Music Teachers Values And Beliefs

In Music Teachers' Values and Beliefs, Dwyer investigates the relationships between teachers, learners and music in music classrooms. Using Bourdieu's concepts of habitus and doxa as an interpretive lens, the book explores the values and beliefs of four music teachers, depicted in richly detailed narratives. The narratives are contextualised through the examination of traditions of music and contemporary approaches. In the past, music education has been shaped by elitist tendencies regarding the types of music worthy of study, the ways in which music should be learnt, and the purpose of such learning. Contemporary approaches to music education have enacted significant change in some regions and systems, while others have been slower to leave behind deeply entrenched values, beliefs and practices. These approaches have been blamed for low rates of participation and engagement in school music education, despite the fact that the majority of young people listen to and enjoy music outside of school. This innovative book provides music education researchers and practitioners with a new understanding of the impact of teachers' personal values, beliefs and experiences of music and music education on classroom practice, and the impact this has on students' experiences of music education.

Music, Education, and Religion: Intersections and Entanglements explores the critical role that religion can play in formal and informal music education. As in broader educational studies, research in music education has tended to sidestep the religious dimensions of teaching and learning, often reflecting common assumptions of secularity in contemporary schooling in many parts of the world. This book considers the ways in which the forces of religion and belief construct and complicate the values and practices of music education—including teacher education, curriculum texts, and teaching repertoires. The contributors to this volume embrace a range of perspectives from a variety of disciplines, examining religious, agnostic, skeptical, and atheistic points of view. Music, Education, and Religion is a valuable resource for all music teachers and scholars in related fields, interrogating the sociocultural and epistemological underpinnings of music repertoires and global educational practices.

Constructing a Personal Orientation to Music Teaching: Growth, Inquiry, and Agency, (Second Edition), is a textbook for studies in music education. Expanding upon the first edition, the authors promote inquiry and reflection to facilitate teacher growth, lifelong learning, and a disposition toward educational change. The revised text responds to current calls for social change and teacher education reform by reaffirming and intensifying the need for music teachers to adopt a personal orientation toward their work. A personal orientation encourages teachers to initiate their own growth, engage in inquiry, and exercise agency in school contexts. Strongly grounded in current theories and research in teacher education, Constructing a Personal Orientation to Music Teaching: Growth, Inquiry, and Agency strives to do the following: Engage readers in analyzing their own experiences in order to conceptualize the complexity of teaching Involve them in clarifying their reasons for seeking a career in teaching Support their insights, questions, and reflections about their work Promote a reflective, critical attitude about schools in general as music teachers are urged to think of themselves as change agents in school settings Construct a moral purpose as a compass to guide their current and future endeavors in the profession. Every chapter includes a wealth of pedagogical features, including new methodologies and examples of practice to engage the readers in processes of inquiry and reflection. The second edition is organized in two parts. Part I focuses on positioning music teachers as learners in the profession, significantly expanding concepts explored in the first edition that are central to a personal orientation to professional growth. In the new edition, a reconceptualized Chapter 5 challenges teachers to cultivate their identities as change agents. The second half of the book—focusing on becoming a student of music teaching— features five new chapters. A provocative chapter on curriculum sets the stage for a set of additional chapters that invite deeper considerations of the commonplaces of teacher, learners, subject matter, and context. An epilogue speaks directly to the power of agency, imagination, and hope in teachers’ lives.

This open access book highlights the importance of visions of alternative futures in music teacher education in a time of increasing societal complexity due to increased diversity. There are policies at every level to counter prejudice, increase opportunities, reduce inequalities, stimulate change in educational systems, and prevent and counter polarization. Foregrounding the intimate connections between music, society and education, this book suggests ways that music teacher education might be an arena for the reflexive contestation of traditions, hierarchies, practices and structures. The visions for intercultural music teacher education offered in this book arise from a variety of practical projects, intercultural collaborations, and cross-national work conducted in music teacher education. The chapters open up new horizons for understanding the tension-fields and possible discomfort that music teacher educators face when becoming change agents. They highlight the importance of collaborations, resilience and perseverance when enacting visions on the program level of higher education institutions, and the need for change in re-imagining music teacher education programs.

Based on topics that frame the debate about the future of professional music education, this book explores the issues that music teachers must confront in a rapidly shifting educational landscape. The book aims to challenge thought and change minds. It presents a star cast of internationally prominent thinkers in and beyond music education. These thinkers deliberately challenge many time-worn traditions in music education with regard to musicianship, culture and society, leadership, institutions, interdisciplinarity, research and theory, and curriculum. This is the first book to confront these issues in this way. This unique book has emerged from fifteen years of international dialog by The MayDay Group, an organization of more than 250 music educators from over 20 countries who meet yearly to confront issues in music teaching and learning.

The Musical Experience proposes a new concept - musical experience - as the most effective framework for navigating the shifting terrain of educational policy as it is applied to music education. The editors and contributors define musical experience as being characterized by the depth of affective and emotional responses that music generates. The chapters map out the primary forms of musical engagement - performing, listening, improvising, and composing - as activities which play a key role in classroom teaching. They also address the cultural scope of musical experience, which calls for the consideration of time, place, beliefs, and values to be placed upon musical activities. The Musical Experience discusses how music teachers can most effectively rely on means of musical communication to lead students toward the development and refinement of musical skills, understandings, and expression in educational settings. This book serves to expand upon the dimensions of musical experience and provides, from the forefront of the field, an integrated yet panoramic view of the educational processes involved in music teaching and learning.

For upper level undergraduate and introductory graduate and doctoral courses in music education. Outlining the basic aspects, constructs and concepts relevant to understanding music teaching and learning from a sociological perspective, this volume introduces students to the discipline as a tool in understanding their own work. The text shows how certain academics in music, sociology and education have thought about the relationship of music to education, schooling and society and examines the consequences of such thinking for making instructional choices in teaching methods and repertoire selection. School music teaching is imbedded in two major societal traditions: (1) the tradition of music making, listening, and responding; and (2) the tradition of education as a societal mandate. The first tradition holds firmly to music artistry and musicological scholarship, the latter of which includes music sociology. The second tradition, that of education as a field of study, relies mostly on pedagogical principles rooted equally in psychology and sociology. Hildegard Froehlich bases the book upon the premise that a music teacher's work is equally shaped by both traditions. The more music teachers become aware of how societal structures shape their own lives as well as the lives of their students, colleagues, and superiors; the more "reality-based" their teaching will become. Society is a composite of communities in which different social classes, groups, and reference groups co-exist-to varying degrees of compatibility due to real or perceived differences in norms and values as well as hierarchies of power. Informed or intuitive choices made by an individual indicate allegiances to particular groups, how those groups are structured hierarchically; and where and how each individual fits into those hierarchies. This is true for the music world as it is true for the world of education.

Editorial Board: Deborah Blair VanderLinde, Oakland University. William Bauer, University of Florida. Lisa R. Hunter, The State University of New York at Fredonia. Ronald Kos, Boston University. Joshua A. Russell, The Hartt School, University of Hartford. Peter Whiteman, Institute of Early Childhood, Macquarie University. Analyzing Influences: Research on Decision Making and the Music Education Curriculum examines influences on research in music teacher preparation, practices, and policies. These influences include administrators’ perspectives, preservice music educators’ beliefs, and in-service teachers’ practices. Invited essays offer insights into past and present trends in music teacher preparation. This collection of studies represents best thinking in the field and serves as an impetus for further research and action. Each author’s analysis on the influences affecting their specific areas provides insights into key issues affecting decision making processes. This volume is a significant addition to the libraries of Colleges of Education and Schools of Music, as well as an important reference for music scholars and educators, researchers, and graduate students who are concerned with advancing both the scope and quality of research in the study of music teaching and learning.