How has technology impacted music education?
Music has brought up the learning curve in understanding how music is made both theoretically and how it is made.
When I was younger "Band in a Box" had come out and was used for improvisation and understanding chord progressions mainly in jazz.
Since then there are great programs for electronic composition in addition to a program called smart music.
Smart Music helps students by recording and grading performance bench marks which justifies grades.
Recording software such as protools allows high school students to create compositions giving students any instrument they can think of and allowing them to write for it and hear it instantaneously.
In New York there are state competitions for electronic compositions at the high school level.
Today for example I had taught the major and minor scale using a website called virtual keyboard. The students interests peaked when I had asked them to use their cell phones to download piano app so that they could play along in the class and hear the scales as I had explained them.
The music theory information involved was much easier for the students to understand since they had tactile, visual and auditory means of learning the concepts.
In the future I believe music theory should be and will be delivered electronically. The information does not have to be watered down as I had mentioned above the three modalities of learning are there.
I do believe however that instruments still need to be played and singing must be done in my opinion for students to really understand the music they would like to play.
Good points Joe. I like the keyboard app idea. Great way to teach scales and gives everyone there own easy-to-use instrument.
ReplyDeleteHey Joe, I definitely agree with your last point. I think that it can be easy to get carried away and get lost in the uses of technology when the reality is that music is learned by thinking, singing, and playing. I think technology plays a vital role in creating music after certain skills are learned, but without that foundation the rest is just computer class!
ReplyDeleteJoe K,
ReplyDeleteThank you! I agree whole-heartedly. That is all.
Is an iPad an instrument?
ReplyDeleteHonest answer, no. Computers, tablets, and ipads do not replace instruments but they can enhance the learning process.
ReplyDeleteHi Joe,
ReplyDeleteThe resounding message that I garner from your posting is that technology should augment the "conventional" lessons of a music classroom, but will never take the place of "traditional" instruments, such as the saxophone, guitar, piano, violin or human voice for that matter. I am not much of a technology guru myself, but I have to say that Professor Schneider's teachings during Music in the Secondary School, combined with reading Dr. Scott Watson's book "Using Technology to Unlock Musical Creativity" have opened my eyes to the many possibilities, which exist to incorporate electronic instruments, computer software and digital recording devices into the music classroom. The programs that you mention in your response to this particular blog prompt (Band-In-A-Box, Smart Music and Pro Tools) all have many positive applications across the courses offered by a typical public school music program. However, I think that you are completely justified in cautioning eager educators to be wary of the drawbacks and potential losses that could be wracked up from an overabundance of technology in the classroom. Akin to 'Than, I too think that the keyboard application idea is quite interesting, but I am wondering if it would be more effective to set students up in a keyboard laboratory, so that they would actually be applying the concepts that you taught on a "conventional" instrument. This brings up the debate that Professor Schneider references by asking the question, "Is an iPad an instrument?" I completely agree with you that an iPad can never take the place of a tried-and-true musical instrument, but I think that in this day and age, the definition of the term "musical instrument" is expanding. There are probably plenty of people who would argue that an iPad could be considered a musical instrument. It is true that there are many musical tasks that could be accomplished on an iPad without much study or skill going in, but there are definitely concepts that require a great deal of practice to master, at least from what I understand. I too would not classify an iPad as a "musical instrument", but I think that it might be better served under the term "musical tool" since it has the capacity and capability of creating sonic textures. I enjoyed reading your writings and appreciate the thoughtful insights, which as with all of our classmates' postings, have given me much to consider as I prepare to man the helm of my own program in the not-too-distant future. Have a great weekend!
-Matt Chasen-