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Name: Dr.
David Berlin E:mail:
teacher55@excite.com Art Form:
Arts Educator Training Grade
Level(s) Graduate training Q. What is
the advantage of having historical/cultural context
standards embedded into a
curriculum? A. There are
many reasons why historical and cultural studies
belong in a music curriculum. Too often we become
so focused on performance and production that we
neglect the comprehensive education of the student.
The collection of cultural and historical
information surrounding a work of music promotes
the crystallization of thought regarding that work.
The student can reflect upon one's own experiences
with the work and how the experience might have
been shared or experienced differently by a person
of that historical or cultural environment. It
increases the breadth and depth of one's
understanding while enabling the student to more
fully respond to the content of the work. There are
also a number of other reasons to include
historical/cultural context standards in one's
curriculum: 1.The body of
educational experts recognizes the importance of
historical and cultural contexts and includes it as
one of the state standards. There is a similar
recognition and inclusion in the national standards
in music. 2. The
comprehensive musicianship movement of the 1960's
recognized historical and cultural context as
essential to complete musical understanding.
3. Some
school districts (North Allegheny Music Dept. for
example) include historical and cultural context as
one of the essential strands of their curriculum.
Q: What
principles apply in relation to historical/cultural
context standards? A: Always
teach from the literature. Historical/cultural
material is meaningful only after the student has a
feelingful relationship with a work of music
through listening, reading, writing, performing and
creating original yet similar music either through
composition or improvisation. For our
purposes here: 1. Listening
means using the ear to link sound stimulus(i) with
the mind in order to hear, identify, label and
classify musical entities and respond to the
aesthetic experience in a feelingful way.
Ear-training activities are designed to develop
pitch discrimination, tonal imagery and tonal
memory. 2. Reading
and Writing means using the eye to link visual
stimulus(i) with the mind in order to see,
identify, label, classify, write and compute
musical entities in order to promote understanding
and appreciation of those musical entities. For our
purposes here this strand can also be known as
"note reading and analysis". 3. Performing
means using the ear, eye, muscles and mind to
generate and combine musical entities by moving,
singing or playing instruments in order to produce
an aesthetic experience. 4. Creating
means using the ear, eye, muscles and mind in order
to generate new and original musical entities by
improvising and/or composing in order to produce an
aesthetic experience. 5. Historical
and Cultural Context, is a more inclusive
expression of Music History and Literature. This
means using the ear, eye and mind to gain insight
in order to express crystallized thought about the
growth and development of music in various cultures
and style periods. Historical
material is most meaningful when presented at the
end of the process of studying a work. Too often it
is presented as the first process step thereby
rendering it boring trivia.
One of the
most valuable strategies in my experience is to
require students to create and maintain a
portfolio. Each learning
activity leads to and culminates in some benchmark
outcome, which can be documented. These
achievements are maintained in a portfolio. The
portfolio is a repository of the learner's
authentic work. The term authentic is used here to
mean the actual work produced by the student as
opposed to some grade or evaluation form or
transcript, which is not the actual work, itself.
The most desirable kind of work to include in a
portfolio are what a musicologist would call
"primary source material". This is actual direct
musical evidence of a pupil's work. For example, a
video tape recording of a pupil performing is
useful. A teacher's evaluation sheet on that
performance is not useful in the portfolio.
Performances and presentations are recorded on tape
for inclusion in the portfolio. The portfolio
contains a collection of portfolio projects. A
project is a collection of authentic work, which
addresses all of the strands (defined below), of
the curriculum. The work collected in the portfolio
should show growth over time. The portfolio is
organized in such a way that it can be used for any
appropriate purpose. For example, students take
them to college-admission interviews. They can be
shared with guidance counselors. They can be used
for parent conferences or student teacher training.
Incidentally, students have reported that taking
the portfolio to interviews was extremely helpful.
It focuses attention on the work accomplished
rather than on the person. This makes the interview
much more comfortable for the
student. Here is a
collection of prompts, which served well with
students in grades 9-12. 1. Record a
performance of the music you composed/arranged.
This recording should be of you performing, or it
can be of music you programmed into a computer.
This recording is to be included in your
portfolio. 2. Write your
journal entry. This should
include: 1. an
introduction which includes your role in and
contributions to the project. In other words, what
you did and how you did it. 2. five facts
about the structure of the music 3. five
important facts about the style/historical
period 4. five
important facts about the composer 5. five
important facts about the genre
3. Present
your recording and the journal entry to the
instructor for evaluation. You will be
asked questions about the period, the structure of
the example, the composer, the genre, your
reflections about your production and your
contributions to the project.
If the music
studied is original the prompts are slightly
different. 1. Record a
performance of the music you composed/arranged.
This recording should be of you performing, or it
can be of music you programmed into a computer.
This recording is to be included in your
portfolio. 2. Write your
journal entry. This should
include: 1. an
introduction which includes your role in and
contributions to the project. In other words, what
you did and how you did it. 2. five facts
about the structure of the music 3. five
important facts about the style/historical
period 4. five
important facts about your reflections about the
music a.What
aspect(s) of the musical outcome were pleasing and
you will use again in another work. b.What is
the greatest weakness in the music. (Something you
will avoid next time). c.If you were
to rewrite the work right now, what would remain
the same. d.If you were
to rewrite the work right now, what would be
different. e.What did
you learn/discover in the creation of this
work. 5. five
important facts about the genre
3. Present
your recording and the journal entry to the
instructor for evaluation. You will be
asked questions about the period, the structure of
the example, the genre, your reflections and your
contributions to the project
When I was a band director 1965-94, I found that
most of the quality band literature available was
Twentieth-Century, tonal, with a modal harmonic
language. It was helpful to address technical or
theoretical elements as an entire to historical
investigation. Some example topics, which I used,
included: the
history and evolution of meter the
history and evolution of rhythm the
history and evolution of the staff the
history and evolution of the clefs the
history and evolution of tonality the
history and evolution of the genre of the work
under discussion. (there are many quality suites
and sets of variations in the band
repertoire) the
history and evolution of instrument-making
technology the
history and evolution of bands
By
tracing genre or theoretical issues across time,
information about historical style periods, the
sociocultural issues and influences upon them, ways
in which music of the era was used and significant
figures of the era could be addressed in a natural
and logical manner as an outgrowth of the music we
were rehearsing and performing at the
time. |