Elementary Music Teaching and Learning:
Introduction to Orff Schulwerk
Spring 2023: EDEL 595, a 3 credit University of Alberta graduate course taught in Calgary
Instructors: Sue Harvie and Heather Nail
This course is an extensive hands-on examination and experience of the teaching and learning processes of Orff Schulwerk. This course is designed for music educators looking to inform their practice and classroom teachers who are looking to interact more musically with their students. As an introduction to Orff Schulwerk, participants will explore Orff terminology and basic music theory whilst experiencing the creative ways of working with music, movement and the whole child. Participants will critically engage with the Orff Schulwerk philosophy and pedagogy and gain facility in it’s sequential, four-stage learning process: imitation, exploration, improvisation, and literacy. In addition to building a repertoire of age and grade level appropriate songs, singing games, and activities, participants will discover ways to instill creativity in their practice through the integration of speech, song, movement, and instruments.
Course Meetings:
Griffith Woods School (7652 26 Ave SW, Calgary)
● Tuesdays - 5:30-8:30: April 18, 25; May 2, 9, 16, 23
● Saturdays 8:30am-3:00pm: April 29, May 13
For more information contact:
Sue Harvie: sdharvie@ualberta.ca
Heather Nail: hnail@ualberta.ca
Dr. Kathy Robinson: kr10@ualberta.ca Please see attached for registration information.
Please click this document for more info on how to register:
edel_595_spring_teaching_and_learning.pdf
The Calgary Orff Chapter is excited to have a scholarship available to course participants. For more information and to apply, please see the following document:
scholarship_application_form_2023.pdf
Introduction to Orff Schulwerk
Spring 2023: EDEL 595, a 3 credit University of Alberta graduate course taught in Calgary
Instructors: Sue Harvie and Heather Nail
This course is an extensive hands-on examination and experience of the teaching and learning processes of Orff Schulwerk. This course is designed for music educators looking to inform their practice and classroom teachers who are looking to interact more musically with their students. As an introduction to Orff Schulwerk, participants will explore Orff terminology and basic music theory whilst experiencing the creative ways of working with music, movement and the whole child. Participants will critically engage with the Orff Schulwerk philosophy and pedagogy and gain facility in it’s sequential, four-stage learning process: imitation, exploration, improvisation, and literacy. In addition to building a repertoire of age and grade level appropriate songs, singing games, and activities, participants will discover ways to instill creativity in their practice through the integration of speech, song, movement, and instruments.
Course Meetings:
Griffith Woods School (7652 26 Ave SW, Calgary)
● Tuesdays - 5:30-8:30: April 18, 25; May 2, 9, 16, 23
● Saturdays 8:30am-3:00pm: April 29, May 13
For more information contact:
Sue Harvie: sdharvie@ualberta.ca
Heather Nail: hnail@ualberta.ca
Dr. Kathy Robinson: kr10@ualberta.ca Please see attached for registration information.
Please click this document for more info on how to register:
edel_595_spring_teaching_and_learning.pdf
The Calgary Orff Chapter is excited to have a scholarship available to course participants. For more information and to apply, please see the following document:
scholarship_application_form_2023.pdf
2023-2024 Workshops
Stay tuned for updates on future workshops!
Other Chapter's Workshops
Using your Carl Orff Canada Membership, access workshops at member pricing hosted by Orff Chapters across Canada.
Find a list of workshops here: www.orffcanada.ca/chapter.html
Find a list of workshops here: www.orffcanada.ca/chapter.html
What is the Calgary Orff Chapter?
The Calgary Orff Chapter is a chapter of Carl Orff Canada and is dedicated to providing high quality professional development opportunities for music teachers. Through our workshops and courses we aim to help improve the quality of music education in both Calgary and the surrounding areas.
Looking for More?
Carl Orff Canada’s new Mentorship Program* offers additional support to educators who have engaged in Orff training, and assists them in linking the pedagogy of the Orff process with the realities of individual teaching situations. Educators experienced in the Orff process will partner with a teacher who is new to the Orff process to co-create an individualized mentorship program, meeting the mentee’s needs in developing their practice, deepening their understanding of Orff pedagogy, refining their artistic intentions and developing their teaching style and profile. Direct and consistent communication will occur between mentor and mentee, using a wide variety of platforms (including online and face-to-face).
If this sounds like something that you’ve been looking for, please go to the COC website, Members Only, P & P, Section R for more information, including an application form, or contact Liz Kristjanson, Mentorship Committee, Chair at past-president@orffcanada.ca. *The new Mentorship Program is not to be confused with the Levels Course Instructor Internship Program, formerly known as the Mentorship Program. |
What is Orff Schulwerk?

Orff Schulwerk, an approach to music education developed by Carl Orff, is experiential and holistic and is for all types of learners, aural, visual and kinesthetic. In Orff Schulwerk, children learn in an active way, where imitation and exploration lead to improvisation and music literacy. Speech, song, movement and instruments are the vehicles used to teach rhythm, melody, form, harmony and timbre. Carl Orff defined the ideal music for children as “never music alone, but music connected with movement, dance, and speech – not to be [merely] listened to, meaningful only in active participation.”
Orff Schulwek is built on the idea that a child must be able to feel and make rhythms and melodies before being called on to read and write music. Orff believed that a child internalized and developed ownership of a concept by experiencing the concept before it is put into words. “Experience first, intellectualize second.” In the same way that a child learns to speak before learning to read and write, he or she must have a musical language in which to feel at home before technical knowledge is introduced.
Through pitched and non-pitched percussion instruments, movement, games, singing, and rhythmic exploration, the child learns of his own innate musical talents in a way that is immediately successful and rewarding.
Orff Schulwek is built on the idea that a child must be able to feel and make rhythms and melodies before being called on to read and write music. Orff believed that a child internalized and developed ownership of a concept by experiencing the concept before it is put into words. “Experience first, intellectualize second.” In the same way that a child learns to speak before learning to read and write, he or she must have a musical language in which to feel at home before technical knowledge is introduced.
Through pitched and non-pitched percussion instruments, movement, games, singing, and rhythmic exploration, the child learns of his own innate musical talents in a way that is immediately successful and rewarding.