For our MUED 271 Final, we were required to attend the MUED 670 graduate student debate, as well as one of three options of other music events. The other event I decided to attend was the Student Showcase I. Below are some pictures of me and my friend, Erica, at the event and my reflections! 1. Prior to the beginning of the debate, what was your reaction to the topic? What beliefs did you hold at that time about the topic being debated?
I had heard that the topic of the graduate debate was whether or not music education should be taught in schools. When I heard that this was the topic, I thought that the answer was a no brainer—of course music education should be taught in schools, that was what we were getting our degrees for! I did not understand why this topic needed to be debated if we all wanted to be music educators and believed that music needed to be taught to students in schools. However, once I got to the debate, I realized that the topic was whether every student should be required to have music education every year for their K-12 schooling career (Team A) or if that music education should not be the responsibility of public education (Team B). After getting this clarification, I still thought that Team A’s stance was so much easier to debate and believe in. I would not be studying music education in college now if not for the fact that I was taught music in a public school, so it seemed obvious to me that this option should be available to every student in a public school setting. If not, how else were students going to be exposed to music? While I was pretty certain I knew who was going to win the debate (Team A), I was excited to hear what the other side was going to come up with and argue. I wanted to see if it was true that the “worse” side would end up with a better argument because they had to study both sides of the debate more avidly. 2. Describe ways in which positions expressed in the debates challenged, strengthened, and/or clarified your beliefs about the topic being debated. Please refer to questions posed by the moderator throughout the event, as well as the Q&A at the end of the debate. Once the graduate students began presenting their opening statements, the debate topic at hand became even clearer for me. I realized that a key word in the debate was “mandating” music in public school education, rather than simply offering it as an option. My beliefs about the topic being debated were clarified as the moderator explained the two different, yet intertwining philosophies that each side was based off of: aesthetic and praxial. The aesthetic philosophy defines music as sounds that are inherently meaningful and since music is emotions, students must be educated to understand the emotions that music is displaying. On the other hand, the praxial philosophy states that while listening to music in an aesthetic manner is important, there is no universal or absolute feeling that music displays. Instead, music must be culturally developed through active music making. It was interesting to hear about two developed music education philosophies that I had never heard of before and realize how each supported the different positions. I was challenged when Team B asked, “Why is the classroom the best place for music education?” and stated that by putting them in a classroom where only one type of lesson is taught at a time there is no way to support the individual interests of students. While I believed that both sides had great arguments, my beliefs about the importance of community music making were strengthened. Not only is important to have music education in schools, but in order for their love of music to diversify and grow, music students must be active in seeking out the different kinds of music making in their neighborhoods. 3. How has your thinking about the topic that was debated changed? Do you hold a completely different position? Is your position now more nuanced? Were there elements of an argument that was made that you may have disagreed with, but can see as a reasonable opposing point of view? Please be specific when citing elements of the debate. After hearing the debate, my position is not completely changed, rather I think it is now more nuanced than before. I have more terms and philosophies to back up my beliefs instead of simply stating my opinions based on my music education personal experiences. Team A and Team B’s arguments were both extremes of music education in schools; I do not think that music education should be mandated for every student because it would take the enjoyment out of making music. However, I do not believe that it should be completely taken out of schools and left to the community because music in schools is a huge way for students to initially get plugged in. One element of an argument by Team B that I disagreed with was when they stated that when music education was cut out of public schools, people would use that extra money to spend on community music making programs and events. I just think that this would not be the case because people would spend the money on newer objects and items rather than music programs. However, if the people in the community fervently believe in the power of community music, I do think that this could be a reasonable point of view. Team A and B both had great reasonings behind their positions, but I thought Team B was better able to support their argument and definitely made idea of community music learning in order to reach a diverse amount of people and better suit their needs seem very plausible. But I still cannot see how that this is the most feasible and accessible idea for teaching and exposing students to music. Over the past semester, I have been engaging with a variety of reading materials such as books and state and national music standards, as well as interacting with guest music education speakers. My engagement with these different ideas has challenged me to ask difficult questions about music and acknowledge that the answers to these questions are not black and white. It makes me a little nervous to pursue licensure in K-12 music education because I will not have all the answers, but it also makes me excited because I get to work and discuss my thoughts with my peers and professors and begin developing my own beliefs about what it means to be a music teacher and what music education should be.
Reading Remixing the Classroom: Toward an Open Philosophy of Music Education (2016) by Randall Allsup has challenged what my original image of a music classroom is. One of my favorite quotes I read this semester from this book was “Thus, the laboratory and the museum are both metaphors for relationship making as well as actual physical spaces that construct how we live and learn with others.” (2016, p.105) because it made me consider the musical background I had and what my experience was like. I realized that the classroom could be both a laboratory, a place of experimenting and creativity, and a museum, a place where tradition is appreciated and used; however, there is a way for both the laboratory and the museum to become negative and become places where only rules and structure are enforced. I was forced to redefine what I wanted my future classroom to be like. Did I want it to just be a place where traditional repertoire was played or where we added more modern songs? Would students just sit in concert arcs and play music or would we have technological experiences and music making projects in small groups? These were the questions that made me nervous and excited about being a music teacher in the future. When Dr. Bledsoe visited, I believe that she did an excellent job of articulating and giving examples of how she combines the laboratory with the museum through Duo Musical Playground. She incorporates music learning with fun crafts and artwork. It was a great encouragement to see that it is possible in the real world and that I can incorporate this into my teaching. We also read Hammel and Hourigan’s Teaching Music to Students with Special Needs: A Label-Free Approach (2017) and it made me realize how important it is to reach out to students with special needs and how difficult it can be. It made me understand a lot more about what it is to work with students who have special needs and the information I needed to be proactive in communicating with other teachers about, like IEPs, in order to provide the best experiences for my students. Hearing Dr. Hammel explain the complexities of the system and her experiences about working with support staff and the school administrators makes me feel more confident that even though it can be stressful working out all the many details, it is possible and there are so many other knowledgeable people who are willing to help and have the students’ best interests in mind. Gordan’s Quick and Easy Introductions also brought about similar considerations for me regarding student learning differences and how I should diversify the way I teach because the way students learn music is actually different than I initially thought. Learning music is similar to learning how to speak, so if this is the case, I should be teaching skills that allow them to recognize sounds first before notation. We also looked at relevant professional documents such as the JMU Eight Key Questions, the Virginia Standards of Learning for Music, and the National Core Music Standards. After looking at these documents, I was amazed by how many standards are explicitly stated that need to be accomplished. It will be difficult to incorporate all of them, but they have many great ideas like incorporating history and current events, different ethnic music, and contemporary media and technology that I would love to have in my classroom. The JMU Eight Key Questions helped me ponder and engage with an entire situation from an ethical standpoint. When Dr. Abramos visited, he also brought about these difficult questions when asking us what Beyonce’s Run the World was conveying and how so. From these scholarly engagements, I’ve been challenged to ask hard, thought-provoking questions, seek out answers, and discuss with others to become the best teacher I can be and know how to develop my own beliefs about music education topics. Reference List:
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Davina MiawOn this page, I will present examples of my scholarship in the form of reflective essays and philosophical assignments. Archives
November 2019
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