Educational Assessment Methods and the Physics of Rhythm

Pupil Assessment: Behavioral Categories and Procedures

Pupil assessment should consider the types of behavior expressed in the objectives proposed in this draft rule: cognitive, motor, and emotional. These categories involve:

Behavioral Categories for Assessment

1. Knowledge: The student's understanding of the subject, acquisition of knowledge, and development of intellectual and professional abilities.
2. Acquisition of Habits and Skills: The student's development of necessary work habits and practical skills.
3. Adoption of Attitudes: The student's adoption of fundamental attitudes relevant to the subject.

Aspects of Corporal Expression (Blazquez, 1990)

Blazquez, D. (1990) notes that activities of Corporal Expression involve several common issues:

1. Technical mastery and gesticulation.
2. Rhythmic sense.
3. Communicative expressive capacity.
4. Creative capacity.

Assessment Procedures

Assessment can utilize various procedures:

• Written Tests: Unifying the goals of knowledge. These may include multiple choice, short answer, and schematic development of a thematic unit.
• Practice Tests.
• Oral Tests.
• Observation Procedures: The most appropriate procedures include pious observation, performance tests, co-evaluation, and self-evaluation.

Sound, Rhythm, and Temporal Organization in Movement

Fundamental Dimensions of Noise and Sound

Sound occurs as a result of the vibration of a body. If vibration occurs with regularity, the resulting sound is "musical" (e.g., a musical note like do, re, mi...). If vibration is uneven, the result is noise.

Characteristics of Sound

Height or Pitch:

Refers to the discrimination of a sound as serious (low) or acute (high).

Intensity or Volume:

Determined by the amplitude of the sound wave.

Timbre or Color:

The quality that defines the difference in tone color of a note played by different instruments or voices.

Duration:

The greater or lesser extension of the sound.

Articulation:

Defined according to the form and method of producing the sound.

Pulse and Tempo

Pulse is the infinitesimal impact that happens regularly. Tempo is marked by the speed of the piece; it is the duration between pulses. The pulse rate, or degree of rapidity or slowness with which it manifests itself, can vary from very slow to very rapid.

Perception of Temporal Organization

• The Moment: Awareness of the precise time an action happens.
• Simultaneity: Completion of two or more actions simultaneously.
• Succession: Performing an action after a previous action has been previously agreed upon.

Rhythm: Definition and Concepts

Rhythm is a game of contrasts, which may be caused by intensity, duration, or timbre (tone). Rhythm in corporal expression should be studied and experienced first in its primary manifestations.

Rhythm vs. Meter

There is a distinction between rhythm and meter: between rhythmic expression as a vital, creative phenomenon, and how it can be "measured" to be written. The metric is the method used to measure the rate and give it a script.