{"id":12200,"date":"2025-04-10T09:25:17","date_gmt":"2025-04-10T14:25:17","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin-new\/?post_type=campus_story&p=12200"},"modified":"2025-04-10T09:25:17","modified_gmt":"2025-04-10T14:25:17","slug":"music-educator-goes-to-to-the-ends-of-the-earth-to-inspire-her-students","status":"publish","type":"campus_story","link":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/story\/music-educator-goes-to-to-the-ends-of-the-earth-to-inspire-her-students\/","title":{"rendered":"Music educator goes to to the ends of the earth to inspire her students"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Photo<\/a><\/p>\n

A passion for education drives one Wisconsin music teacher to extremes: playing a trumpet while experiencing zero gravity, exploring a Teacher at Sea experience on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ship Bell M. Shimada off the coast of northern California, and \u2014 yes \u2014 traveling to the end of the Earth to participate in research as a Grosvenor Teacher Fellow with National Geographic in Antarctica.<\/p>\n

Lisa Werner is not only a music educator and band director at St. Bruno Parish School in Dousman, but also an adventurer and an explorer \u2014 actively seeking out ways to form a connection between what she teaches in class and the broader world.<\/p>\n

\u201cI like to tell the students in my classroom that music is connected to everything,\u201d Werner explains. \u201cThe more connections I can make, the better it is for them.\u201d<\/p>\n

In 2022 Werner, who earned her B.M. in\u00a0music education-instrumental<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0at the University of Wisconsin-Whitewater in 2001, was one of four teachers in the country selected to fly microgravity experiments aboard a modified aircraft that creates periods of weightlessness. Werner\u2019s experiments \u2014 performed in an aircraft NASA refers to as \u201cg-force 1\u201d with her signature purple trombone in hand \u2014 were designed to measure her ability to perform tasks such as keeping beat and responding to tempo signals in a weightless environment.<\/p>\n

\"Photo<\/a>
Lisa Werner floated around NASA’s KC-135A aircraft as she played her purple trombone. (Photo credit: Steve Boxall)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The experience left her with the determination to do more to tap into her childhood curiosity about how things happened and why and to connect it back to her teaching.<\/p>\n

\u201cOnce I started with the zero G flight, I started to think anything is possible,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

A teacher at sea<\/h3>\n

The adventure continued in 2024, when Werner was a part of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Teacher at Sea Program, one that offers educators a unique opportunity to join NOAA scientists aboard an ocean research vessel as a member of the science team. For two weeks in late August through mid-September she worked on the EXPRESS project aboard NOAA Ship Bell M. Shimada off the coast of Northern California.<\/p>\n

The ship uses Popoki, an autonomous underwater vehicle (or AUV), that \u201cconverses\u201d with the AUV pilot aboard the ship, something she wrote about\u00a0in the blog she kept<\/strong><\/a>\u00a0during her voyage.<\/p>\n

\u201cCommunicating with Popoki has a lot to do with acoustics,\u201d said Werner. \u201cListening to her pilot talk about how important the angles between Popoki and the ship are reminded me a lot of preparing for a recital when I was a music education student at UW-Whitewater. For solo performances, the more experienced music majors would always pass on a very important piece of acoustic information to the new undergrads \u2014 always aim the trombone bell at the 3rd exit sign along the stage right wall. Hitting this sweet spot would cause the recital hall to ring, the trombone sound to be dark and full, and the experience to be the best for all who were listening.\u201d<\/p>\n

Bringing the sea to Wisconsin<\/h3>\n

Back in the classroom in Dousman, she used what she\u2019d experienced on the sea to help her students train their ears.<\/p>\n

\u201cI divided the students into pairs, and they had to develop a code using music, rhythm and notes,\u201d she said. \u201cOne would be the AUV, like the Popoki, and the other would be the pilot, and they would have to sing or play to communicate with one another.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI also related careers on ships to careers in music. For example, conductors are like the captain of the ship \u2014 they see the big picture. And on the Shimada scientists were using environmental DNA \u2014 or eDNA \u2014 to collect seawater and determine what living beings had gone through the water at some point in time. In music this can translate to a recording \u2014 I\u2019ll ask the students what instruments they can detect. If they hear clarinets, how many clarinets do they think there are?\u201d<\/p>\n

Werner finds her students are more engaged when she can show them that the skills they are getting will translate to anything they will do in life.<\/p>\n

\u201cWho would have thought that we\u2019d be sitting in Wisconsin discussing oceans and the science related to that?\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Photo<\/a>
Lisa Werner complements her fifth and sixth grade music classes with a touch of science about ocean currents on Thursday, Nov. 14, 2024, before she leaves for Antarctica. Werner, a music education alum, teaches at St. Bruno Parish School in Dousman. (UW-Whitewater photo\/Craig Schreiner)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Going to the ends of the earth<\/h3>\n

Even before she embarked upon the Teacher at Sea program, Werner was preparing for the trip of a lifetime \u2014 a two-week expedition to the southernmost continent as part of a National Geographic and Lindblad Expeditions’ Grosvenor Teacher Fellowship, a professional learning opportunity for prekindergarten through 12th grade teachers to travel and get field experience that they can take back to the classroom.<\/p>\n

\u201cMy goal has been to go to as many places as possible in my lifetime. It\u2019s actually my students who said, \u2018What about Antarctica?\u2019 There\u2019s so much of the world that I don\u2019t know firsthand, and it\u2019s the most barren and isolated continent. If I can find music there, I can find it anywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

As part of the program, Werner visited Washington, D.C., in April 2024 to meet the other fellows. They toured the National Geographic headquarters, got an overview of their respective expeditions, and learned what they would be expected to create in their classrooms.<\/p>\n

Back in Wisconsin, she began to prepare herself and her students for the adventure to come.<\/p>\n

\u201cI did the Float Your Boat project with all the grades in the school. The students decorate wooden boats that come with unique codes on them, and we mail them in. The program puts the boats out on arctic sea ice and, once it melts, the boats will go where the ocean takes them. Scientists \u2014 and our students \u2014 can then find where they washed up to learn about ocean currents.\u201d<\/p>\n

She asked her students to paint pictures of what they thought Antarctica looked like and to make the noises she thought penguins made, recording their efforts. And, to be able to bring her students with her on the voyage, she made a necklace out of small pictures of them dressed as polar explorers.<\/p>\n

By late November, Werner traveled first to Argentina and then by ship on the Endurance, with more than 100 passengers and crew heading toward Antarctica.<\/p>\n

During her two weeks aboard, the ship made stops when Werner could join others in walking on the sea ice, kayaking, or snowshoeing. She also\u00a0updated her blog<\/strong><\/a>, took photos, answered student questions, worked on her lesson plans for when she returned and recorded sounds of seals and penguins.<\/p>\n

\u201cI was surprised when I recorded the penguins,\u201d she said. \u201cOne kid got really close \u2014 one species sounds exactly like the sound he made.\u201d<\/p>\n

Since getting back, she\u2019s been busy bringing what she experienced into her classrooms. She plans the same activities for the grades she teaches, which runs from kindergarten to grade 8, scaling them back or simplifying them as needed.<\/p>\n

\u201cI had the students listen to music composed about Antarctica and do watercolor paintings of what they thought the composer was thinking of. We used saltwater with the same salinity as the weather in the Antarctic \u2014 I know because I tested it when I was there.\u201d said Werner. \u201cI showed the students landscape photos I took when I was there and had them work on composing music that follows the shape of the mountains, glaciers and icebergs.<\/p>\n

Werner is also guiding projects using temperature data gathered in the Antarctic combined with data gathered locally helping students prepare a water-related goal in time for the spring concert, where some of the compositions will be played. Each student will have a poster displayed in a \u201cdreams room\u201d at the concert, and each post will include a QR code that leads attendees to more discovery.<\/p>\n

\u201cDoing these new lessons is like hitting refresh on the way I teach,\u201d said Werner. \u201cIt keeps my passion for teaching invigorated.\u201d<\/p>\n

Werner was recently named the\u00a0UW-Whitewater 2025 Distinguished Alumna for Professional Achievement<\/strong><\/a>, a recognition given to graduates who have exhibited distinguished professional, personal and career achievement, and accomplishments in their field.<\/p>\n

Africa: the next, but not final, frontier<\/p>\n

Werner, who is also the senior symphony orchestra manager at the Milwaukee Youth Symphony Orchestra and jazz ensemble director at Kettle Moraine High School in Wales, has received a Fulbright to go to Senegal in April 2025 to teach.<\/p>\n

\u201cI picked Asia or Africa, and my cohort of 16 teachers was selected to go to Senegal. First we\u2019ll go to the U.S. Embassy in Dakar to learn about the country and its culture, and then we\u2019ll travel to the town or village we\u2019ll be teaching in.\u201d<\/p>\n

To prepare, Werner participated in a 10-week online course about global education and participated in a symposium in Washington, DC, accompanied by the school administrator, Mary MacDonald, a UW-Whitewater alumna who earned a B.A. in music education as well. MacDonald has been supportive of the wealth of educational opportunities Werner\u2019s adventure brings to the school, which has about 72 students.<\/p>\n

\u201cI couldn\u2019t do any of this without the support of my principal and school community and students,\u201d said Werner, who will only have the continents of Asia and Australia left on her bucket list after her trip to Africa.<\/p>\n

\u201cI am so grateful we have a principal who was a music teacher. I know I am in the right space at the right time.\u201d<\/p>\n

\n

Written by Kristine Zaballos | Photos by Craig Schreiner and submitted<\/p>\n

Link to original story: https:\/\/www.uww.edu\/news\/archive\/2025-2-music-educator-inspires-students-story<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A passion for education drives one Wisconsin music teacher to extremes: playing a trumpet while experiencing zero gravity, exploring a Teacher at Sea experience on the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration ship Bell M. Shimada off the coast of northern California, and \u2014 yes \u2014 traveling to the end of the Earth to participate in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":15,"featured_media":12204,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","template":"","institution":[84],"story_category":[],"class_list":["post-12200","campus_story","type-campus_story","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","institution-uw-whitewater"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story\/12200","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/campus_story"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/campus_story"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/15"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12200"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12204"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12200"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"institution","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/institution?post=12200"},{"taxonomy":"story_category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.wisconsin.edu\/all-in-wisconsin\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/story_category?post=12200"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}