This inquiry project is about aspects of leading a classroom that isn't necessarily studied in our bachelor's degrees. The phrase “I love you” means something different to every person. While curriculum, activities, and pedagogy is incredibly important in general music, so are the elements that create a positive classroom environment. Teachers can show love in their classrooms by understanding the importance of humanity, positivity, and inclusion toward the children that they teach. Teachers must also prepare themselves to be invested in all of their students and their own individual well-beings. For this assignment, I very much enjoyed getting to study the milestones of childhood movement development. We were instructed to create a heuristic that would help us better remember and learn the different stages of movement throughout a child's life. The better we know these things, the more accurately and inclusively we can plan movement lessons to ensure that our students are learning to the best of their abilities! Starting at infancy, and expanding all the way to 5th grade, my heuristic takes the form of something like a bookmark. This could be something to hang on a desk or a cork-board to be easily seen and read. It is themed after video games, as video games remind me of movements like jumping and running. These things are actually milestones in a child's development, so it will help me remember these aspects in the future! These questions guided my illustration!
1) Who were Carl Orff and Gunild Keetman why did they create the Orff-Schulwerk? 2) What is his approach and what are key components of the process? What are the aims, learning processes, and activities often associated with Orff-Schulwerk? 3) What are some of the practical uses Orff-Schulwerk (your thoughts included)? 4) What are some of the advantages and challenges (your thoughts included)? mrfrederickmusic (2012, August, 3). Interview with Zoltan Kodály [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dow-m3BuuNk
Organization of American Kodály Educators (2018). The Kodály concept. Retrieved from https://www.oake.org/about-us/the-kodaly-concept/ (Links to an external site.) J.I M (2015, July 7). Kodály summer school [Video File]. Retrieved from https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VrTshUY1oko. Project-Based learning applies a subject, music in this case, to real world problems. This is a common theme for project based learning and these articles. This is a reason why PBL is so popular in today’s education world. Applying subjects to real world scenarios allows instruction and classes to be more student-based rather than lecture/note taking-based. This helps students stay engaged, and learn about themselves, as well as from their teachers and peers!
What is project-based learning (PBL)? At its core, project-based learning is built on the idea that real-life problems capture student interest and provoke critical thinking and develop skills as they engage in and complete complex tasks that typically result in a realistic product, event, or presentation to an audience. (Tobias, Campbell, and Greco 2015) It is a way for students to apply subject matter to real life situations in a student-centered manner! What are the key characteristics of elements of PBL? The tables in the reading entitled “Bringing Curriculum to Life” includes four main topics that I feel summarize the elements of PBL very well. The four topics are
What are the affordances and constraints of PBL? There are many affordances to PBL. The fact that it is so student centered and engaging, means that the students should be learning more about themselves as well as the subject matter. They are learning in a different way than they are used to, and sometimes they are learning in ways that they can’t even see! From personal experiences, I can provide a constraint to PBL. At my high school at home, they have recently switched their curriculum to almost entirely project based learning. From a future educator’s standpoint (myself), I see it as an awesome transformation that I am enjoying hearing about through my alma mater. However, my 16 year old brother, who is a sophomore at that high school, utterly despises project based learning, and “having” to do it in school. I recently had a conversation with him, and it very much threw me for a loop in how I see these types of educational strategies. He has told me that the teachers, especially those who have been teaching for a while, do not enjoy the transition. I feel like because these teachers don’t like teaching PBL, therefore don’t put as much effort into it, and as a result, the students don’t enjoy it either. I feel that a major constraint to PBL, especially right now, is the transition from “traditional” teaching that is unfortunately turning many teachers and students away from PBL at my old high school. The music program, however, is thriving under the direction of a JMU alum. I was shocked to hear about the rest of the school though! What are important aspects for a PBL designer to consider (topics, contexts, questions, scope, standards, assessment, etc.)? Assessment is a very important aspect in all means of learning, for public schooling, specifically. An idea that is suggested in the Tobias, Campbell, and Greco reading, these assessments should be summative, and be sure to track progress and growth, rather than the finished product in relation to a set standard. The article also suggests that student and teachers can co-create rubrics to assess the product of a project. This can be by presentation, performance, and more. (Tobias, Campbell, and Greco 2015) Another aspect of PBL that we must focus on is the scope. Asking ourselves how ready our students are for these projects, and how ready am I, as an educator, ready to facilitate them? (Tobias, Campbell, and Greco 2015) This type of deep consideration could be helpful in a situation like the one at my old high school. Some thorough thought and discussion about what PBL means may open some minds at the school! Envision a PBL-based project for the course you will be proposing at the end of the semester. Create a vignette or short story snapshot that depicts the goals, activities, interests, and pedagogy. The entirety of my course proposal is based off of project based learning. One PBL-based project for this course could be the writing of the lyrics and music to the opening song of the musical we create. The topic is up to the students, but it will be based off of something that personally affects most of them and/or the community. Students will discuss the overall form of the piece, with the teacher facilitating. Then, they will split off into “singers” and “instrumentalists” (depending on their planned role in the musical), and the singers will write the words, (no melodic line), while the instrumentalists come up with chord progressions (no melodic line). The melodic line will be done all together at the end of the project. The final assessment will be a student and teacher created rubric to assess the sound and how the piece evokes emotion at the end! APA Citations Edutopia (2014, June 2014) Tobias, E. S., Campbell, M. R., & Greco, P. (2015). Bringing curriculum to life: Enacting project-based learning in music programs. Music Educators Journal, 102(2), 39-47
"What might teaching and learning music look and sound like when taking into account a broad spectrum of musics and how people engage with them in contemporary society?"
(Tobias, 2012)
A main focal point of this chapter was the idea of a "hyphenated musician." In a hybrid classroom, students are encouraged to do just that. Because of these ideas, I decided to become a hyphenated musician for my hybrid presentation of what I learned through Dr. Tobias' chapter. For this assignment, I was the singer-instrumentalist-songwriter-producer-videographer-etc, etc, etc. Not only this, but I also used a backing track from Garage Band to accompany me. I tried to represent a project you would see in a hybrid classroom to express my findings in the reading.
My question for Dr. Tobias: What are some ways that we can still have a hybrid classroom on a very limited budget? Tobias, E. S. (2012). Hybrid spaces and hyphenated musicians: Secondary students' musical engagement in a songwriting and technology course. Music Education Research, 14(3), 329-346. These two articles are about participatory culture in media, and how we, as educators, should be handling it in our classrooms. While some may say that there are negative repercussions to using social media in a music classroom, the emphasis of the articles is to simply embrace the change, and utilize this tool for good. Students can learn many things through using social media and music, in fact, they already have. Teens are making music online in the form of parodies, covers, tutorials, arrangements, mixes, and more, without any sort of instruction by a music teacher. Imagine what they could do if they had this hobby turned into an activity in music class? It is essential for teachers to help students reflect on their contributions to media, and how media impacts society and the world today. Ultimately, we should be utilizing social media in music classrooms, and using one of the most ultimate forms of participatory culture we have today.
Jenkins, H., Purushotma, R., Weigel, M., Clinton, K., & Robison, A. J. (2009). Executive summary. In Confronting the challenges of participatory culture: Media education for the 21st century (pp. 3-4). Boston: MIT Press. Tobias, E. S. (2013). Toward convergence: Adapting music education to contemporary society and participatory culture. Music Educators Journal, 99(4), 29-36. ‘They wasn't makin’ my kinda music’ reflectionWhat are the key points of the article (report, rather than critique)? In our efforts as educators to include different types of music in our classrooms, we should consider that “Pop and rock music certainly are relevant for some students, but it should not be assumed that this music is relevant for all students.” p241. In this article, we read about two separate students, Terrance and Darius, who both had a strong passion for music, but never found themselves represented enough in music classrooms to pursue their interests in school. Darius quit band, and Terrance dropped out of high school all together. The author asks himself how, and what he could have done to make these students feel more included in the music making at school. Not only this, but we also take time to reflect on who is in the wrong in a situation like Terrance, where his feeling of being outcast in high school led him to drop out completely. Is anyone in the wrong? Terrance doesn’t have regrets about dropping out of school, why do we automatically assume that he should or would? Essentially, the article opens our eyes to how many “musicians” that are wandering the halls of our high school, and gives insight on how to start including them in our classrooms. Based on the article, what is secondary general music? What types of classes and activities might it involve? After reading the article, I feel that secondary general music should include anyone and everyone that is interested in music. I feel that the curriculum shouldn’t be strict, and should be constantly evolving along with time, and students’ interests. Activities like music production, pop song form and study, rap lyric writing, country music history, and more. All depending, however, on the interests of the students in the class at that time. Based on the article, what is the need/rationale for secondary general music? Flexibility. Going along with the answer to “what is secondary general music?”, in order to adhere to everyone’s interests and needs, the curriculum and activities in class should not necessarily be the same every year. The goal should be to include all music makers in the school, not just the ones who sing or play an instrument. Keeping in mind that there is an entire world of music outside of band, choir, and orchestra, would be an effective way to construct a secondary general music classroom. What additional questions do you have for the author (ask regarding gaps and when you disagree)? A question I would ask would be if the author has currently changed anything in his band classroom to include students like these. The story about Darius was heartbreaking, personally, and obviously had a strong affect on the author. I would wonder if there was anything he actively changed about his classroom following that incident. Kruse, A. J. (2016). ‘They wasn't makin’ my kinda music’: a hip-hop musician's perspective on school, schooling, and school music. Music Education Research, 18(3), 240-253. |
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