Music Education Commons^™

Critically Assessing Forms Of Resistance In Music Education, Brent C. Talbot, Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams

Education Faculty Publications

In their classrooms, music educators draw upon critical pedagogy (as described by Freire, Giroux, and hooks) for the express purpose of cultivating a climate for conscientização. Conscientização, according to Paulo Freire (2006), “refers to learning to perceive social, political, and economic contradictions and to take action against the oppressive elements of reality” (p. 35). This consciousness raising is a journey teachers pursue with students, together interrogating injustices in communities and the world in order to transform the conditions that inform them. Learning to perceive social, political, and economic contradictions often leads to multiple forms of resistance in and …

Going For Broke: A Talk To Music Teachers, Juliet Hess, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

In 1963—a racially-charged time in the United States—James Baldwin delivered “A Talk to Teachers,” urging educators to engage youth in difficult conversations about current events. We concur with Giroux (2011, 2019) that political forces influence our educational spaces and that classrooms should not be viewed as apolitical, but instead seen as sites for engagement, where educators and artists alike can “go for broke.” Drawing upon A Tribe Called Quest’s 2017 Grammy performance of “We the People…” as an example of the role of the arts in troubled times, we consider ways to work alongside youth in schools to respond, consider, …

Superdiversity In Music Education, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

Globalization has changed the social, cultural, and linguistic diversity in societies all over the world (Blommaert, J & Rampton, B. Diversities, 13(2), 1–22 (2011)). As new technologies have rapidly developed alongside increased forms of transnational flow, so have new forms of language, art, music, communication, and expression. This rapid and varied blending of cultures, ideas, and modes of communication is what Vertovec (2007) describes as super-diversity—diversity within diversity. In this narrative, I explore the theoretical and methodological pluralism that has aided my research in diverse settings, drawing from post-structuralism, critical theory, sociolinguistics, complexity theory, and discourse analysis—specifically Scollon and Scollon’s …

Towards A More Inclusive Music Education: Experiences Of Lgbtqqiaa Students In Music Teacher Education Programs Across Pennsylvania, Edward J. Holmes, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

During the past decade, the field of music education has seen an increase in the amount of scholarship surrounding LGBTQ studies in music teaching and learning. For example, the University of Illinois hosted three symposia for the field of music education dedicated to LGBTQ studies (2010, 2012, 2016), and proceedings from these symposia were published in three separate issues of the of the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education (2011, 2014, 2016). Other notable scholarship has been published in Action, Criticism, and Theory for Music Education (Gould 2005); the Music Educators Journal (Bergonzi, 2009; Carter, 2011; McBride, …

An Education Carol, Benjamin J. Fruchtl

Student Publications

This work is rendition of a small play written by Ben Fruchtl. This work analyzes one of the essential questions of the course, Social Foundations of Music Education, and questions how educators can change models of education to make learning more relevant in and out of school.

A Classroom's Evolution, Brooke E. Maskin

Student Publications

Based on the four texts that we read in Social Foundations of Music Education, I took some of the main points and concepts from each of these books and incorporated them into an original poetic monologue. The main question I was trying to answer was: How should teachers as transformative intellectuals navigate through the current educational system in the age of accountability to pursue equity among, in, and through education? Teachers must work to completely defy the stereotypical boundaries of education and inspire students to become investigators in the world, both in and out of the classroom.

The Fortenbaugh In A Music Education Context, Brittany N. Barry

Blogging the Library

This past weekend I attended the Pennsylvania Music Educators Association (PMEA) Annual Conference in Hershey, PA. Along with the rest of my music education program here at Gettysburg College I went on a two day trip the Hershey Lodge to attend professional sessions, network with in-service teachers and administrators, and walk the music education marketplace. Now that I am back it is time to begin work putting together my library research guide geared towards helping others involved in music education and I have new insights to consider. [excerpt]

From The Classroom To Musselman Library: Bridging The Gap For Music Education, Brittany N. Barry

Blogging the Library

I am in my sixth semester as a music education major through the Sunderman Conservatory and yet I had no idea there was a music education collection here at Musselman Library until just a couple weeks ago. After reading up on some policies and practices for maintaining collections I was given some time to peruse the music education collection more closely. As I looked through the shelves and skimmed some introductions and tables of contents of a few of the books in MT1 I began considering how I would go about updating and maintaining this small collection. [excerpt]

Composing/Arranging Familiar Songs In Choir With Garageband, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

This practical multi-stage project description demonstrates to teachers how they can engage students in arranging and composing music related to the choral curriculum by using Digital Audio Workstations (DAW) like GarageBand.

Extending Invitations, Becoming Messmates, Alison M. Reynolds, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

As music educators we can model proactive advocacy among community members to prevent individuals' reactive violence in response to intolerance for differences. We can offer music-learning tables as safe spaces in which community members openly and collaboratively learn to know each other as individuals with diverse identities and interests. As messmates around the table, we can identify ways that researching, questioning, and being musical together can eradicate fears and the damaging effects of homophobia.

Equity In The Classroom, Robert L. Napoli

Student Publications

When discussing how teachers should pursue equity among, in, and through education in their current educational system, many go straight to discussing the lessons. These are very important, and the planning of these lessons can very much influence students to think more openly about equity, but there is something that must be established first before even thinking about executing a lesson plan, and that is the classroom itself. After all, “a large part of the work of teaching is constructing the laboratory for learning.” (Campbell & Demorest, 2008, p. 87). Postman & Weingartner also say that “the most important impressions …

Letters To Mr. Carter, Jasmin S. Eddy

Student Publications

This final project synthesized discussion and learning from four different books: "To Teach: The Journey in Comics" by W. Ayers and R. Alexander-Tanner, "Musician and Teacher: An Orientation to Music Education" by P. S. Campbell, "Teaching as a Subversive Activity" by N. Postman and C. Weingartner, and "Pedagogy of the Oppressed" by P. Freire. Through a series of letters to a teacher, Mr. Carter, the letter writers demonstrate the important ideas presented in each of the books.

The Trials Of A New Teacher, Diego A. Rocha

Student Publications

Tim, a new teacher, faces challenges as he works towards changing the environment in a high school music program.

Dissecting Dialogue: The Value Of Music Education In Esl/Ell Programs, Kyle R. Furlong

Student Publications

Among educators and philosophers alike, critical dialogue is widely regarded as one of the most effective ways to communicate and educate in the classroom. In his quintessential work, Pedagogy of the Oppressed, Paulo Freire reflects upon the importance of dialogue stating, “Only dialogue, which requires critical thinking, is also capable of generating critical thinking. Without dialogue, there is no communication, and without communication there can be no true education.” This point is reinforced in other notable texts such as Teaching as a Subversive Activity, which describes the “new education” as not only student and question centered, but “language-centered” as well. …

Notes From Mrs. Hadgu's Class: Conceptualizing Music Education Curriculum For A Changing World, Logan B. Santiago

Student Publications

How can we conceptualize curriculum and school knowledge to better address important questions of social change, contingency of knowledge, life in mediated worlds, and inequalities? To answer this question I wrote fictional stories from students about their favorite moments from their 8th grade music class. Each account deals with a specific activity or instance in which the teacher included social change and/or student centered knowledge in the curriculum. The explanation at the end of the accounts details the reasons for creating each activity and the relation of the stories to texts utilized in class.

How Can We Change Our Habits If We Don’T Talk About Them?, Roger Mantie, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

For the late nineteenth century pragmatists, habits were of great interest. Habits, and the habit of changing habits, they believed, reflected if not defined human rationality, leadingWilliam James to describe habit as “the enormous fly-wheel of society.” What the pragmatists did not adequately address (at least for us) is the role of power relations in the process of changing habits. In this article we discuss our experience of attempting to engage critique and reflection on habitual practices in music teacher education, offering the reader an article within an article. That is, we reflect on our failure to publish a critical …

Mia's Music, Miranda L. Bubenheim

Student Publications

Mia’s Music is a story narrating what I view as an ideal curriculum being put into practice. Music educators have an advantageous and unique position to explore a medium with students that truly has the power to bring people together and help them to understand one another. A curriculum based in the cultural themes that students identify with will challenge them to learn through sharing their experiences and understanding others'.

Biophily: Five Musical Episodes For The Revolutionary Educator, Edward J. Holmes

Student Publications

"Biophily: Five Musical Episodes for the Revolutionary Educator" is a composition meant to reflect, through music, some of the key concepts and ideas of authors like Paulo Freire, William Ayers, Neil Postman, and Charles Weingartner in their works that we covered in Social Foundations. Each piece aims to deconstruct poor teaching habits and practices, and musically express a better way to go about education.

Unlocking The Question, Kelly E. Reymann

Student Publications

Educators are constantly seeking ways to establish equity inside and outside of the classroom. This presentation explores ways in which an inquisitive mindset can make steps toward achieving this goal, and how questioning is essential for creating the optimal learning environment.

Fighting A Resurgent Hyper-Positivism In Education Is Music To My Ears, Hakim Mohandas Amani Williams

Africana Studies Faculty Publications

In this article, I argue that one of the gifts of the Age of Enlightenment, the ability to measure, to experiment, to predict—turned rancid by hyper-positivism—is re-asserting itself globally in the field of education (including music education). I see a neoliberal, neocolonial connection—in terms of the ideologies that fuel them—between some of the homogenizing, epistemologically/culturally imperialist aspects of globalization and this resurgent hyper-positivism that has been accompanied by a corporatization of education. I posit that critical education, including critical music education, is an essential component of a necessary—if rancorous—dialogue in maintaining a definition of education that is as varied and …

A Proleptic Perspective Of Music Education, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

By explaining the cultural mechanism of 'prolepsis' through examples of my own teaching, I posit that all too often educators' and teacher educators' (purely 'ideal') recall of our pasts and imagination of our students' futures become fundamentally materialized constraints on our students' life experiences in the present.

Global Music Perspectives: Music Outside The Western Canon In Local Schools, Jane A. Best, John F. Grimsley, Alan C. Heise, Lauren M. Mascioli, Samantha F. Moroney, Lauren A. Satterfield, Emily I. Zeller

Celebration

As a class, we are designing a research project for investigating how music teachers from counties in South-Central Pennsylvania use music from outside the Western canon (i.e. "world music"). We are performing a qualitative study by interviewing k-12 music teachers from school districts in South-Central Pennsylvania. Teachers may choose to participate in a focus group interview with other teachers or in one-on-one interviews. The focus group interview will not exceed two hours and the one-on-one interviews will not exceed an hour. The interviews will be guided using a questionnaire (see attached), but the conversation may deviate from these questions at …

Another Project Underway, Alexander K. Schweizer

Blogging the Library

I have embarked on another researching journey; this time focusing on “The President’s Own” U.S. Marine Band. Ever since I got to see them perform at a neighboring high school my freshmen year, I been fascinated and inspired by the level of excellence and precision that the Marine Band displays. One day I hope to join their ranks as part of the euphonium section, but I still have a lot of work and practicing to do before I can achieve this goal. [excerpt]

Collection Project Completed, Alexander K. Schweizer

Blogging the Library

I hope everyone had an awesome Spring Break and is enjoying the short burst of nice weather! It’s been a long time since my last post because I have been working on a month-long project, and I wanted to wait until it was complete to give the whole scoop. Due to my interest in any and everything that has to do with the euphonium, I did a great deal of research in an effort to improve and expand upon the large collection of musical resources that the Musselman Library has to offer. [excerpt]

Fortenbaugh Music Intern, First Post Of The Semester, Alexander K. Schweizer

Blogging the Library

As the Fortenbaugh Music Library Intern, I will be working on several projects throughout the semester. I plan to use the skills that I acquire during this internship when I am a band director, and need to know how to catalog and easily access music. Currently, I am researching euphonium repertoire (both audio recordings and physical sheet music) to potentially add to the large collection of scores and CDs already in the Musselman Music Library. [excerpt]

The Same Person, Jeffrey C. Binner

Student Publications

How can we conceptualize curriculum and school knowledge to better address important questions of social change, contingency of knowledge, life in mediated worlds, and inequalities? This question was given to me by Dr. Brent Talbot for my final presentation in Music 149, Social Foundations of Music Education. The purpose of this assignment was to synthesize the knowledge of various philosophies and models of music education covered in this course while utilizing the course material given to us throughout the semester. After Dr. Talbot’s emphasis on creativity and having already written too many papers to count, I decided to write and …

The Music Identity Project, Brent C. Talbot

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

At MayDay Group Colloquium 24 in East Lansing, MI, Sandra Stauffer (2012) charged that: "If we want change, we need to start telling different stories . . . we work with beginning teachers, and we worry about teacher identities. We tell them a story...one that does not serve them well. A story that they will be prepared. Maybe we should tell stories of self-making, of re-making and replacing ourselves. Of preparation as a constantly evolving teacher story. Maybe then transformation can be the norm."

Sandy’s comments of transformation resonated strongly with the very project I was presenting at the same …

Dragon Rhyme By Chen Yi, Russell G. Mccutcheon

Sunderman Conservatory of Music Faculty Publications

Russell McCutcheon, Assistant Professor of Music and Director of Bands in the Sunderman Conservatory of Music, published an analysis of "Dragon Rhyme", a major new composition for wind band, by composer Chen Yi in Teaching Music Through Performance in Band, Volume 9.