Course: MUS 156 Music Theory I · Kenosis College
Instructor: Professor Hemsworth
Unit: Learning Unit 6 of 16 (Week 6) · two sessions per week
Objectives: SLO 3 · SLO 7

This file holds two pieces: (A) the Week 6 Overview page ("Start Here") and (B) the Welcome Announcement that posts when the module opens. All timing is relative — "Week N" language throughout.

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(A) Week 6 Overview — Start Here

Welcome to Unit 6: Intervals I

This is your home base for the unit. Read it first, then work the checklist below from top to bottom. Everything on it is linked inside this module.

You've been measuring musical distances by ear your whole playing life — it's how you harmonize, how you catch a wrong note, how you find the next phrase. This unit gives every one of those distances its full name: quality plus size — a major third, a perfect fifth, M3, P5. The method is two rulers used in strict order: letters give the size, half steps give the quality. It's a small system, and everything after the midterm — chords, harmony, voice leading, the whole back half of the course — is built directly on top of it.

The unit's big question

"Every pair of notes has a distance, and that distance has a first and last name. How do you measure it — and why do you need two rulers instead of one?"

By the end of this unit, you can…

Use this as a checklist. If you can do all five out loud, the quiz will feel like confirmation.

• [ ] Find any interval's size by counting letter names, both ends included — with accidentals ignored completely.
• [ ] Find its quality from the half-step count, applied second — and explain why C4 up to E♯4 is an augmented third, never a perfect fourth.
• [ ] Keep the two families straight: unisons/fourths/fifths/octaves take perfect; seconds/thirds/sixths/sevenths take major or minor.
• [ ] Spell a named interval above or below any note — letters first in both directions — using the major scale as your interval bank.
• [ ] Invert any interval by rule: sizes sum to 9; M↔m, A↔d, P↔P.

What to do this unit, in order

The table below lists the unit's items in working order, with points and due dates.

#	Do this	Type	Points	Due
1	Read the Week 6 chapter — the two-ruler method, the families, the E♯ trap, inversion, and spelling downward	Chapter (ungraded prep)	—	Before the first session if you can
2	Browse the Readings & Resources links that interest you	Prep (ungraded)	—	Alongside class
3	Tutorial 6 — Intervals I (AI tutor + audit) — your chatbot teaches, you learn, then you audit it; from this unit on, the audit runs on your own arithmetic, no printed answer sheet	Tutorial · graded	10	before Week 6's second session — before the studio, which builds on it
4	Studio 6 — "Sound to name" — in class, session 2: sing the gaps, name them, and build the hook-bank card you'll use all term	Studio · graded in session	20	In session, Week 6's second session (async make-up at full credit by the end of Week 6)
5	Practice 6 (AI coach) — six quick reps before the quiz	Practice · graded (completion)	5	the end of Week 6
6	Quiz 6 — Intervals I — 10 questions, 15-minute timer, one attempt, closed to AI	Quiz · graded	10	the end of Week 6
7	Discussion 6 — "The Leap You Already Sing" — a dialogue with your AI about one leap from your own music; post the summary + share link (that post is the whole submission)	Discussion · graded	10	the end of Week 6
8	Assignment 6 — "Spell It Both Ways" — twenty problems: name it, build it up, build it down, flip it; the coach's report (score on line 1) + share link	Assignment · graded	100	the end of Week 6

Also opening with this week's second session: the whole midterm family

The unit-8 midterm's support materials release with this week's second session — the study guide, the exam-prep tutorial, and a practice exam (0 points, unlimited attempts). That's deliberately early, and here's the shape of the calendar behind it: midterm week has exactly one class meeting — the exam takes it, and Week 7's second session carries the big cumulative review. Review that spreads across three weeks beats review crammed into one evening before a one-meeting week. Nothing is due from the family this week; just open the practice exam once this weekend and see where you stand. The midterm is Foundations' finish line — the certification that units 1–7 are yours — and there is nothing on it we won't have named together.

The late-work policy is in the syllabus.

How to succeed this unit

• Run the rulers in order, every time. Letters give the size; half steps give the quality; the second ruler never overrules the first. Every trap this unit sets — and every trap your chatbot falls into — comes from skipping ruler one.
• Say full names. "A sixth" is half a name; m6 is a name. On the quiz, in the assignment, and on the bandstand, quality + size or it doesn't count.
• Lean on the scale you already own. Do up to every degree of a major scale is major or perfect — that's a spelling machine for seven intervals in fifteen keys, free, from unit 4.
• Watch the two downward traps: the letter trap (A♭4, never G♯4, when the letters committed to A) and the octave trap (the B/C boundary works going down too).
• Do the tutorial before the second session. The studio assumes it; the pre-studio deadline is the one mid-week deadline this course ever asks of you, and it's the same every week.

You've had the ear for years. This week it gets the names — and from here on, the names start stacking into chords.

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(B) Welcome Announcement — Week 6

Release: posts on the module's opening day (drip — not before). Ships workflow_state=active with side_comment discussion; see placement block.

Subject: Unit 6 — every gap gets a name (and the midterm family opens with the second session)

Hi everyone,

Quick experiment before you read another word: sing the first two notes of Amazing Grace, then the first big jump of the Twinkle tune. You just produced two different musical distances, accurately, from memory. You've been doing that for years. This unit hands you the names: intervals — a major third, a perfect fifth, a minor sixth — measured with two rulers used in strict order. Letters give the size. Half steps give the quality. That's the whole system, and it runs everything we build after the midterm.

This unit — Intervals I — three things not to miss:

1. Tutorial 6 is due before the second session (before Week 6's second session) — and it comes with a promotion. From this unit on, the AI-audit step has no printed answer sheet: you check the tutor with your own two-ruler arithmetic. Intervals happen to be the topic chatbots botch most famously — ask one what C4 up to E♯4 is and watch it count piano keys — so the hunting is excellent this week.
2. the studio, "Sound to name," turns songs you already carry into your personal interval bank — a hook card you'll use for the rest of the course. Bring your instrument if you have one. 20 points, in session, full-credit make-up if life happens.
3. The midterm family opens with the second session. Study guide, prep tutorial, and a zero-stakes practice exam with unlimited attempts, all live two weeks ahead of the exam — because midterm week has only one class meeting, review belongs to the next three weeks, not to one long night. Open the practice exam once this weekend. That's the whole ask.

Everything else — practice set, quiz, discussion, and the Spell It Both Ways assignment — closes the end of Week 6. The Start Here page in this module lays it all out in order with points.

Bring your ears to the first session. The gaps they already know are about to get first and last names.

See you in this class,
Professor Hemsworth

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Canvas placement block

# (A) Overview page
canvas_object    = Page
title            = "Week 6 Overview — Start Here · Intervals I"
published        = true
module_position  = first item in the Week 6 module

# (B) Welcome announcement
canvas_object    = Announcement
title            = "Unit 6 — every gap gets a name (and the midterm family opens with the second session)"
workflow_state   = active
discussion_type  = side_comment
delayed_post_at  = module opening day (drip; offset 0 from module start)
# Announcements are NEVER module items — Canvas rejects them as module content.
# They live in the Announcements stream only; do not add this to the Week 6 module.

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