General music is informed by a variety of teaching approaches and methods that guide teachers in planning and implementing instruction. Teaching General Music offers a panoramic view of general music pedagogy and critical lenses through which to view these frameworks and practices. Including descriptions of each of the distinct approaches to general music teaching - Dalcroze, Informal, Interdisciplinary, Kodály, Music Learning Theory, Orff Schulwerk, Social Constructivism, and World Music Pedagogy - it provides critical analyses of teaching systems in light of the new ways children around the world engage with and experience music in their lives.

Castner developed this innovative perspective on geographic education through observation of the Orff-Schulwerk technique of music education. This pedagogical method provides an organizational framework within which the primitive elements and concepts of music can be introduced, experienced, and explored, and auditory discrimination developed. The process of improvisation is the focal point of the Schulwerk. Castner suggests that the numerous educational benefits of improvisation can be obtained in geographic education by the process of "mapping." He defines mapping as graphic description, analysis, and presentation in a problem-solving context. After more than two decades of research in cartographic communication, Castner concludes that success in examining and analysing landscapes, and images representative of them, is dependant upon developed skills in visual discrimination. Seeking New Horizons describes a rationale for linking basic visual discriminations to their logical extensions in the concepts that are fundamental to geographic thinking, thus providing challenging approaches to developing spatial awareness, graphic literacy, and geographic understanding. In addition, Castner identifies eight basic concepts which would allow students and teachers to work interactively with spatial information and, over time, with increasingly complex and sophisticated tools and at increasingly abstract levels of generalization.

"Using Technology with Elementary Music Approaches is a comprehensive guide to how to integrate technology into the popular elementary music approaches of Dr. Feierabend's First Steps, Kodály, and Orff Schulwerk It also includes ideas of integrating technology with project-based learning (PBL). It is written for elementary music educators who want to utilize technology in their classrooms, or possibly fear using technology but are looking for ways to try. It also can be used by new teachers, veteran teachers, teachers with very limited technology, teachers with 1:1 devices in their music classroom, and undergraduate and graduate students"--

Compilation of successful lessons integrating social studies and literacy, using interactive learning.

Whether you are a pre-service, newly-hired, or veteran elementary general music teacher, Engaging Musical Practices: A Sourcebook on Elementary General Music offers a fresh perspective on topics that cut across all interactions with K-5th grade music learners. Chapter authors share their expertise and provide strategies, ideas, and resources to immediately apply their topics; guiding focus on inclusive, social, active, and musically-engaging elementary general music practices.