CHOIR NOTES...
Process-Focused Strategies in the Choral Classroom Marci Major, University of Missouri Ken Tucker, MMEA Choral Vice-president
Preface by Ken Tucker: Thank you for allowing me to serve as your Choral Vice-President. Good luck to Christy Shinn from Jackson, Missouri, who will be taking over this office.
I hope you were able to find things both beneficial and educational at our recent conference. I am most appreciative to Dr. Marci Major from the University of Missouri for her help in presenting her session, “Process-Focused Strategies in the Choral Classroom” and to Dr. Trent Patterson and the Webster University Chamber Singers for assisting her in the session. Marci was gracious enough to summarize the session for this article.
Good luck on the rest of your school year.
“Process-Focused Strategies in the Choral Classroom” by Marci Major
The idea of creating a student- centered approach in the choral classroom often sounds like a great philosophy, but does not always translate into practical everyday rehearsal. In this article we hope to offer a few suggestions and reminders for engaging students in the process of learning choral music.
Involving students starts with the introduction of a piece of music. Teachers are usually very good at finding ways to approach new music and “sell” it to the choir. Whether using a repeating melody or fun rhythmic motive, students walk away from the introduction of a
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piece “hooked” and wanting more. Unfortunately, teachers stop using these techniques as they continue to teach the music. For student involvement throughout, teachers should remember to approach each new element of the piece (e.g. text, a new section, etc.) in the same fashion that they started the music. Also, teachers should teach for transfer. This means asking the students to draw conclusions about similarities and differences from earlier sections of the piece and from music sung before.
Involving students starts with the introduction of a piece of music.
To continue involving students in the process of learning, teachers must expect the students to be active listeners. Building active listening skills requires constant training for young singers. Use every opportunity to engage your singers in the listening process, such playing a recording of the choir during the learning process while singers track changes, or allow small groups of students to come out and listen from an audience perspective. During listening activities, teachers should avoid open-ended questions such as “What did you hear?” and instead should try to give students specific listening tasks. These tasks might include comparing two ways of performing a melody and discussing the similarities and differences, or responding to a specific element such as clarity of text.
Building guided questioning skills will also help engage the students throughout the process. When questioning students, teachers should remember to stay away from either or questions, or questions that lead to ambiguous answers. These situations not only set a student up for failure, but also often require guessing, not the critical thinking skills we want students to use in the classroom. Students need direction when asked a question, and teachers must follow through in exploring the students’ answers creatively.
Directors often want to involve students in the process, but fear that the product will suffer as a result. To counter this argument, we suggest thinking more of the long- term benefits. Not only do we want to put on good concerts, but we also want to develop creative, musical, compassionate human beings who are unafraid to make decisions, take risks, be bold and make mistakes. As we work on developing these skills, you will find that your concerts also reach a new level. Students will feel less pressure to perform, and will also have a sense of self-worth that does not rely on outside opinion for approval. In the end, everybody benefits as we work to create life-long lovers of and hopefully participants in, choral music!
MISSOURI SCHOOL MUSIC| Volume 68, Number 3
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