I write this from the perspective of a person with a Master's Degree in
education, 4 teaching credentials, and 26 years experience at the
elementary and adult levels (mostly elementary school).
I think it takes a special talent to be an effective teacher. Mastery of
the subject matter is insufficient. If it were enough, any high school
graduate could teach elementary school. There would be no reason to go to
college and take theory, psychology of learning, and methods courses.
After much thought, I have come to the conclusion that the best teachers
do
no more than make learning possible for the student. The learner is much
more than an empty vessel waiting to filled up by the expert's wisdom. A
good teacher motivates, simplifies, brings complex material down to the
level of the student, making it easy enough to understand and do, but
difficult enough for progress to be made. I am not really sure that
students ever fail - I'm tempted to say that it is teachers who fail when
their students do not meet expectations. Teachers who have failed to
motivate, to simplify, to connect new information to what a student
already knows. I believe that teachers should ask themselves what they can
do differently if students are having trouble.
My own personal experience with music lessons does not encourage me to try
them again. I was kicked out of ballet class at the age of four because I
would not/could not mimic what the teacher was demonstrating.
Consequently, I have always believed that I could never learn to dance. I
had one or two singing lessons when I was 10. I was very lousy. No one
encouraged me and I quit. I have never learned to sing properly, even
though I love it. I have always believed I had a bad voice, and that was
that. As a young adult I thought I would give an instrument a try. I had
five years of guitar lessons from five different people. With one
exception, none of these people were effective teachers. They were
musicians trying to make some extra money by teaching. Their expertise was
in playing. They did not know how people learn; I'm not even sure they
cared. In each case, I was presented with either a method book or xeroxes
of music and told what to practice for the next time.The method books I
went through lesson by lesson, page by page. It was the book that told
the teacher what to cover. The teachers did not feel free to vary. In
elementary education, we refer to this practice as the publishers
determining the curriculum, rather than the teachers who should know their
students best.
I believe that since time immemorial, elementary schools have completely
failed students in instruction in the arts. In my own education and
through
observations as a teacher and coordinator, I have seen visual arts
instuction largely limited to making copies of the teachers' examples.
More crafts than arts. Where is the instruction? What do students learn
about color, perspective, light and shadow, etc.? If they can copy the
example well, they get praise and a good grade. If they have difficulty,
well tough tomatoes. I was one of those who had difficulty at a young age
with eye hand coordination. I never learned to draw until I took a class
as an adult on using the right side of the brain.
It is the same with elementary music instuction. If you can sing well, you
are invited to join the chorus. If you can't, well, tough tomatoes
again.Is anyone ever taught *how* to sing?
Some children seem to be able to figure these things out on their own,
without a whole lot of prior instuction - how to sing, how to draw, how to
dance. It is this ability that we call talent.
I propose that the arts can be learned by mostly everyone, just as one can
learn to read, write,
and do math. Elementary teachers don't generally *teach* the arts, because
they don't
know how. Either they have no "talent" of their own or they do not
understand why what they create is judged to be "good." So arts teaching
becomes no more than arts demonstrations.
I stopped playing the guitar a long time ago. I had mastered a lot of
technique, but I didn't really like the music I was playing. I was still
young and just didn't know very much about music history and different
styles. None of my teachers exposed me to anything beyond what they
themselves played. Now as a mature adult, I find that I truly love what we
call Early Music. I love to listen to it, and I want to play it. I thought
of getting a lute and finally settled upon a wire strung harp.
I have learned a fair amount of music theory through the years - a
semester at
UCLA Extension, a year of music history, and a couple of years fooling
around with the piano (self taught). But most of all, I have listened to
thousands of hours of music. I know what I like to hear and how it is
"supposed" to sound.
As for the necessity of lessons for "proper" technique, I refer you to the
film of the original Woodstock. I think few people would dispute that
Jimi (sp?) Hendrix is one of the greatest rock guitarists who ever lived.
In this movie you will see him using a most unorthodox method with his
left hand. He uses his *thumb* to depress the bass strings! A cardinal
sin according to most guitarists. I don't think that technique matters a
whit.
What
matters is the sounds that are produced. As someone else on this list so
accurately observed, it is through variations in technique that music (and
visual arts, as well) have evolved through time. I submit that it is this
willingness to vary from what all others are doing that we call
"creativity".
Playing as all others do, copying examples is not creativity to me. It is
nothing more than mimicry.Daring to be different is what creativity is all
about.
In mathematics instruction these days, we emphasize the idea that there
can be more than one way to solve a problem. What is important is that the
student be able to explain how s/he got the answer. I think that the same
is
true for music. If a person can listen to something that s/he likes and
figure out, on their own how to make those sounds and apply this knowledge
to other music, then s/he has learned well. Not just mimicry but
application of the information. If something a students produces sounds
"wrong" to them, then it *is* wrong and vice versa.
Someone on this list said it was important to know why I want to play the
harp and I agree. It is for fun, to please myself and my friends. I have
no desire to make money at it. I just want to be able to make the music
that I enjoy, which at the moment is limited to Medieval music of the
11th-14th centuries. This is why I chose a wire harp rather than nylon,
which
is probably easier to play. I spent five years making music on my guitar
playing mostly the Spanish Baroque and later repertoire, which I did not
really like. Why learn by playing Celtic or Romantic or New Age music, if
this is not what I really like? Where is the motivation to practice?
I wonder how many people on this list who have recommended lessons to me
are harp teachers themselves. Obviously they speak from the perspective of
someone earning a living (or trying to) from this profession. I don't
expect them to say lessons are not necessary. Nor do I believe lessons are
not necessary for children. They do not have enough context to be able to
know what sounds right. They do not yet know any theory. Many adults, on
the
other hand, especially professionals, play many instruments. Do you think
they went through years of lessons on each one? If one truly understands
how to make music, learning other instruments becomes much easier. Just as
learning other languages is much easier after the second one.
I know this message is very long, and for that I apologize. I just felt
that I needed to explain my point of view. Hopefully the harp teachers can
glean something useful from this. I have much more to say on this topic -
feel free to email me, if this is something that interests you.
Barbara
bshuwarg@lausd.k12.ca.us (yep, that's the Los Angeles Unified School
District)