Music Education and Some of Its Subfields: Thoughts about Future Priorities

Author(s):  
Lucy Green

This article discusses some important issues in music education. Specifically, it identifies three substantial sub-fields under the umbrella of music education: education-in-music, music-education-research, and music-teacher-education. It considers some of the implications of dividing the field this particular way, especially with regards to the relationship between theory and practice within each sub-field.

2019 ◽  
Vol 29 (3) ◽  
pp. 24-36
Author(s):  
Olivia Gail Tucker

The purpose of this article is to provide a framework for understanding and supporting the development of preservice teacher agency across undergraduate coursework and experiences. Emirbayer and Mische’s chordal triad represents a temporal-relational view of agency that may be used in facilitating class discussions and designing field experiences and curricula. In this article, I connect the three components of the framework, which are the iterative (past), practical-evaluative (present), and projective (future) dimensions of human agency, to music teacher education research and suggest how to incorporate findings to facilitate agentic action. These connections between the chordal triad of agency and music teacher education research may serve as starting points for needed inquiry into and the inclusion of agency in music teacher education. Greater agency may provide individual teachers with the means to expand, innovate, and modify school music education for more inclusive forms and practices in local school contexts.


1993 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
pp. 9-21 ◽  
Author(s):  
Betty Hanley

Research about the delivery of music teacher education programs indicates a number of areas which should be addressed. The report below describes innovative practice in an advanced elementary methods course at the University of Victoria, British Columbia. In Music Education 306, theory and practice were connected through student-directed discussions of foundation issues; the development of personal musical competencies; observation, teaching in the schools, and reflection on practice; the challenge to examine issues critically; and student involvement in the planning of their own learning and assessment. Excerpts from student reflections illustrate some of the learning which occurred.


Author(s):  
Colleen Conway ◽  
Shannan Hibbard

This chapter situates the study of music teacher education within the larger body of music education and teacher education research. It problematizes the terms teacher training, teacher education, and best practice and introduces the concept of teaching as an “impossible profession.” Goals of teacher education, including reflective practice and adaptive expertise, are discussed. The chapter outlines the challenges that music teacher educators face as they try to prepare preservice teachers for the realities of P-12 school-based music education while instilling in these new colleagues a disposition toward change. It concludes with narratives that examine teachers’ descriptions of classroom relationships throughout the lens of presence in teaching as a way to remind teacher educators of the importance of their work to push the boundaries of music teacher education in order to serve the profession at large.


The Oxford Handbook of Preservice Music Teacher Education in the United States aims to work from within the profession of music teacher education to push the boundaries of P-12 music education. In this book, we will provide all of those working in music teacher education—music education faculty and administrators, music researchers, graduate students, department of education faculty and administrators, and state-level certification agencies—with research and promising practices for all areas of traditional preservice music teacher preparation. We define the areas of music teacher education as encompassing the more traditional structures, such as band, jazz band, marching band, orchestra, choir, musical theater, and elementary and secondary general music, as well as less common or newer areas: alternative string ensembles, guitar and song-writing, vernacular and popular music, early childhood music, and adult learners


2021 ◽  
Vol 30 (2) ◽  
pp. 51-64
Author(s):  
Mara E. Culp ◽  
Karen Salvador

Music educators must meet the needs of students with diverse characteristics, including but not limited to cultural backgrounds, musical abilities and interests, and physical, behavioral, social, and cognitive functioning. Music education programs may not systematically prepare preservice teachers or potential music teacher educators for this reality. The purpose of this study was to examine how music teacher education programs prepare undergraduate and graduate students to structure inclusive and responsive experiences for diverse learners. We replicated and expanded Salvador’s study by including graduate student preparation, incorporating additional facets of human diversity, and contacting all institutions accredited by National Association of Schools of Music to prepare music educators. According to our respondents, integrated instruction focused on diverse learners was more commonly part of undergraduate coursework than graduate coursework. We used quantitative and qualitative analysis to describe course offerings and content integration.


2019 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 272-285 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carlos Poblete ◽  
Adrian Leguina ◽  
Nicolás Masquiarán ◽  
Bárbara Carreño

Previous research recognizes the importance of musical experiences on music teacher education. However, current efforts do not provide a comprehensive view of the way their students learn music before starting university. The objective of this study is to portray their musical experiences, identifying the distinctive mechanisms underlying the relationship between practices, repertoires, and training contexts for music learning. A combination of pedagogical, social and musical dimensions, inspired by sociological theories of P. Bourdieu and B. Bernstein, examine the pre-university musical experiences and the mediating role of students’ sociocultural origins. Empirically, multimodal information from four Chilean universities ( n = 55) was collected through the application of a survey questionnaire and semi-structured interviews, and analyzed using a set of mixed techniques, including descriptive statistics, text mining, and content analysis. Findings reveal relevant associations between practices, repertoires, and learning contexts, especially in terms of the specialized nature of musical training and the habitus and cultural dispositions of practitioners. Particularly relevant is the predominance of informal and non-formal learning contexts and their translation into specific types of learning. These challenge current perspectives and contribute a tool kit for the understanding of the relationship between power and knowledge in future professional teachers.


2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-88 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura Miettinen ◽  
Claudia Gluschankof ◽  
Sidsel Karlsen ◽  
Heidi Westerlund

Societies worldwide are becoming more aware of the educational challenges that come with increased cultural diversity derived from ethnic, linguistic, religious, socioeconomic and educational differences and their intersections. In many countries, teacher education programmes are expected to prepare teachers for this reality and develop their intercultural competences. This instrumental case study is based on a project that aims to initiate mobilizing networks between two music teacher programmes to explore intercultural music teacher education. In this study, we map the intercultural competences that are required of music teacher educators and that are provided in the music education programmes at two higher music education institutions in Israel and Finland. The data consists of 11 focus group interviews with music teacher educators at the Levinsky College of Education in Tel Aviv and the Sibelius Academy of the University of the Arts Helsinki, conducted by a multinational research team. The data was analysed abductively, using content analysis as a method. While the interviewed teacher educators could articulate many aspects of their own intercultural competences or the lack of them, the findings indicate that in musical diversity and teaching students from different musical backgrounds the teacher educators found it difficult to explain what kinds of intercultural competences their respective programmes provided for the students. Based on the findings, there is a need for a more holistic understanding of intercultural competences in music teacher education as well as how our institutions produce power. There is also a need for the teacher educators in the programmes to collaborate and discuss among each other in order to create “knowledge communities” and to move towards addressing intercultural issues.


Author(s):  
Ian Menter

Although teacher education has been recognized as a key aspect of educational policy and practice, especially over the past few decades, the research undertaken to inform policy is in many respects inadequate. Drawing on reviews of such research as has been undertaken in Europe, the United States, Australasia as well as other parts of the world, we can identify the key questions for teacher education researchers. These include such topics as the relationship between theory and practice in professional learning, the significance of partnerships between schools and higher education institutions, the relationship between preservice teacher education and ongoing professional learning and the nature of the assessment of beginning teachers. Three approaches to teacher education research may be defined, and all of them are important in the quest for better understanding of the field. These three approaches are research in teacher education—mainly carried out by teacher education practitioners; research on teacher education—mainly carried out by education policy scholars; and research about teacher education—carried out by scholars in a range of disciplines and seeking to explore the wider social significance of teacher education. An exploration of each of these three approaches reveals that there is a serious dearth of large-scale and/or longitudinal studies that may be seen as genuinely independent and critical. This suggests that there is a large agenda for future teacher education research.


2019 ◽  
Vol 106 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-37
Author(s):  
John Kratus

The future of American music education may be found in its past—a time when music teachers instilled lifelong amateur music-making in their students. There are differences between amateur and professional musicianship, and the focus of American music education shifted from amateurism to semiprofessionalism in the mid-twentieth century. An orientation toward semiprofessionalism makes little sense given the limited performance opportunities in large ensembles after high school and college. This article suggests a way back to nurturing amateurism and highlights two obstacles to this goal: the inflexibility of music teacher education and the profession’s reluctance to accept popular music. The article concludes with a narrative of what a world of amateur musicianship looks like.


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