Melissa Megna (megnam2@rpi.edu): Teaching Math with Rhythm Wheels

Musical rhythms make use of ratios. This class was focused around Rhythm Wheels, a computer program that integrates mathematics with the musical beats.  We started with heart beats and hand clapping, learned about Latino-Caribbean and African music, and discussed the rhythms in some of our favorite hip-hop songs.  Using the Rhythm Wheels students learned how to create rhythms, understand rhythms, and learn how to find the Least Common Multiple among fractions using rhythms.  We created visualizations of our beat patterns using charts and even beadwork, and thought about how patterns we see (on sweaters, floor tiles, etc.) might sound as a rhythm. We related our work in Rhythm Wheels to some aspects of music theory (beats per measure) using "FlexiMusic Kid’s Composer." Finally, we looked at how hip-hop artists have also expressed themselves in graffiti. By using Graffiti Grapher we found that there was math here too!