Reflection, Week 4

            This week’s assigned readings covered a variety of topics, including music software, performance opportunities and techniques, and creating music with technology instead of instruments. While these topics were intriguing, I was struck by a different topic: practicing. I found myself reflecting on how I model practicing and how I teach students to practice.

            As all music educators know, practicing is a crucial element in learning how to play an instrument, for it is during practice sessions that students are able to rehearse proper fundamentals and recall new ideas and concepts that were introduced in a lesson (Bauer, 2014, p. 81). In my experience, middle school students either love or loathe practicing their instruments. During these introductory years, how do we encourage students to practice regularly, efficiently, and effectively? Bauer explains that proper practice habits are a result of intrinsic motivation, but he recognizes that students tend to be motivated by more extrinsic motivation (2014, p. 81). One way to help students increase their intrinsic desire to practice is to show them how to practice. Consistency is key, and teachers can model consistency by creating a classroom routine. Students who see patterns in the classroom may be more likely to create patterns in their practice routines. Order of rehearsal (breathing exercises, scales and warm-ups, and repertoire study) and use of technology, like the metronome, could be mimicked in a lesson, then a student’s practice session, especially if that student has access to school resources at home.

            Like many teachers, I have motivated my beginning students with stickers and awards, but I have found that my students respond better to slight competition. I use Band Karate with my beginning students, which allows them to show off their lesson book progress by attaching colored strips to their cases. The program encourages students to practice regularly in order to achieve the highest belt, but this extrinsic motivation only lasts through fifth grade. In order to encourage intrinsic motivation, I might consider adding new elements to the current program that may or may not help to continue it into sixth or seventh grade. One planned addition is the use of SmartMusic (see separate blog post), but another features Band-in-a-Box. I am curious about creating Band-in-a-Box accompaniments to be used when reviewing long tones, scales, and other fundamentals. These accompaniments could be introduced during rehearsal warm-ups in order to make fundamentals more exciting for the students. Students who are intrigued by the accompaniments may create their own versions to be used at home when practicing fundamentals.

           

Bauer, W.I. (2014). Music Learning Today: Digital Pedagogy for Creating, Performing,

            and Responding to Music. New York, NY: Oxford University Press.