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Music Technology in the classroom
Music Technology in the Classroom and Rehearsal
Robert Morton
Educational Technology Section 11
April 24, 2007
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Technology in the music classroom has really changed in the past couple decades
with the introduction of computers and their evolutions in computing power. And as
technology continues to evolve and grow, the ways to use technology in the music
classroom will evolve as well. One of the main technologies that is being implemented
within the classroom and rehearsal room is the use of notation software. Notation
software is a program that allows the user to compose music on the computer, rather than
writing it on manuscript paper, also known as staff paper. Through the use of these
programs, students are allowed to ‘compose music in traditional and nontraditional ways’
(Roblyer, 372).
The beginning of learning music, in the primary schools, notation software ‘can
help teach note names and values as well as meter/key signatures in elementary school’
(Brody). When a students starts taking music courses in school the first things they learn
is where the notes fall on the staff, after that students learn simple time signatures and
eventually key signatures. The role notation software is that it helps students create a
strong foundation of the building blocks of music will help students become better with
musical notation. This is done by the teacher creating some handouts or notes, where the
students have to fill in the note names, or the key signature of a given piece, or the piece
is completely filled out and marked as notes for the student to help understand and
remember where the notes fall on the staff.
Another way notation software can be used in the classroom is through guided
composition, which is composing through prescribed parameters, helps students reach
their ultimate goal as a composer, the successful notation of their composition.
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Parameters can include certain meters, keys, clefs, rhythms, note lengths, but never
melody, because so the teacher does not hamper “the sole creation of the young
composer” (Brody). Having the students compose their own musical pieces helps them
not only understand what a composer goes through when writing a piece of music, but the
difficulties involved in part writing. “Students should move through sound exploration,
idea generation, arranging ideas into texture and form, revising, choosing instruments,
dynamics and tempo” (Strand). When they are composing using the software, they need
to think of all the different aspects of the composing, even though with guided
composition, the students have guidelines to follow, other than those guidelines, they are
free to do whatever they wish to do, to create their own musical masterpiece. Students
can also view other musical scores via the web, and now “most music notation packages
are promoting exchanges of scores via the web” (Davison). This can be good and bad,
good meaning the students can view other scores that have been uploaded so they can go
through and look at them for themselves, but the bad part is that some of the students
could get lazy and plagiarize other composers’ works.
In the teaching world, all the students are unique and require attention and help
from time to time, however the mentally or physically handicapped students need more
attention and more help so they can be successful in the class and be successful later in
life. In the music classroom, this could not be truer. There are three technology solution
levels to assist the learning process, no-technology, low-technology, and advanced
(high)-technology. “No-tech solutions are strategies such as teaching a person to use his
or her body in a different manner to minimize the impact of an impairment…Low-tech
solutions are generally considered non-electrical…High-tech solutions are complex
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electrical and hydraulic systems” (Roblyer 413). To help students participate in class and
increase their potential to succeed, special things must be done. Whether it is by using a
miniature piano keyboard instead of the regular computer keyboard, or having the student
work on a touch screen computer and get rid of the keyboard altogether.
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References
Brophy, T. (1996). Building music literacy with guided composition. Music Educators
Journal, 83(3), 15.
Davison, S. (2002). Music Notation Software Formats. Notes, 59(2), 404.
Strand, K. (2006). Survey of Indiana Music Teachers on Using Composition in the
Classroom. Journal of Research In Music Education, 54(2), 154-167.
Roblyer, M.D. (2006) Chapter 13: Technology in Music and Art Education. Integrating
Educational Technology into Teaching 4th Edition (pp 367-387) New Jersey:
Prentice Hall.
Roblyer, M.D. (2006) Chapter 15: Technology in Special Education. Integrating
Educational Technology into Teaching 4th Edition (pp 407-422) New Jersey:
Prentice Hall