Engaging with music What is good instrumentalvocal teaching

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Engaging with musicWhat is good
instrumental/vocal teaching?

• Janet Mills
• Royal College of Music
• jmills_at_rcm.ac.uk

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Acknowledgements

• Eight LEA music services
• Jan Smith
• Higher Education Funding Council for England
  (HEFCE)

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• Context
• Research questions
• The study
• Results
• Conclusions
• Questions!

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British Journal of Music Education

• Teachers beliefs about effective
  instrumental teaching in schools and higher
  education
• Janet Mills and Jan Smith
• BJME 2003 20(1) 5-27
• www.journals.cup.org

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Seven research studies
Observation of school teaching during 23
inspections or reviews of LEA music services
182 conservatoire students writing
Questionnaires from 134 LEA instrumental teachers
about schools and HE
Instrumental teaching
Interviews of 150 conservatoire teachers
Questionnaires from 60 conservatoire students
about the instrumental teaching they give
Observation of conservatoire teaching (ongoing)
Learning to perform instrumentalists and
instrumental teachers
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All this is part of a bigger picture

• Not interested only in instrumental teaching
  these days!
• Schools and curriculum music and beyond
• Youth Music
• Work overseas

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What makes instrumental teaching effective?

• Many ways of trying to answer this question
  including
• OFSTED criteria
• Lessons I have seen
• The framework of Common Approach 2002
• Teachers beliefs

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Research questions

• What do instrumental teachers believe to be the
  hallmarks of effective teaching in schools and in
  HE?
• To what extent are teachers beliefs about
  effective teaching influenced by the teaching
  that they recall receiving?
• What do teachers consider to be the most
  challenging aspects of their work?
• Do teachers answers to any of these questions
  vary according to factors including gender,
  qualifications, or the music service for which
  they work?

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The study

• Eight volunteer music services
• Semi-structured questionnaire (Autumn 2001)
• Just talking about first 4
  questions today.
• 134 responses
• Teachers responded at length, providing us with
  very rich considered data for analysis
• We coded each phrase of the teachers writing,
  checking between ourselves for consistency, and
  extending the range of codes when necessary. We
  aimed to capture as much as possible of the
  quality and detail of what teachers had written.

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The 134 teachers

• Principal instruments strings (45), woodwind
  (35), keyboard (22), brass (13), percussion (6),
  voice (6), other (7)
• Teach up to 6 instruments. 93 (69) teach 2
• 74 (55) have QTS
• Teachers with QTS teach more instruments

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Results

• Q1 Thinking of teachers and pupils in general,
  what do you consider to be the hallmarks of good
  instrumental teaching of pupils of school age?
• Teacher A
• Trying to lay the foundations for good
  technique and habits, while trying to keep
  lessons fun and interesting. Pupils should enjoy
  playing but expect to work hard, practise
  regularly at home and be shown how to do it (Do
  we show pupils how to practise enough?). They
  should learn to play fluently and expressively
  and have opportunities to perform solos, play in
  small groups, and in larger orchestras.
• 68 words 5 hallmarks enthusiasm technical
  focus pupil has fun practice skills
  performance opportunities.

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• Q1 Thinking of teachers and pupils in general,
  what do you consider to be the hallmarks of good
  instrumental teaching of pupils of school age?
• Teacher B
• Enthusiasm. Able to relate to children.
  Sensitive to individual needs. Use of popular
  tunes. Encouragement.
• 15 words 5 hallmarks enthusiasm
  communication match wide repertoire
  praise/positive.
• Teacher C
• Being approachable, communicating well. Making
  lessons fun. Giving good descriptive teaching
  both for technical and musical ideas. Allowing
  the pupil some autonomy in the way their lesson
  goes e.g. would you like to play top or bottom
  in the duet? What do you feel needs most
  attention in this piece? Teaching with humour.
  Also, play and response work is brilliant for
  keeping people responsive and aurally switched
  on.
• 67 words 5 hallmarks communication pupil
  has fun pupil participates sense of humour
  listening skills.

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Most popular hallmarks

• Enthusiastic teacher 50
• Knowledgeable teacher 43
• Communicative teacher 40
• Fun for pupils 27
• Teaching matched to pupils 24
• Praise/positive teacher 24

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• Q2 Again in general, what do you consider to be
  the hallmarks of good instrumental teaching in
  higher education, for example in a conservatoire?
• Teacher A (HE)
• The development of a good technique as a means
  to play musically and expressively. To encourage
  exploration and initiative but give clear
  guidance on how to work and what is expected. To
  play and perform as much as possible in different
  sorts of music solo, ensemble, orchestra,
  other.
• 48 words 6 hallmarks technical focus
  develop individual voice practice skills pupil
  participation performance opportunities wide
  repertoire
• Teacher A (School)
• Trying to lay the foundations for good technique
  and habits, while trying to keep lessons fun and
  interesting. Pupils should enjoy playing but
  expect to work hard, practise regularly at home
  and be shown how to do it (Do we show pupils how
  to practise enough?). They should learn to play
  fluently and expressively and have opportunities
  to perform solos, play in small groups, and in
  larger orchestras.
• 68 words 5 hallmarks enthusiasm technical
  focus pupil has fun practice skills
  performance opportunities.
• Enthusiasm. Able to relate to children.
  Sensitive to individual needs. Use of popular
  tunes. Encouragement.
• 15 words 5 hallmarks enthusiasm
  communication match wide repertoire
  praise/positive.
• Teacher C
• Being approachable, communicating well. Making
  lessons fun. Giving good descriptive teaching
  both for technical and musical ideas. Allowing
  the pupil some autonomy in the way their lesson
  goes e.g. would you like to play top or bottom
  in the duet? What do you feel needs most
  attention in this piece? Teaching with humour.
  Also, play and response work is brilliant for
  keeping people responsive and aurally switched
  on.
• 67 words 5 hallmarks communication pupil
  has fun pupil participates sense of humour
  listening skills.

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• Q2 Again in general, what do you consider to be
  the hallmarks of good instrumental teaching in
  higher education, for example in a conservatoire?
• Teacher B (HE)
• Technique. Variety and breadth of styles.
  Encourage individual interpretation.
• 9 words 3 hallmarks technical focus wide
  repertoire develop individual voice.
• Teacher B (School)
• Enthusiasm. Able to relate to children.
  Sensitive to individual needs. Use of popular
  tunes. Encouragement.
• 15 words 5 hallmarks enthusiasm
  communication match wide repertoire
  praise/positive.

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• Q2 Again in general, what do you consider to be
  the hallmarks of good instrumental teaching in
  higher education, for example in a conservatoire?
• Teacher C (HE)
• Giving good background to the style / character
  of a piece. Clear, easily understood technique
  teaching that enables the pupil to take off with
  their own musical ideas. Supporting the pupil
  and giving positive support when they experiment
  musically.
• 39 words 4 hallmarks knowledge technical
  focus develop individual voice praise/positive.
• Teacher C(School)
• Being approachable, communicating well. Making
  lessons fun. Giving good descriptive teaching
  both for technical and musical ideas. Allowing
  the pupil some autonomy in the way their lesson
  goes e.g. would you like to play top or bottom
  in the duet? What do you feel needs most
  attention in this piece? Teaching with humour.
  Also, play and response work is brilliant for
  keeping people responsive and aurally switched
  on.
• 67 words 5 hallmarks communication pupil
  has fun pupil participates sense of humour
  listening skills.

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The top 10 in schools and HE
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• While the school rankings of teachers with and
  without QTS are similar, those for HE often
  differ.
• The greater commonality of views re school may
  reflect the impact of INSET provided by LEAs.

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HE ranks of teachers with/without QTS
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• Q3 Please reflect on the teaching that you
  received on your main teaching instrument,
  consider how well it worked for you, and complete
  a table to show its main strengths and
  weaknesses.
• Teachers completed this table for teaching
  while at school and teaching after leaving
  school. Whereas Qs 1-2 related to their
  beliefs, Q3 relates to their recollections.
• There was generally only a weak link between
  teachers beliefs and recollections. This
  finding challenges the anecdotal view that
  teachers teach as they were taught.
• Teacher As recollections, like his/her beliefs,
  emphasised technical focus, but Teacher C was
  more typical.

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Teacher C
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Strengths and weaknesses of teaching recalled
from time at school
Some strengths (e.g. enthusiastic teacher) do not
have a balancing weakness
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• Q4 Do you remember a single lesson that was
  particularly effective for you as as student? If
  so, please explain its content and focus, and
  what made it particularly effective.
• Much closer link between responses to
  this question and
  teachers
  beliefs.

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• Teacher A
• When I was first made to really listen to
  intonation instead of just thinking I was. My
  teacher told me to listen to the intonation of
  each note that she played, I found I listened
  much more carefully and analytically than I did
  to myself, by playing a passage slowly being
  very fussy (changing experimenting) could
  improve intonation.

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• Teacher C
• It wasnt exactly a lesson but a
  masterclass made up of people the same as me (at
  the time) preparing for college auditions.
  Experiencing very clear technical advice that
  enabled me to play the music how I wanted then
  watching someone else receiving the same kind of
  help was very helpful.

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Conclusions

• Instrumental teachers emerge from this study as
  highly committed and professional individuals,
  determined to provide effectively for the wide
  range of pupils that they teach
• The link between special lessons and beliefs is
  reminiscent of John Slobodas references to peak
  experience
• This also ties in with some research at the RCM
  on special lessons received by students
• In order to influence further teachers beliefs,
  it may help to alternate INSET on OFSTED
  criteria, Common Approach, what makes a good
  lesson etc, with some first class music making
  or even some instrumental lessons from time to
  time
• This is all about engaging with music for
  teachers as well as pupils.

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After the research

• We sent each of the 8 music services a summary of
  their data, compared with that for the whole
  sample. Some used this to guide INSET
• We wrote brief user-friendly resumés for two
  service newsletters
• Using the findings to structure some INSET at the
  RCM
• We are making our questionnaire available to
  other LEA music services
• We are ready to experiment with producing a
  structured version of the questionnaire. This
  would be much faster to process.

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