| Description |
xii, 207 leaves : illustrations ; 29 cm |
| Note |
Typescript. |
| Thesis |
Thesis (Ph. D.)--New York University, Graduate School of Arts and Science, 2008. |
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references (leaves 132-142). |
| Summary |
This study examines the inner transformation of myself as a teacher throughout a sixteen-week composition project using computer technology with my fourth and fifth-grade music students. Approached from a phenomenological perspective, this research engages constructivist philosophy through an action research method aimed at examining the critically reflective music educator. |
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This research addresses how the integration of music education computer software applications like Morton Subotnick's Making Music, Music Ace I and Music Ace II can be used in the creation of teaching environments designed to develop critically reflective music makers who engage synthesis, evaluation and critical reflection in cognitive processes. |
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This research explores how the implementation of such representative computer applications can assist in the development of teaching strategies designed to lead students to compose a text-based choral composition, an essential element of a general/choral curriculum. This problem is interrogated by creating a study involving a "meta-journal" monitoring the progress of the design of a text-based choral composition project using computer technology to assist in the creative, intuitive compositional process with the philosophy of constructivism engaged as a lens through which to view the educational setting. Tweaking the computer technology and the use of traditional performing forces is highly encouraged in this experiment. |
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The process of inner transformation that occurs in this work within my teaching and within my critical, self-meta reflection on the projects I conducted with my students provides a concrete application of constructivist ideals within an actual classroom environment. It provides a model for other music educators interested in engaging technology within a constructivist platform in their classrooms when they approach research, particularly that which is action-based and critically self-reflective. While I have reviewed Bruner, Gardener, Elliott, and others, I have also grounded the philosophy of constructivism, through a phenomenological lens, in one small New Jersey classroom with one small group of my students. This local study opens up possibilities for global ideas. It is my belief that great philosophies become greater when taken off the bookshelf and placed into practice in the real world. It is my hope that this work serves as a mirror for such great philosophies to reflect their applications upon students, in classrooms, on schools, and most importantly, upon the inner lives of teachers. |
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The research undertaken in this dissertation has urged the view that students not only actively participate in the use of what is learned, but also actively engage that knowledge in situations that replicate real-world scenarios. For example, when students are going through the process of composing, publishing, rehearsing, and performing compositions of their own creation, they are facing the same problems that "real musicians" face in their creative processes. The term "real musician" is one that points to active use of the knowledge students are acquiring and has been an important and active term throughout this study. In other words, they are not simply performing tasks as students in an artificial environment, but rather are acting as real musicians themselves. Moreover, they are facing the problems that exist in real life: coming up with creative ideas to compose, being sure scores are accurate and readable by performers (this part may involve many struggles with software and hardware), preparing their performers to interpret their composition as they intended and perhaps at the same time allowing leeway for the performer's own creative, interpretive ideas. Colwell observes, "assessment depends upon a clear definition of the discipline" (2004, p. 1). And in this case, the discipline is defined by the work done in the real world: the composer's study, the music publisher's office, the stage, and the rehearsal hall. This process continues as the student's critically reflect upon what they have done at every stage of this process. As Bohlen writes, "each of us has the responsibility to vigorously create the environment within which [the] Einsteins might occur (2004)." Meta-reflecting leads us closer to the brilliance of Einstein, whose theories were grounded in the real world effects they promoted. And this meta-reflection leads our students to alter their approaches and thinking as they revisit both the processes they applied to their creative process as well as the content of their creative result. |
| Subject |
Music -- Instruction and study.
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Music -- Instruction and study. |
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Music and technology.
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Music and technology. |
| Genre/Form |
Academic theses.
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Academic theses.
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