The Educational Establishment is Moving Our Way.
For years band directors have been employing techniques in their teaching which have now been given formal names and official sanction by the educational establishment. By learning these names and informing your school administration of your new and innovative programs you can earn additional prestige for educational leadership in your school. In some states, the implementation of these programs can also mean additional salary for the educator through programs enacted through legislation titled Career Ladders. Let’s examine some of the latest educational jargon and see how easily these terms apply to procedures and facets of your program you may already have in place.
Peer Tutoring Program: If you have section leaders responsible for helping their section members learn their parts, or if you have high school musicians helping younger students, you have a Peer Tutoring Program established.
Competency Based Education: If you are using some type of check off system and require the students to prove competency before progressing to the next exercise, guess what you have in place in your band program?
Mastery Learning System: If you are using The Band Awards System (C.L. Barnhouse, Co.) as the nucleus of your middle school band program, with students progressing from one learning objective to another, you are not only using a Mastery Learning System but also an Instructional Management System. With some adapting, those of you using Total Musicianship (Neil A. Kjos, Jr.) at the high school can claim the same fame.
Cooperative Learning Teams: The greater world of education has discovered the benefit of small groups of students working together. By giving an assignment with specific learning objectives and encouraging team work, greater learning takes place than in a traditional classroom setting. If you have a small ensemble program functioning, your administration will be delighted to know you are running Cooperative Learning Teams. If you assign a leader and ask for a written assignment, defining musical terms, expressive devises and even a short biography on the composer , you will have successfully accomplished what academic teachers across the country are struggling to implement. Student involvement is the secret band directors have kept for years!
The Gifted and Talented: For many years band directors have been identifying The Gifted and Talented in music. We have been providing Enrichment Activities to cultivate special musical abilities. All-District and All-State Bands, District and State solo and ensemble festivals, special clinics provided by our state universities and even jazz improvisation are all programs we provide for The Gifted and Talented. Although many states are creating these programs, their orientation is academic and most include no provision for the talented in the performing arts. In your school let your administrators know the opportunities you are providing for The Gifted and Talented.
Increased Time on Task: When students record assignments during band in practice rooms or when you find any way to get more accomplished during your band hour, you have increased Time on Task. By reporting to your principal your new technique you plant a seed: music is education, not merely an activity.
Modeling: Performing a new rhythm on your instrument, or selecting a student with a beautiful tone quality to demonstrate for the class is labeled Modeling by administrators. For a successful performance based evaluation of a teacher by an administrator, Modeling is essential.
Spiraled Learning: Coming back to a concept and reviewing it so that it will not be forgotten is Spiraled Learning. If you teach a concert G major scale during the third quarter and review it during the fourth quarter you have Spiraled.
Congruency With Teaching and Testing: Remember when teaching the test was educational blasphemy? Now it is the only acceptable educational practice. Teaching the material to be on the test is now considered standard communication between teacher and student (except for national standardized tests of course!) When a concert band performs in an evaluative festival they have been given the material to be tested (evaluated) well in advance. If you are testing students individually over their parts and have communicated performance objectives in advance (tone quality, correct notes, rhythms, articulations, dynamics and phrasing) you have achieved Congruency between Teaching and Testing!
Main Streaming: Almost every band in the country has learning disabled, educable mentally handicapped or behaviorally disordered students. We find places for these special kids to be successful and we have all experienced the joy of seeing them become involved in the learning and performing process. When was the last time you communicated to an administrator how well one (or several) of these students are doing in your program?
When instructing our students we communicate in age appropriate terms. When discussing program objectives or behavior problems with parents, we must speak in terms they will understand. When you kick off your ensemble program this year tell your principal you have inaugurated a Cooperative Team Learning Program. Watch him light up! Educational theorists are uncovering teaching techniques band directors have been using effectively for some time. The gulf between the academics and the arts may be narrowing. Perhaps in some areas, we have been leaders in educational development for improvement, but too timid to assert the effectiveness of our methods to the greater educational establishment. In your school, you have been employing many of these new concepts and just need to point it out (over and over and over!) to your school administration. We do have many things in common with current trends in the greater educational world. Keep your ear tuned to coming educational trends and see if, with only minor adjustments, they are not techniques you are already using. Accentuate the similarities we have with the other departments in our schools. Let another department head be activities director. Let the music educator be the educational leader!
Bandworld Magazine: Vol 6, p.102 (Nov-Dec 1990)
