percussion Konga drums, five 10-inch Remo frame drums, a Toca Freestyle Djembe, and a talking drum.

“Poetry Meets Percussion” enabled second-grade and third-grade students to explore the intersection between poetry, rhythm, meter, and instrumental performance. Second and third-grade students used the instruments in a multiweek unit titled “Snowetry.” In this unit, students engage with the asymmetrical meter by engaging with a snowflake-themed speech piece in ⅝. They then transferred this speech piece to body percussion and various hand drums. This speech piece would later serve as the A section in a larger-scale rondo form.

After the students mastered the speech piece “Snowflakes,” they composed poems and ostinati that functioned as contrasting sections in the rondo form. Second-grade students explored the poetic structure of Haiku and, in partners, composed Haikus about snowflakes. They then orchestrated their Haikus using pitched and unpitched percussion instruments. Third-grade students explored and wrote original cinquains that they later orchestrated using various percussion instruments. Students also wrote four-word ostinati using different winter-themed descriptive words and transferred them to percussion instruments. The speech piece, poetry, and ostinati culminated in a large-scale rondo form.

Thank you,

Clay Fissel