The lecture given my Dr. Hammel on teaching music to students with special needs was both enlightening and fascinating. My junior and senior year in chorus, there was a special needs boy in my chorus class. As a high school student, I often found myself becoming impatient and irritated in class. At the time, I thought this was because of the student himself. But looking back now after Dr. Hammels lecture, I realize that it was not the student who was the root of the problem, but the way in which my choral director, whom I love to death, handled the student. She was often dismissive and impatient with him, which is clearly not what he needed to fully grow as a student and a musician.

Looking back after Dr. Hammels lecture, I realize there are a few things that could have been done differently in order to help the class run more smoothly. I wont go into intimate details simply for privacys taste, but those two things have allowed me to see just how important it is that special needs children get just the same out of their music education experience as those students who are able to learn more normally. This is vital not only to the special needs child, but also to the teacher, to the rest of the class, and to the teaching environment as a whole. In many music classes, the concept of ensemble is one of the major emphasis points in the education program.

Making sure that a special needs child feels included in the ensemble, while still catering to their learning needs, is one of the toughest challenges I feel one can face as a band, chorus, or orchestra director. However, that is why the development of modern music technologies is going to be so important to music classrooms in the coming years. These technological developments are going to allow students who have some sort of learning impairment or disability to feel included, which simultaneously feeling as though they are not getting any special attention or making a scene. Often times, embarrassment will hold such a student back. And with various technologies, such as the BigMack we looked at in class, allow these students to participate with much less of an embarrassment factor.