An Appreciative Discovery of High School Band Students’ Experiences:A Tool for Band Curriculum and Instruction
Author: Matthew R Moehle
Case Western Reserve University
Cleveland, OH United States
05/01/2004
Annotation: As the field of education faces new state and federal mandates, one of the challenges is to adjust curriculum and teaching methods to meet new demands. At the same time, consideration must be given to proven education strategies and methods. Additionally, diverse individual students, teachers, administrators, and school environments are also factors in designing and implementing curriculum and teaching strategies. The ultimate challenge to the field of education is to design and use teaching methods and curriculum designs that take all factors into consideration and yield the greatest, positive effects on students.
As attention is further directed to the needs of students, the questions regarding the implementation of curriculum and instruction include: What do students perceive as the aspects of curriculum that are of most value and interest to them and the class? What do students perceive as the moments and methods that create the greatest learning and intellectual development of students and what do students perceive as the aspects of teaching that are leading to this learning and development? The feedback of students directly involved in the curriculum and instruction must be used to receive first-hand answers to these questions.
The purpose of this study was to use an appreciative inquiry approach to investigate and describe what aspects of band class students perceive as having the greatest value, influence, and contribution to their personal education. By focusing on what students feel are the most positive reasons for joining and continuing band as well as their most positive band experiences and performances, an insight of students’ beliefs regarding current aspects of music education that are having the most positive impact on their education may be revealed. Such a viewpoint may be invaluable to educators, curriculum designers, and researchers in the field of music education.
This paper is serving as a pilot study for a larger thesis. In the current version, it is to be presented at the Amercian Educational Research Association Annual Meeting in Montreal, April 2005.
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