Discipline-Specific Writing and Assessment

Music is one of those courses in which a student may never be required to write anything more than their name. Many music teachers incorporate little or no writing into their curriculum, assuming that, as an aural skill, music has little to do with other elements of learning. I think this is a mistake.There are many different learning styles, none of which should be neglected, and the act of writing out your thoughts and seeing them on paper is a powerful learning tool. Writing about any subject forces you to think critically, organize your thoughts, and condense them into a concise, legible form.

In my experience, those music teachers who have required written feedback have also had the most invested students and the most effective teaching styles. In a typical band or choir, learning is assessed through performance: passing off scales, rehearsing in sectionals, passing off sections of pieces, sight reading, playing complex rhythms, etc. My high school choir teacher required us to do concert reports, practice logs, and text analysis forms in addition to the more traditional performance practices. My band teacher required only that we play our instrument well, and assigned no homework other than practicing.. Although both groups had comparable performances, I certainly learned more about music from my choir teacher. A teachers approach to the music classroom depends greatly on their personal teaching philosophy. Many see performances and competitions as the end goal, others choose to teach music theory and aural skills alongside repertoire. Both approaches are valid and have far reaching effects. As for me, I believe that producing well rounded students who understand the musical concepts behind what they are playing/singing will be better prepared (and therefor more likely) to participate in music ensembles in the future. I also believe individual understanding will help with performance. But now I'm on a tangent, so back to writing.

A few assessment methods that I might use in my future classrooms would be listening assignments, concert reports, text analysis forms, and music maps. Listening assignments teach students to listen critically rather than passively, and writing reflections about what they hear can help them compare and contrast different genres of music. Concert reports encourage students to attend live music performances and broaden their experiences with music by exposing them to new and unfamiliar musical styles. The text analysis forms are a personal favorite of mine. My high school choir teacher required us to do these, and I found them fascinating and extremely beneficial. We would basically do a poetic analysis of whatever text we happened to be singing. Students must consider what they think the text means, and then explain what it means to them personally. This enables the students to perform with conviction, put emotion into their singing, and also helps clear up their diction. I learned about music maps in college. You literally draw up a map of a song, including depictions of rhythms, textures, colors, and images. It's difficult to describe, but they are really something. The nice thing about these drawings is that students don't need to have the musical vocabulary and understanding of a musicologist to express what they are hearing.

It is the teachers responsibility to tailor their teaching methods to the students so that they reach as many different learning styles as possible. Writing is one of the many forms teachers can use to prompt critical thinking and assess understanding.