comprehensive musicianship through performance
Beyond the Bumper Sticker: Exploring and Assessing the Affective Domain Margaret Jenks, CMP Committee Member
Where words fail, music speaks. Without music, life would be a mistake. Music is the voice of the soul.
Look no further than the Cafe Press T- shirt collection to confirm: the whole world buys into this idea that music has the power to influence, move and speak to our deepest feelings. Maybe the average guy on the street can’t explain it, but no one goes through life without experiencing a moment in a concert, movie or song on the car radio where music works its su- pernatural power to create an unexpected emotional response.
The Affective in Education
More attention has been given in recent years to affective learning and the impor- tance of emotional investment in brain recall ability. A quick Google search of scholarly articles on the subject shows this topic already being studied in the 1960s, but interest in the affective connection to memory storage and recall really exploded in the 1990s.
Arts educators have been pointing out that the affective domain is a key component in their classrooms, and that visual art, dance and music classes should be a critical part of every student’s education.
While I agree quality music education matters, this doesn’t mean that as teachers we can just sit back and let music do its magic affective work. It might be impos- sible to explain (at least through science or psychology) why the cantus firmus oboe part of Bach’s “Suscepit Israel” simultane- ously brings feelings of longing and hope to a human, while a cat (at least mine) remains unmoved and indifferent. But just because there are aspects of human emotional responses that we can’t explain, does not mean the affective domain is unteachable.
56
Can We Really Plan for the Affective? First of all, though all music teachers might believe that it is important (even expected) that students have an affective experience in their ensemble, they don’t always believe that it is necessary (or even desirable) to plan for it.
Reasons I’ve heard:
• “I don’t want to tell my students how they should feel.”
• “If I plan an affective outcome, it seems less likely that authentic feelings are expressed – it seems contrived.”
• “By working on the skills and playing really well, the affective naturally happens.”
• “And what about assessing an affective outcome? Counting goosebumps per square inch?”
Of course I don’t believe every student must feel a certain emotion at a certain moment – this thinking demonstrates a much too narrow definition of the affective domain, with outcomes that are solely fo- cused on students’ feelings and responses (apart from their grounding in the musical composition). Yes, affective outcomes might include the emotional response to the music, but can also explore much more. The wide affective domain includes what music can show us about our own values, opinions or desires. It provides an avenue for building self-awareness and personal knowledge as well as revealing essential aspects of the shared human experience. Failing to purposely delve into affective learning is an opportunity missed.
If the affective experience is limited to natural human responses, a wealth of other ideas, relationships and connections that could be explored are missed, but it
Want to know more about CMP’s four types of affective outcomes and how to create them? Click here in the online version for a resource by Randal Swiggum, current CMP Chair.
also shortchanges the teacher’s important role. For example, playing Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” melody – whether as part of a symphony orchestra, or as a begin- ning clarinetist in a band – might produce feelings of unity or hope. If the outcome was “Students will experience a feeling of hopeful unity when playing the “Ode to Joy” melody,” the teacher might “coach” students to respond this exact way by prompting, helping students uncover what changes would make the piece less hopeful and unified. But this does not provide rich insights, allow the students to analyze or reflect on their own responses, or uncover anything on their own. It definitely doesn’t really bring a much deeper level of think- ing into the class.
Taking the same little melody and general idea of unity, here are some possible af- fective outcome rewrites that inspire a much larger range of teaching strategies and a more interactive experience with larger ideas:
• “Students will reflect on and analyze melodies that they feel inspire unity and examine aspects of the compositional craft that contribute to the emotional response.”
• Or “Students will explore the political context that surrounds works of art, and implications of the way that the art is received by an audience.”
April 2017
Page 1 |
Page 2 |
Page 3 |
Page 4 |
Page 5 |
Page 6 |
Page 7 |
Page 8 |
Page 9 |
Page 10 |
Page 11 |
Page 12 |
Page 13 |
Page 14 |
Page 15 |
Page 16 |
Page 17 |
Page 18 |
Page 19 |
Page 20 |
Page 21 |
Page 22 |
Page 23 |
Page 24 |
Page 25 |
Page 26 |
Page 27 |
Page 28 |
Page 29 |
Page 30 |
Page 31 |
Page 32 |
Page 33 |
Page 34 |
Page 35 |
Page 36 |
Page 37 |
Page 38 |
Page 39 |
Page 40 |
Page 41 |
Page 42 |
Page 43 |
Page 44 |
Page 45 |
Page 46 |
Page 47 |
Page 48 |
Page 49 |
Page 50 |
Page 51 |
Page 52 |
Page 53 |
Page 54 |
Page 55 |
Page 56 |
Page 57 |
Page 58 |
Page 59 |
Page 60 |
Page 61 |
Page 62 |
Page 63 |
Page 64 |
Page 65 |
Page 66 |
Page 67 |
Page 68 |
Page 69 |
Page 70 |
Page 71 |
Page 72
