Cross Curriculums with Drums Alive

How can a school incorporate Drums Alive across curriculums?

Crabapple Lane is in its second year of Drums Alive implementation. On a regular basis, music teacher Kelly Jackson, art teacher Dana Siewert, and physical education (P.E.) teachers Nick Bellantoni and Forest Johnson collaborate to provide lessons to impact grade levels in the school gym (between 80-120 students at a time). Says Kelly, “The Drums Alive lessons have allowed us to actively engage large numbers of children while meeting Music, PE, and Art Standards–we often add an Art Rotation to the lesson, as we did when students created beach-themed art while others drummed to ‘Wipe Out’!”

Crabapple Lane also uses the Drums Alive equipment to demonstrate Math and Language Arts concepts, integrating rhythm and movement across disciplines while facilitating discovery, problem-solving, and cognitive processing. In this manner, Drums Alive activities reinforce concepts that students have already learned with their classroom teacher. According to principal Margaret Davis, “Drums Alive has helped strengthen our student engagement at Crabapple Lane. Whether the program is used in a large or small group, students are curious, focused, motivated and excited about learning.” Earlier in the year, Crabapple Lane was honored to host Carrie Ekins and Dean Owens as they provided training to several staff members, including colleagues from neighboring schools (who have now purchased the Drums Alive curriculum for their own programs). At the training were representatives from each grade level, who now have a basic understanding of how to incorporate Drums Alive strategies into their own instruction.

The students love the drumming activities, and the teachers and staff love that what they teach in the classroom is being supported actively through Drums Alive!

Cross Curriculums with Drums Alive

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