I am honored to be the new research advisor for the Michigan Music Education Association. Let me start by thanking my friend and colleague, Dr. Terese Volk Tuohey, for her work in this position over the past several years. During her tenure, she has increased the number of submissions for our annual poster session, contributed many informative articles to the Michigan Music Educator, and initiated the annual research symposium at the Michigan Music Conference (MMC). Terese recently retired from her position as associate professor of instrumental music education at Wayne State University in Detroit, but plans to continue her prolific research agenda in music education history and world music education. We wish her well. Research is becoming increasingly
important in education, especially in light of the call by various stakeholders to determine curricula, pedagogy, and assessment on best practices. Best practices are defined as strategies, activities or approaches that have been shown through research and evaluation to be effective and/or efficient (Florida Department of Education, n.d.). Perhaps the opposite of best practices is folk pedagogy, which involves teaching based on notions or assumptions about how people learn and think (Brunner, 1996). This is not to say that the pedagogical decisions we make based on experiences alone are wrong. After all, we are professionals who learn a great deal through our observations and interactions with students. We know they are learning because we hear improvement in their tone and intonation, notice greater nuance in their musical phrasing, and see a higher level of complexity and cohesion in their compositions.
In the end, however, we need research to
determine if our teaching methods are the most effective and efficient compared to other strategies and approaches. Fortunately, there are a number of sources available for teachers looking to provide evidence of best practices. Literature reviews—articles that synthesize and draw conclusions and implications from many research studies on a particular topic—are a good place to start. Several journals regularly publish literature reviews including Update: Applications of Research in Music Education, which is available to all NAfME members on the organization’s web site. In addition, the Center for Music Learning at the University of Texas at Austin will soon begin publishing Reviews of Research in Human Learning and Music (RRHLM), an online journal dedicated to reviews of literature related to the various dimensions of music activity in the human
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experience (Center for Music Learning, 2012). Other journals that publish literature reviews include Contributions to Music Education, published by the Ohio Music Educators Association, and the Bulletin of the Council for Research in Music Education, published by the University of Illinois. Reviews of the literature are also included in most dissertations and at the beginning of most research articles. Recent literature reviews from Update include articles on gender and instrument selection (Wych, 2012), children’s singing and the implications for teaching children to sing (Hedden, 2012), sight singing strategies (Kuehne, 2010), and elementary music assessment (Salvador, 2010). In addition to consulting current research,
many educators work to establish best practices within their own setting through action research. This process may involve testing two or more pedagogical approaches among different groups of students or collecting data about the attitudes, values, habits, or actions of various stakeholders in the music program. A basic experiment, for example, could determine if sight singing with solfege and Curwin hand signs leads to higher achievement on this task compared to sight singing with syllables alone. Likewise, a survey of parents and students might reveal otherwise unknown factors involved in the decision for a child to continue or discontinue participation in a music ensemble. Although conducting research can seem like a daunting task, it does not have to be complicated. We can learn a lot from analyzing basic numerical data such as averages, percentages, and frequency counts, or from students’ anonymous responses to well- constructed survey questions. There are a number of resources available
for teachers who want to learn more about research. Exploring Research in Music Education and Music Therapy by Kenneth Phillips (2007) introduces readers to research concepts, terminology, and techniques in our field. Another book, Using Research and Reason in Education: How Teachers Can Use Scientifically Based Research to Make Curricular and Instructional Decisions (Stanovich & Stanovich, 2003), is published by the Partnership for Reading and available online, free of charge. Although not directly related to music education, this text provides a clear, concise explanation of (a) the difference between research and non-research based practices, (b) the teacher’s role in research, (c) the characteristics of quality research, and (d) the use of research-based practices in the classroom.
Outreach to Research
Phillip M. Hash, Research Editor
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