My name is Ginny Capps, and based on what the state of South Carolina says, I have been teaching for one year. I attended East Carolina University and graduated in 2001 with a Bachelor of Music in Music Therapy and a Bachelor of Music in Performance (Flute). After graduation, I did a six month internship in music therapy at Florida State Hospital in Chattahoochee, FL. After my internship, I began working as a music therapist at a psychiatric hospital in Anderson, SC. Between then and now, I have had many jobs including activity director at a nursing and rehabilitation facility, admissions director at a nursing and rehabilitation facility, full time mother, and medical transcriptionist.
My husband is a high school band director, and I was always jealous of his summers off (though he does enough work during the school year that he deserves more than the summer off)! After having our daughter, I decided that I wanted to teach, too. Why not teach music, work with children, and have paid vacations? I was able to get a part time job teaching K-2 music at a private school and loved every minute of it. I was only able to teach for the year there as they wanted someone with an education degree. I also taught music to K-1 students at my church. So, I made up my mind at that point to go back to school so that I could have a teaching license. I chose to go to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill to get my Master of Arts in Teaching. After a long and hard year of graduate school, I was done and ready to teach!
Unfortunately, God had different plans for me! My husband had already moved to Myrtle Beach, SC while I was completing my masters, and I was unable to find a job in his county the next year. I became a long term elementary music substitute in Southport, NC during the fall and then a long term substitute at my husband's school in the spring. That substitute position had nothing to do with music or elementary students (which I love). The next school year, I got a job teaching at McDonald Elementary School in Georgetown, SC. That is where I still am!
While I can (and do) complain about my job, I love it! I love working with children and teaching music! I enjoy using my music therapy background as much as I can, though I wish I could do more with it. Maybe as I progress in my teaching, I will be able to do more.
As a new teacher, I am struggling with what path to take to teach music--Kodaly, Orff, Feierabend.... At this point, I am following the Feierabend First Steps and Conversational Solfege method. I have really enjoyed teaching this way, and the students seem to be understanding the music much better.
I am hoping that this blog will be a way for me to tell others about what I do on a regular basis at my school. I know there are many teachers following the Feierabend method, but I haven't found many (or any) blogs, so I decided why not start one? I have been following many Kodaly method teachers this past year and gotten a lot of great ideas from them that I hope to incorporate as much as I can in my teaching. I am hoping to start a Teachers Pay Teachers store some time this year as well. I will see how it goes!
Thanks for reading my blog, and let me know what you would be interested in reading about!
