| 1. |
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| 2. |
- Ferm-Almqvist, Cecilia, et al.
(författare)
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Assessment as learning in music education : The risk of "criteria compliance" replacing "learning" in the Scandinavian countries
- 2017
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Ingår i: Research Studies in Music Education. - : Sage Publications. - 1321-103X .- 1834-5530. ; 39:1, s. 3-18
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Recent reforms in England and the USA give evidence that teaching methods and content can change rapidly, given a strong external pressure, for example through economic incentives, inspections, school choice, and public display of schools' and pupils' performances. Educational activities in the Scandinavian countries have increasingly become dominated by obligations regarding assessment and grading. A common thread is the demand for equal and just assessment and grading through clear criteria and transparent processes. Torrance states that clarity in assessment procedures, processes, and criteria has underpinned widespread use of coaching, practice, and provision of formative feedback to boost achievement, but that such transparency encourages instrumentalism. He concludes that the practice of assessment has moved from assessment of learning, through assessment for learning, to assessment as learning, with "assessment procedures and practices coming completely to dominate the learning experience" and "criteria compliance" replacing "learning". Thus, formative assessment, in spite of its proven educational potential, threatens to be deformative. In this article we will explore to what extent and how this development is visible in two cases, presenting music education in one Norwegian and one Swedish compulsory school setting. Three thematic threads run through this exploration: quality, power, and instrumentalism.
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| 3. |
- Ferm, Cecilia, et al.
(författare)
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Assessment as learning in music education : The risk of ‘criteria compliance’ replacing ’learning’ in the Scandinavian countries
- 2014
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Assessment as learning in music education - the risk of ‘criteria compliance’ replacing ’learning’ in the Scandinavian countriesRecent reforms in England and USA give evidence that teaching methods and content can change rapidly, given a strong external pressure, for example through economic incentives, inspections, school choice and public display of schools’ and pupils’ performances. Educational activities in the Scandinavian countries have increasingly become dominated by obligations regarding assessment and grading. A common thread is the demand for equal and just assessment and grading through clear criteria and transparent processes. Torrance (2007) states that clarity in assessment procedures, processes and criteria has underpinned widespread use of coaching, practice and provision of formative feedback to boost achievement, but that such transparency encourages instrumentalism. He concludes that the practice of assessment has moved from assessment of learning, through assessment for learning, to assessment as learning, with assessment procedures and practices coming completely to dominate the learning experience and ‘criteria compliance’ replacing ‘learning’. Thus, formative assessment, in spite of its proven educational potential, threatens to be deformative (Torrance, 2012). In the symposium we will explore to what extent and how this development is visible from four perspectives. Four examples of assessment investigation of dance and music education in primary, lower and upper secondary schools will function as entrances to the dilemma.The symposium will start with an introduction of assessments demands in general and in the Scandinavian countries specifically, ending up in the theories of Torrance, and the risk of assessment as learning or even. Thereafter the following perspectives and settings will be described.Professionalism in Action – Music Teachers on an Assessment JourneyIf assessment practices within education have led, as Torrance (2007) claims, to instrumentalism in the form of “assessment as learning [and] criteria compliance” (p. 281-282), how can teachers and researchers reclaim the exploratory notions of (music) education? In an ongoing collaborate Research and Development and Participatory Action Research project, a group of Swedish upper secondary school music teachers together with a researcher investigates issues regarding assessment, for instance why equality is not spelled “exactly the same thing” and how teachers balance professionalism with accountability. Demands on documentation of dance knowledge in upper secondary schools in Sweden – how does that processing assessment practice?In the syllabuses from Gy11, expressed dance performance can be seen as an embodied action. Though, students and teachers are asked to evaluate themselves and fill out a written rubric in the same way as all other subjects at studied upper secondary schools. The focus on criteria-referenced feedback can have coherence to assessment as learning instead of assessment for learning. Based on observations, conversations and written reflections teachers are expressing the insufficiency with the rubric in combination to dance. How is the demand on documentation processing the assessment practice? Through a study of grading conversation teachers´ conception of qualities are illuminated. What is the base for what is assessed and communicated and how is that effect the teaching professionalism? What is prepossessing teachers´ conceptions of qualities?An outline of an understanding of assessment as didactical self-defence strategiesThe findings of Vinge (2014) indicate a clear tendency towards a systematic criterion based assessment practice in the compulsory music of subject in lower secondary schools in Norway. This change in practice follows the implementation of the latest curriculum reform (LK06, the knowledge reform), a curriculum reform initiated to enhance student learning within the frames of international competency comparison. Music teachers make use of new assessment principles and techniques designed to enhance student learning, associated with the so-called assessment for learning concept. However, the analysis indicates that these principles and techniques are being used mainly for grading purposes and settings – assessment of learning. All though teachers seem to face lots of difficulties in the construction of various assessment schemes; once adopted they seem to become important tools in the teachers’ strive for effectiveness and control. This poses a central question, which will be elaborated in this presentation: Who is assessment actually for? Is it for the students or the teacher? Teaching for learning or teaching for documentation: on the effects of a curriculum reformThe Swedish 2011 curricular reform brought considerable change to the school system. Among other changes, grading was to take place from school year 6 and not from year 8 and a new grading regime was introduced with more grades and more detailed criteria than in the preceding curricula. In this presentation, preliminary results from a survey among music teachers in Swedish compulsory school will be discussed. The survey is based on the findings in a qualitative study of music teachers’ perceptions of this reform (Zandén & Ferm, forthcoming) and aims at giving a representative picture of the effects of the reform on music education and music teachers’ professional situation. Finally Lauri Väkevä will draw lines between the different contributions, comment critically, and conclude with with a Finnish perspective.
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| 4. |
- Ferm, Cecilia, et al.
(författare)
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Implementation of a new assessment system – consequences for teaching and learning of music in Swedish schools year 5-7
- 2013
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Over the last years several reforms have influenced the educational system in Sweden. A new curriculum for the compulsory school has offered teachers and pupils a totally new system for assessment. A new credit scale is constructed and all pupils will be graded already in the 6th grade, which means that new teacher groups will have to grade their pupils’ performances. The curriculum describes criteria in three qualitative levels for each subject by defining aspects of a holistic knowing and describing three levels of competence within each of these aspects. Clarity and transparency have been steering concepts in the formulation process in order to offer parents and pupils a better possibility to understand and influence education and assessment in schools. At the same time teachers are expected to make holistic assessments of the pupils’ acquired knowledge. In a subject as music, teachers’ subject knowledge and conceptions of quality can transcend what is currently possible for them to verbalize. In several other subjects written and spoken language constitute the primary media of communication. Musical knowledge though, can be expressed and experienced in sounding forms, a mode of expression which is not easily transduced into writing or speaking. Hence, high demands for verbal clarity in aims and assessment may result in essential parts of music being excluded from teaching and learning, based on a view that these aspects are too complicated to assess equally, or impossible to communicate verbally in a clear way. There is a risk that the new demands on clarity and transparency may reduce the subject to comprise only those aspects that can be easily measured and talked about. The current study aims to systematically and critically investigate in which ways the Swedish curriculum with its new assessment- and grading regime influences music teachers’ practice and their students’ musical learning in grade 5 to 7. Earlier research has generally stated that educational reforms take time to implement, but recent reforms in England and USA give evidence that teaching methods and content can change rapidly, given a strong external pressure, for example through economic incentives, inspections, school choice and public display of schools’ and pupils’ performances. Music education could become an easy prey for such pressures, given that music teachers lack a tradition to accompany music with words and that musical assessment criteria often are perceived as subjective, as compared to objective measurables. The demand for clear and explicit criteria offers challenges, since differences between credit levels are expressed as assessable qualities and not measurable quantities. A forced verbalisation of these quality aspects may get consequences for music teachers’ evolving understanding of knowledge aspects, as well as for their experience of and qualitative evaluation of students’ musical achievements and expressions. The first phase of the study includes interviews with music teachers teaching in year 5-7 about changes in their teaching practices as well as their perceptions of the new demands in Lgr11. The second phase will be a survey, aiming to map the implementation scenario among Swedish music teach in the same years. The third and final part gets its inspiration from Engeström’s activity theory where structural and intentional contradictions are expected to have a key function for learning and development. In this phase the teachers’ as well as the students’ perspectives are focused through participant observation, interviews, and collegial conversations. The teachers define the problems found in practice, which are discussed among colleagues who together create strategies for further development. A model for general development work will be constructed through the project. By limiting the investigation to teachers who teach music in year 5-7 the study can claim to generate new knowledge concerning a group of teachers that have been neglected earlier. In the presentation at the conference we will present the study as a whole and also communicate some preliminary results from the first phase interview study.
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| 5. |
- Ferm Thorgersen, Cecilia, et al.
(författare)
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Teaching for learning or teaching for documentation? : about music teachers' relations to syllabuses in Swedish compulsory schools year 5 to 7
- 2013
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Over the last years several reforms have influenced the educational system in Sweden. A new curriculum for the compulsory school has offered teachers and pupils a totally new system for assessment. A new credit scale is constructed and all pupils will be graded already in the 6th grade, which means that new teacher groups will have to grade their pupils’ performances. The curriculum describes criteria in three qualitative levels for each subject by defining aspects of a holistic knowing and describing three levels of competence within each of these aspects. Clarity and transparency have been steering concepts in the formulation process in order to offer parents and pupils a better possibility to understand and influence education and assessment in schools. At the same time teachers are expected to make holistic assessments of the pupils’ acquired knowledge. In a subject as music, teachers’ subject knowledge and conceptions of quality can transcend what is currently possible for them to verbalize. In several other subjects written and spoken language constitute the primary media of communication. Musical knowledge though, can be expressed and experienced in sounding forms, a mode of expression which is not easily transduced into writing or speaking. Hence, high demands for verbal clarity in aims and assessment may result in essential parts of music being excluded from teaching and learning, based on a view that these aspects are too complicated to assess equally, or impossible to communicate verbally in a clear way. There is a risk that the new demands on clarity and transparency may reduce the subject to comprise only those aspects that can be easily measured and talked about.The current study aims to systematically and critically investigate in which ways the Swedish curriculum with its new assessment- and grading regime influences music teachers’ practice and their students’ musical learning in grade 5 to 7. Earlier research has generally stated that educational reforms take time to implement, but recent reforms in England and USA give evidence that teaching methods and content can change rapidly, given a strong external pressure, for example through economic incentives, inspections, school choice and public display of schools’ and pupils’ performances. Music education could become an easy prey for such pressures, given that music teachers lack a tradition to accompany music with words and that musical assessment criteria often are perceived as subjective, as compared to objective measurables. The demand for clear and explicit criteria offers challenges, since differences between credit levels are expressed as assessable qualities and not measurable quantities. A forced verbalisation of these quality aspects may get consequences for music teachers’ evolving understanding of knowledge aspects, as well as for their experience of and qualitative evaluation of students’ musical achievements and expressions. The first phase of the study includes interviews with music teachers teaching in year 5-7 about changes in their teaching practices as well as their perceptions of the new demands in Lgr11. The second phase will be a survey, aiming to map the implementation scenario among Swedish music teach in the same years. The third and final part gets its inspiration from Engeström’s activity theory where structural and intentional contradictions are expected to have a key function for learning and development. In this phase the teachers’ as well as the students’ perspectives are focused through participant observation, interviews, and collegial conversations. The teachers define the problems found in practice, which are discussed among colleagues who together create strategies for further development. A model for general development work will be constructed through the project. By limiting the investigation to teachers who teach music in year 5-7 the study can claim to generate new knowledge concerning a group of teachers that have been neglected earlier. In the presentation at the conference we will present the study as a whole and also communicate some preliminary results from the first phase interview study.
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| 6. |
- Fredriksson, Karolina, et al.
(författare)
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Teaching and learning in music education – a meta-synthesis
- 2024
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Ingår i: Music Education Research. - 1461-3808 .- 1469-9893. ; 26:2
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This article reports a meta-synthesis of 14 qualitative studies on how teachers can support students’ musical learning. The aim of the article is twofold: to (1) contribute to empirically grounded knowledge in music education, and (2) advance the methodological development of meta-synthesis in qualitative research. All included studies have a common unit of analysis: teacher–student interaction. In the synthesis of the studies, four aspects emerged as crucial for students’ musical learning: (1) the framing of the teaching, (2) taking the learners’ perspectives, (3) teachers’ scaffolding strategies, and (4) representations of sounding music. Further, three pedagogical tensions were identified: (a) using local versus expansive language, (b) following the students’ or the teacher’s perspectives and interests, and (c) ways of approaching musical content through representations. The article also contributes to the methodological development of meta-synthesis by elaborating on how some of the challenges involved are tackled.
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| 7. |
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| 8. |
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| 9. |
- Leijonhufvud, Susanna, et al.
(författare)
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On the developing of a Swedish national assessment support in music : context, commission, design, and possible outcome
- 2013
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Sweden has adopted the principles of New Public Management by creating an educational market where private and public providers compete to attract school children and where the government is increasing its efforts to measure output and audit the providers. However, Sweden goes against the flow by emphasizing subject specific knowledge and skills instead of key competences. In an attempt to further natonal equivalence when it comes to education, assessment and marking, the Swedish National Agency for Education is issuing supporting kits in different subjects. We have been responsible for the design and production of the supporting kit in music for primary and lower secondary education. In this presentation, we will place this didactical material in a historical context, describe the process from commission to publication and discuss some of the considerations that have guided our work.
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| 10. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Assessment and legitimation of entrance auditions to Swedish music teacher education
- 2019
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Ingår i: RIME 2019. Research in Music Education Conference, 23-26 April, Bath Spa University.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In Sweden, admission to higher education is gained primarily through either grade awarded in upper secondary school or SAT-tests. However, admittance to higher music education is restricted to those who pass specific tests of what is regarded as required musical knowledge and aptitude from the perspective of jurors at different universities. This can be seen as a challenge to democratic ideals of equal opportunities, especially since the Swedish government demands a broadened access to higher education. There are as yet only a few studies on the recruitment of prospective music teachers, and hence no firm ground for discussing neither their predictive value, reliability and validity of these tests, or the education and future profession of the applicants. In a three-year research project funded by the Swedish Research Council we are now studying entrance auditions to music teacher education in order to produce knowledge about assessment criteria, legitimacy claims, approaches to knowledge and quality as well as the tests’ relevance and reliability. Applicants’ performances during the tests have been video recorded, and these recordings have later been used as stimulus material to elicit assessments and reflections from the jurors, either in focus group discussions or through interviews. In the analysis, a multimodal social semiotic approach and the concept discourse is used in order to identify how the representations of quality and knowledge are articulated and legitimized. Although the design of the tests varies between institutions, music theory, ear training, ensemble playing and instrumental and vocal proficiency are customary content. Some tentative findings will be presented and discussed with regard to the study’s central questions of assessment and legitimization. The study generates new knowledge about admission to higher education, with special regard to procedure, transparency and relevance.
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| 11. |
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| 12. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Care as technology for exclusion : Power operating in jurors’ talk about admission tests to Swedish music teacher education
- 2021
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Ingår i: Nordic Research in Music Education. - : Cappelen Damm Akademisk. - 2703-8041. ; 2:2, s. 58-73
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- In this article, we explore and problematise admission tests to specialist music teacher education in Sweden from a governing perspective, where higher music education is considered a discursive practice. It illustrates how power operates in legitimating the tests. The study uses stimulated recall in jury members’ talk about assessing applicants for music teacher education programmes, and uses Foucault’s concept of governmentality to reveal entrance tests as something regarded as generally good for all. This operating discourse is built on governmental rationality and processes that make it possible to reach conclusions about the applicants’ personalities and prospects for learning and developing in the future. Through care as technology of power, failing applicants are excluded from becoming music teachers and at the same time they are rescued from struggling in the future. The results are discussed in relation to issues of democratic music education, ethics and requirements for widened access to higher music education.
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| 13. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Design and assessment of entrance auditions to music teacher education. : The 23rd conference of Nordic Network for Research in Music Education. NNMPF. Oslo, Hurdal: Nowegian Academy of Music, 12-15 February, 2018.
- 2018
-
Ingår i: https://nnmpf.org/nb/konferanser.
-
Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The overall aim of the study is to produce knowledge about the principles of assessment design and criteria for student selection to music teacher education. Although the qualification require-ments and principles of selection based on entrance auditions are often decisive for admission to music teacher education programmes, the field has been scantily researched. In particular, there is a lack of studies of the design and usefulness and value of the tests, as well as of Swedish studies and studies of other genres than classical music. The prognostic value of the tests, as well as its value to music and other education programmes are called in question. When assess-ment in music education is used, there are problems with subjective interpretations and implicit criteria. With the increasing focus in education on issues of assessment, equality and broadened recruitment, it is important to study how entrance auditions are legitimated and assessed. The aim of the study is to investigate entrance auditions to music teacher education with regard to the assessment criteria applied, legitimacy claim, and approach to knowledge. A multimodal social semiotic approach is adopted to study how individuals use linguistic, mate-rial and bodily sign systems in order to represent and perform their understanding of, attitude to and interpretation of various phenomena in the world, and how these representations constantly transform. On a micro level the concept discourse is to study how applicants, through using sign systems such as notes, music instruments, singing and gestures, represent their ability and musical knowledge, and to identify the representations of quality and knowledge that the jury members construct in their assessments of the applicants’ performances. The concept discourse is also used to find out which versions of available constructions are used, and how these are used when the jury members justify their standpoints and selections. On a macro level the con-cept discourse is used to elucidate how assessment, legitimization and selection in the local prac-tice are related to dominant approaches to musical conventions, shaped by musical education institutions. Data will consist of video documented entrance auditions, and focus group conversations, in-cluding stimulated recall interviews with jury members. Together, these methods offer opportu-nities to talk about how qualitative aspects of musical performance can be assessed and legiti-mated. Data will be collected from four music teacher education institutions and consist of a total of eight days of video documented instrumental entrance auditions in various genres, and one recorded focus group conversation with each jury. After the entrance auditions, the teachers on the jury panel and one of the researchers will discuss the applicants’ performances on the basis of selected sequences from the video documented auditions as stimulus material. A pilot study with focus on entrance auditions in the genre folk music, classical music and rhythmical improvised music was carried out last year, with the aim to test the chosen theory and method. Both the theory and the method were considered to be enrichening and fruitful. The preliminary result of these analysis shows that the representations for and understandings of quality and knowledge constructed in the conversations can be seen as assessments of the appli-cants’ singing and playing skills; musical and bodily expression ability; singing and playing in accordance with the style of the period; and ensemble interaction. All of these aspects were as-sessed in relation to the traditions and idioms of the genres. According to the teachers’ stand points on assessments and how these are justified, micro-level discourses were displayed, high-lighting the importance of genre fidelity, genre cutting edge, and genre experience. In contrast to these discourses, other discourses on genre violation, genre breadth and genre unfamiliarity, for instance, are indicated to be acceptable, at least in some of the jury groups. These tensions in attitudes reflect a polemic between various assessments of musical quality and knowledge.
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| 14. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Ideas of new directions for music teacher education. A discussion based on current Nordic Research in relation to challenges of the present and the future.
- 2022
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Ingår i: Nordic Network for Research in Music Education conference 2022.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of this symposium is to stimulate discussion of new directions for generalist and specialist music teacher education in Finland, Norway and Sweden. The symposium incorporates research from the three Nordic countries and the discussion will be based on results from the research projects. This research has been going on for several years and has recently been completed or is in the final phase. Common to all projects are the critique of status quo in music teacher education and the call for changes and new directions in relation to the needs and challenges in our contemporary societies. By this, we join all those scholars who for decades have addressed democracy and social justice in relation to music education. However, because democracy is an open and socially constructed concept (Woodford, 2005), we make no claim to a specific common paradigm in this presentation. Rather, we will present three research initiatives by contextualizing the results within the respective Nordic countries as democratic societies. And from there, we will take the opportunity to raise and discuss some questions about how to set forth a music teacher education agenda for the future: How should music teacher education evolve to increase equity, inclusion and access in music education? Curriculum discourses indicate teacher education as a field of tension, marked by negotiations and struggles between competing policies, philosophies and views of music, culture and education. Can such tensions have potential for change? How can teacher education prepare student music teachers for a complex and diverse school life? How can we approach digital tools in educational spaces that can promote critical reflection about challenges of the present and the future? How can we rethink the selection principles for the music teacher programs?
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| 15. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Representations and legitimations of quality and knowledge in entrance auditions to Swedish music teacher education
- 2019
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Ingår i: NNMPF 2019: Futures of Music in Higher Education, February 26-28 2019.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- For entrance to Swedish higher education, special qualification requirements and selection principles are allowed if there are special reasons with regard to the content and orientation of the education or the field of education that the education is preparing for. In music education, special requirements and selection in the form of entrance auditions have since long been used. The Swedish government’s demands on higher education to act for increased equality in society and a broadened access to higher education, along with the increasing focus in education on issues of assessment and the fact that both design and assessment of entrance auditions can vary between providers of higher music education, raises questions about the relevance, validity and reliability of these auditions as selection instruments. Although the auditions’ qualification requirements and principles of selection generally build on long traditions, and generally are decisive for admission to music teacher education programmes, the field has been scantily researched. There are as yet only a few studies on the recruitment of prospective music teachers, and hence there is no firm ground for discussing the predictive value, reliability and validity of these tests, neither for the music teacher education as such nor for the applicants’ future profession. The aim of our three-year research project funded by the Swedish Research Council is to study entrance auditions to music teacher education in order to produce knowledge about assessment criteria, legitimacy claims, approaches to knowledge and quality as well as the tests’ relevance and reliability. The project started in January 2018. The data were produced in spring and autumn 2018 and consists of video recorded entrance auditions and audiorecorded focus group or single conversations with jurors from four Swedish music teacher education institutions. More than one hundred entrance auditions on i) instrumental musicianship; ii) ensemble and leadership skills and iii) ability to sing and accompany themselves were video documented. Furthermore, 29 group discussions or single conversations with jury members were conducted, in which selected sequences from the video documented auditions were used as stimulated recall. Apart from the jurors’ assessments of the applicants’ performances, the design of the entrance auditions and how qualitative aspects of musical performance could be assessed and legitimated was discussed in these interviews. Further, 6 jury groups have been interviewed about the design and assessment of music theory tests and ear training skills. Altogether, nearly 60 jury members have been interviewed. The data material has been transcribed during autumn 2018. The analyses have started late in the autumn 2018 and are still going on. In the analysis, a multimodal social semiotic approach and the concept discourse is used in order to study how the jurors interpret applicants’ musical performances and representations of ability and musical knowledge through their use of sign systems such as notes, music instruments, singing and gestures. We also analyse how the jury members construct representations of quality and knowledge in their assessments of applicants’ performances, and how these representations are articulated and legitimised. Concerning the interviews about music theory tests and ear training skills, the analyses deal with the jury members’ representations of quality and knowledge in the design of the tests, and how these representations are articulated and legitimised. Although the design of the tests varies between institutions, music theory, ear training, ensemble playing, and instrumental and vocal proficiency are customary content. In spite of the fact that almost all the institutions have developed explicit assessment criteria, the jury members frequently also assess other aspects in the applicants’ performances. In our presentation, some tentative findings will be presented and discussed with regard to the study’s central questions of assessment and legitimization.
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| 16. |
- Lindgren, Monica, 1958, et al.
(författare)
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Singing in Swedish Secondary Schools: A discursive practice. : The 23rd conference of Nordic Network for Research in Music Education, NNMPF. Oslo, Hurdal: Norwegian Academy of Music, 12-15 February 2018.
- 2018
-
Ingår i: https://nnmpf.org/nb/konferanser.
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Konferensbidrag (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- In Sweden, as in several European countries, singing and choral activities in school tend to become increasingly marginalized. The Swedish National Agency for Education recently stated, that playing on musical instruments has come to dominate at the expense of all other activities in the music classroom. Since Swedish music education research only cursorily addresses singing in the classroom, a lack of interest in the matter becomes apparent. Therefore, the aim of this ongoing project is to study singing during music lessons in a public secondary school and in a music profile secondary school, and to describe the interaction between the participants in the teaching situation. Drawing on a poststructuralist and critical perspective, classroom singing is considered as discursively governed. The discourse concept positions itself in between a micro-sociological perspective, where the rhetorical organization of language and action is studied and analysed in an action-related context, and a macro-perspective, considering subject positions as produced by overarching institutional and social discourses. Further, discourse is considered as multimodal. Thus, besides operating via the spoken and written word, discourse also has visual and auditory dimensions. As such, discourse is mediated by both spatial aspects in the classroom and by various artefacts. In the first phase of the analysis, a number of questions were asked to the empirical material. These questions assisted in identifying problematic situations for further analysis. The second phase of the analysis was influenced by discourse theory, which enables to discuss the different subject positions offered, taken and tried by the actors. The empirical material derives from The Swedish National Agency for Education´s most recent evaluation, and consists of video recorded music lessons from two out of ten schools involved in the qualitative part of the evaluation. For this paper, recordings with singing activities were selected for analysis. More specifically, sequences of events that distinctly illustrated each classroom practice were selected and transcribed for further analysis. Findings reveal one prominent tendency for each classroom practice respectively. Singing as a musical adventure-the micro managed musical discourse was constructed in the public school with a music profile. In this classroom discourse, following routines of discipline and order, practising breathing techniques, vocal intonation and articulating song lyrics are prominent. Singing as a pastime activity-the musically undemanding discourse was constructed in the ordinary public school. Prominent aspects of this discursive practice are that anything goes, reducing singing to physical behaviour exempt from meaning. In conclusion, the diversity in classroom singing and its consequences for quality in music education is addressed. Also, the music teacher´s competence and profile is discussed, related to the character of the interaction in the classroom, the discourses that are constructed and the musical knowledge possible for the students to achieve.
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| 17. |
- Sandberg Jurström, Ragnhild, 1954-, et al.
(författare)
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A Mozart concert or three simple chords? : Limits for approval in admission tests for Swedish specialist music teacher education
- 2021. - 1
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Ingår i: Higher Education as Context for Music Pedagogy Research. - Oslo : Cappelen Damm Akademisk. - 2703-7843. - 9788202696979 - 9788202706326 ; , s. 19-40
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Against the background of problems with unarticulated concepts of quality and assessment criteria when assessing music, this article concerns how the limit for approval is constructed and legitimised by jurors when assessing entrance auditions to Swedish specialist music teacher education. The data comprise video documented auditions, focus group conversations, and stimulated-recall based interviews, involving jury members at four music education departments. Social semiotic theory is used to study how jurors assess applicants’ knowledge representations in main instrument tests, what is considered decisive for an approval, and how this set limit is legitimised. Four approaches have been constructed:the demanding education and profession;the supposed capacity of the applicant; the flexible admission situation, and the care of the applicant.What is considered to be the minimum requirement for approval in these constructions differs markedly, which shows a striking difference between the views of jurors within and between institutions on how the applicants´ musical performances on a main instrument should be assessed. These findings are discussed in relation to two possible scenarios of revised admission tests.
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| 18. |
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| 19. |
- Sandberg Jurström, Ragnhild, 1954-, et al.
(författare)
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Assessment cultures and limits for approval in entrance tests for Swedish music teacher education
- 2021
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Ingår i: Qualities in music education practice and research.
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This paper concerns assessment of main instrument entrance tests for Swedish specialist music teacher education. The two articles presented are part of a larger research project of admission tests financed by the Swedish Research Council. The background of the project is based on problems with transparency and unarticulated assessment criteria when assessing music (Harrison et al, 2013; Olsson & Nielsen, 2018; Zandén, 2010), as well as the Swedish governments demands on higher education to strive for strengthened societal democracy by promoting equality and broader recruitment. Four music education institutions with specialist music teacher educations participated in the project. Applicants who gave their written consent were video recorded during their entrance auditions during spring 2018. Almost every member in the jury groups, in which video recordings had been carried out, agreed to participate. The data in the two studies comprise 27 video documented auditions and 22 focus group conversations or individual interviews with use of stimulated-recall for comments on the auditions. A social semiotic theory (Kress, 2010) was used to capture how instrumental/vocal skills were represented by applicants in main instrument auditions, and verbally articulated and assessed by jurors. The aim was to study what was considered as acceptable skills in applicants’ knowledge representations, and how these statements were legitimised. In article one (Sandberg-Jurström et al., in press, a), with focus on how criteria are articulated and used by jurors when assessing main instrument entrance auditions, two assessment cultures is emerged showing a great discrepancy between assessing musical skills and assessing person-related skills. The music-centred assessment culture emphasises assessments of technical, communicative, and genre-anchored interpretation skills essential for meeting the demands of the education and profession. The person-centred assessment culture emphasises assessments of personal traits suitable for education and profession. In the discussion the reliability, credibility, and validity of assessing abilities in terms of being and behaving in a particular way is addressed. The second article (Sandberg-Jurström et al., in press, b), concerns jurors’ views of the limit for approval in main instrument auditions. Four approaches to what is considered decisive for an approved instrument test have been constructed: (a) the demanding education and profession that legitimises a high or very high level of competencies for approval, (b) the supposed capacity of the applicant that legitimises a low level of competencies for approval, (c) the flexible admission situation that legitimises a changeable level for approval, and (d) the care of the applicant that legitimises an insufficient level. What is considered to be the minimum requirement for approval in these constructions differs markedly. The findings are discussed in relation to transparency and broadened recruitment by highlighting two possible scenarios of revised admission tests. In the presentation, focus is on the criteria and the limits for approval used, the qualities and skills represented in these criteria, and the assessment cultures considered for the assessments. Some overlaps between the findings are also highlighted.
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| 20. |
- Sandberg Jurström, Ragnhild, 1954-, et al.
(författare)
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Design och bedömning av färdighetsprov till musiklärarutbildningen
- 2018
-
Ingår i: The 23rd conference of Nordic Network for Research in Music Education Oslo, Norway February 12-15 2018.
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Design och bedömning av färdighetsprov till musiklärarutbildningenStudiens övergripande mål är att skapa kunskap om bedömningsgrunder och kriterier för urval av studenter till musiklärarutbildningar. Trots att behörighets- och/eller urvalsgrundande färdighetsprov ofta är avgörande för möjligheten att få tillträde till en musikutbildning är området tämligen svagt beforskat. Det saknas studier om provs utformning och värdet av dem, liksom det saknas svenska studier och studier inom andra musikgenrer än den konstmusikaliska. Provs prognostiska värden, både till musik- och andra utbildningar, ifrågasätts och vid bedömning inom musikundervisning finns en problematik med subjektiva tolkningar och outtalade kriterier. Med ett ökat skolfokus på frågor som rör bedömning, jämlikhet och breddad rekrytering blir det angeläget att studera hur färdighetsprov legitimeras och bedöms. Syfte med studien är att undersöka färdighetsprov med avseende på hur proven designas och bedöms. Den teoretiska utgångspunkten utgörs av ett multimodalt och socialsemiotiskt perspektiv med fokus på hur individer använder språkliga, materiella och kroppsliga teckensystem för att representera och gestalta sin förståelse för, förhållningssätt till och tolkning av olika företeelser i världen, och hur dessa representationer ständigt transformeras. På mikronivå används begreppet diskurs i syfte att studera hur sökande, med användning av teckensystem, såsom noter, musikinstrument, sång och gester, laddade med innebörder kopplade till musikstil, tidsskede och genrers praxis, representerar sitt kunnande och sin musikaliska förtrogenhet samt vilka representationer för kvalitet och kunnande som bedömande lärare lyfter fram i sina bedömningar av de sökandes prestationer. Diskursbegreppet används även för att utröna vilka versioner av tillgängliga förståelser som används och hur de används när lärarna legitimerar sina ställningstaganden och urval. På makronivå används begreppet även för att belysa hur bedömningskriterier, legitimeringar och urval i den lokala praktiken kan relateras till dominerande kunskapssyner formade i olika musikutbildningssystem.Som metod användes videodokumentationer och fokusgruppsamtal, med inslag av stimulated recall-intervjuer. Tillsammans kan dessa metoder ge möjlighet till samtal om hur kvalitativa aspekter i musikframföranden bedöms och legitimeras. Datamaterialet kommer att hämtas från fyra lärosäten med musiklärarutbildning och bestå av sammanlagt åtta dagars videoinspelade instrumentalprov inom skilda genrer samt ett ljudinspelat fokusgruppsamtal för varje bedömande jurygrupp. Lärarna i de bedömande jurygrupperna diskuterar de sökandes prestationer med utvalda sekvenser från proven som stimulusmaterial. En pilotstudie med fokus på färdighetsprov inom folkmusikgenren genomfördes förra året med syfte att bland annat pröva studiens valda teoretiska grund och metod. Både teori och metod sågs som berikande och fruktbara. Sedan dess har även färdighetsprov inom genrerna klassisk musik och rytmisk improviserad musik videodokumenterats och analyserats. I det preliminära resultatet av dessa analyser framkommer att de representationer för och förståelser av kvalitet och kunnande som konstruerades i samtalen handlar om värderingar av de sökandes sång- och spelskicklighet; musikaliska och kroppsliga uttrycksförmåga; stilkännedom samt samspel, allt relaterat till de olika genrernas traditioner och idiom. Vad gäller lärarnas ställningstaganden och hur dessa legitimeras har diskurser på mikronivå kunnat synliggöras, där vikten av genretrohet, genrespets och genrevana framhålls. I kontrast till dessa antyds diskurser där genrebrott, genrebredd och genreovana också kan ses som acceptabla, åtminstone inom vissa jurygrupper. Utifrån dessa spänningar kan förhållningssätt skönjas som visar på en polemik mellan olika värderingar av musikalisk kvalitet och kunnande.
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| 21. |
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| 22. |
- Sandberg Jurström, Ragnhild, 1954-, et al.
(författare)
-
Musical skills, or attitude and dress style? : Meaning-making when assessing admission tests for Swedish specialist music teacher education
- 2022
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Ingår i: Research Studies in Music Education. - : Sage Publications. - 1321-103X .- 1834-5530. ; 44:1, s. 70-85
-
Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Although entrance test criteria seem decisive for accessing higher music education programmes, and problems and challenges with the assessment process are reported, the area is largely unexplored. This article concerns how entrance auditions, specifically primary instrument auditions for Swedish specialist music teacher programmes, are examined and discussed. The data comprise video-documented auditions, focus group conversations, and stimulated-recall-based interviews involving assessor groups at four music education departments. Social-semiotic theory is used to study how assessors judge applicants' knowledge representations in audition performances. A music-centred assessment culture is constructed, emphasising assessments of technical, communicative, and genre-anchored interpretation skills essential for meeting the demands of the education and profession. Also, a person-centred assessment culture is revealed, emphasising the assessment of personal traits suitable for education and profession. The discussion addresses the reliability, credibility, and validity of assessing abilities in terms of being and behaving in a particular way.
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| 23. |
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| 24. |
- Thorgersen, Ketil, et al.
(författare)
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Internet as Teacher?
- 2012
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Ingår i: NNMPF 2012 : Abstracts. ; , s. 44-45
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- For economical reasons, today’s students in Swedish music teacher education are provided with a fraction of the tuition time that was considered necessary thirty years ago. Since there are no resources for instrumental tuition within the curriculum, alternative ways of encouraging students’ learning must be explored. The advance of, and access to, information and communication technologies (ICT) , has lead to new platforms and opportunities for learning music through social platforms for sharing, exchanging and collaborating in all stages of producing music. In less formalized settings for learning music, a whole new arena for learning music has consequently developed. As Väkevä (2010) states, informal settings for musical learning are no longer placed solely in garage bands: Through the advance of technology for communication, creating, sharing and interaction a set of new and extended arenas for learning music has developed. There is a growing body of research concerning the use of computer software in music education, but as yet there is no published research on using internet in learning to play a musical instrument. However, internet offers a plethora of guides, tips and tricks for playing different musical instruments. Georgii-Hemming and Kvarnhall ( 2011) have coined the expression “the digital music pedagogue” for YouTube-clips that are explicitly produced for didactical purposes. They emphasise that such didactical resources are lacking both the dialogical relation and the cultural historical situatedness that traditional institutional didactical contexts provide. They also tend to regard viewing and listening as mainly passive activities. However, it is an empirical question to what extent YouTube can be used for active learning purposes. A Google search on such an esoteric activity as to “learn accordion” returns 19 000 hits and a YouTube search on ”learn” + “accordion” returns over 2 000 hits. Clearly, there are vast resources at the fingertips of the internet-user and the question is to what extent these resources can be used for musical learning.This presentation reports on a project that lasted for half a year in 2011 and had a triple intention. 1) It was supposed to provide the students with experiences about learning how to play by help of the internet in ways similar to what some of their pupils-to-be possibly will be doing. 2) The students were to learn to play a second instrument besides their regular one – something which the new syllabus (Lgr11) requires from pupils. 3) The project aimed to investigate if and how out-of-school practices for learning an instrument aided by the Internet could be useful in music teacher training.
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| 25. |
- Thorgersen, Ketil, 1972-, et al.
(författare)
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Internet as Teacher?
- 2012
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Ingår i: 17th conference of the Nordic Network for Music Educational Research. ; , s. 44-45
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)
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| 26. |
- Thorgersen, Ketil, 1972-, et al.
(författare)
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The Internet as Teacher
- 2014
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Ingår i: Journal of Music, Technology and Education. - : Intellect. - 1752-7066 .- 1752-7074. ; 7:2, s. 233-244
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Social media has led to new opportunities for learning music. In less formalizedsettings, a whole new arena for learning music has developed. The aim of this arti-cle is to investigate student teachers’ experiences of learning to play an instrumentwith the Internet as a teacher. The investigation was done as an action researchstudy where twelve beginning teacher-training students were given the task to usethe Internet to learn how to play an instrument. The students were organized in peergroups to help each other. Documentation of the progress happened through logbooks.The project lasted for half a year in 2011 and had a triple intention: to provide thestudents with experience about learning how to play by help of the Internet, for thestudents to learn to play a second instrument, and to investigate if and how learningpractices for learning an instrument aided by the Internet could be useful in musicteacher training.
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| 27. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Att arbeta med kvaliteter i populärmusik
- 2011. - 1
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Ingår i: Perspektiv på populärmusik och skola. - Lund : Studentlitteratur AB. - 9789144068770 ; , s. 69-82
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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| 28. |
- Zandén, Olle, et al.
(författare)
-
Bedömningsstöd i ämnet musik : uppdrag, överväganden och design
- 2013
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- I anslutning till genomförandet av den stora läroplans- och bedömningsreformen Lgr11 har Skolverket producerat material som syftar till att underlätta arbetet med att implementera reformen. En del i Skolverkets material är ett så kallat bedömningsstöd. Detta paper kommer att presentera uppdraget, överväganden och design av bedömningsstödet i ämnet musik för årskurs nio respektive årskurs sex, ett arbete som undertecknande har genomfört. Bedömningsstödets explicita syfte är att öka likvärdigheten i betygsättning mellan olika skolor i Sverige. Vid utarbetandet av stödet för årskurs nio gavs relativt fria händer att, med förankring i en referensgrupp musiklärare, utforma materialet. Bedömningsstödet för årskurs sex hade något snävare gränser, bland annat för att det förväntades anknyta till stödet för årskurs nio. En utgångspunkt för båda bedömningsstöden var att de skulle centreras kring elevers konkreta musicerande och behandla frågor om musikalisk kvalitet i anslutning till eller helst med klingande exempel. Samtidigt ville vi undvika att skapa ”benchmarks”, det vill säga modeller för vad man ska prestera som helhet för att få ett visst betyg. Bedömningsstödet i musik för årskurs nio innehåller i stället omfattande diskussioner om kvalitetsaspekter i elevers musicerande och bedömer dessa aspekter med kunskapskravens terminologi och värdenivåer utan att ge summativa omdömen om de enskilda elevernas helhetsprestationer. Bedömningsstöden innehåller inspelningar av elevers musikskapande och musicerande, inspelade såväl som skriftliga lärarkommentarer, referenser till forskning om bedömning samt förslag på hur materialet kan användas som fortbildning och för professionalisering inom musiklärarkåren. Under arbetets gång har vi fått balansera mellan uppdraget, våra musikaliska och musikdidaktiska värderingar samt vårt ansvar som forskare. I presentationen kommer vi att beskriva och illustrera uppdraget, några av de kritiska överväganden vi gjort, materialets slutliga utformning samt, förhoppningsvis, något om hur det blivit emottaget av musiklärare.
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| 29. |
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| 30. |
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| 31. |
- Zanden, Olle, 1956
(författare)
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Enacted possibilities for learning in goals- and results based music teaching
- 2018
-
Ingår i: Comparing international music lessons on video, red. Wallbaum, C.. - Hildesheim, Zürich, New York : Georg Olms Verlag. - 9783487156330 ; , s. 255-276
-
Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Jämförelse mellan två videoinspelade grundskolelektioner i musik från Sverige och Skottland med avseende på vilka möjligheter till musikaliskt lärande som ges inom två målstyrda undervisningssystem. Comparison between two video-recorded lower secondary music lessons in Sweden and Scotland, both of which are framed by a goals-based curriculum. The focus is on what possibilities to musical learning that are given through the lesson design.
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| 32. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
-
Function-based accompaniment om keyboards (FUBAK)
- 2012
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- Function-based accompaniment on keyboards (FUBAK)The new curriculum for music in Swedish compulsory school puts strong emphasis on singing and ensemble-playing. Each child is expected to learn basic keyboard, guitar, bass and percussion skills. This puts great demands both on schools’ equipment and on teaching methods. In this workshop, a method for whole-class teaching of fundamental keyboard skills is presented. The method has been tested with teacher students that have no earlier experience with playing piano or keyboard. The results are promising: within nine weeks, all participant students could accompany childrens’ songs with three to six chords without looking at their fingers and they could transpose these songs into a new key with no more than fine minutes of practice.The FUBAK-metod is based on some simple principles:• Each function (Tonic, Dominant etc.) has its dedicated fingering that is kept during transpositions• When changing between functions (chords) each voice is moving as short a distance as possible• Each chord is in three part harmony with the left hand playing the root of the chord and the right hand playing two other chord notes.• The main focus is on aural and kinaesthetic perception of the playing – visual and tactile aspects are actively ignored aside in order to focus on sound and movements.This function-based method for learning basic accompaniment on keyboard seems promising on the following grounds:1: For teachers with little or no experience of piano-playing, it provides a quick way of learning to accompany while keeping contact with the class instead of focusing on the fingers and chords.2: For music teachers it provides a quick method to teach chord-playing to children3: The function-based approach inculcates, through playing, a theoretical understanding of the relation between chords within a key. It also gives a hands-on, or rather “in-hand”-experience of voicing and does to a large extent facilitate accompaniment by ear.4: The same technique can be used for different musical roles: a) bass-line in left hand and chords (two notes) in right, b) chords (two notes) in left hand and melody or improvisation in right hand, c) the bass is left to another instrument and the keyboardist plays only the two notes that constitute the chord.In summary, this method for Function Based Accompaniment on Keyboards provides music teachers with a simple and effective way to teach playing and theoretical understanding simultaneously.
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| 33. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Fyra förrädiska förgivettaganden
- 2011. - 1
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Ingår i: Musik och kunskapsbildning. - Göteborg : Konstnärliga fakulteten, Göteborgs universitet. - 9789197847629 ; , s. 193-200
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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| 34. |
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| 35. |
- Zanden, Olle, 1956
(författare)
-
Kritik av tydlighetsdoktrinen
- 2018
-
Ingår i: Lärares bedömningsarbete –Förutsättningar, villkor, agens. Red Lindberg, V, Eriksson, I & Pettersson, A. - Stockholm : Natur & Kultur. - 9789127823020
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Bokkapitel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Relationer mellan lärarprofessionalism, undervisningskvalitet och krav på tydliga mål och kriterier i grundskolan diskuteras med utgångspunkt i Flecks vetenskapssociologi, dialogiskt teori och internationell forskning om mål- och resultatstyrning.
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| 36. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
-
Music teachers' constructions of teachers' and pupils' roles and identities
- 2013
-
Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- In an analysis of music teachers’ collegiate discourses on upper secondary students’ ensemble playing (Zandén 2010) the teachers’ discourses were of a surprisingly lay character; the discourses seemed to a large extent to draw on everyday conceptions of quality. In a subsequent study of how the Swedish words musikalisk (musical), talang (talent) and begåvad (gifted) are used on the internet (Zandén 2011) I concluded that these concepts were seldom used in ways that hinted at the possibility that they denote developable capacities. If music teachers subscribe to this commonsensical idea of musicality as a stable, innate gift and assign pupils roles and identities accordingly, it might well influence their teaching and their expectations of progress among their pupils.This presentation focuses on how the role of the teacher and the roles of the pupils are constituted in music teachers’ dialogues with their colleagues. The data consists of ten hours of recorded music teachers’ group-discussions on pupils’ musical performances. Half of these discussions was recorded in 2007 and focused on 17-18-year old pupils’ ensemble playing while the other half was recorded in 2011 and focused on 15-16-year old pupils’ ensemble playing and musical compositions. Both sets of data were originally used for analysing music teachers’ assessments and conceptions of quality. Thus, the ways in which the teachers expressed themselves about teachers and pupils as such were not the focus of discursive attention, neither in the discussions nor in the ensuing analysis. In this study, the data are reanalysed in order to elicit the music teachers’ construction of pupils’ and teachers’ roles and identities as expressed in the dialogues.
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| 37. |
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| 38. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Professionalise or perish : A case for heightened educational quality through collegiate cooperation
- 2010
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Ingår i: Nordisk musikkpedagogisk forskning. - Oslo : Norges musikkhøgskole. - 1504-5021. ; 12, s. 135-151
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Professionalise or perish; a case for heightened educational quality through collegiate cooperation.In this article, I will argue for the necessity of developing a professional jargon among music teachers; a collegiate discourse in which musically and artistically relevant aspects of music-making and music education are continuously addressed and cultivated in order to improve the quality of music education on all educational levels. As my point of departure I present findings from my doctoral thesis which suggest that music teachers may be unaccustomed to discussing the sounding aspects of music and that they have low confidence in their didactical efficacy. Drawing from different fields of research, I sketch some prerequisites for a reform of music teachers’ collegiate discourse. However difficult it may be to talk about music in a musically relevant way, I contend that a living, evolving professional collegiate discourse on musical and music-didactical issues is a prerequisite for general progress within music education, for fair and equal assessment and marking in schools and for the establishment of a strong music teacher profession with the capacity to argue successfully for music as an essential part of public education.
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| 39. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Samtal om samspel. Kvalitetsuppfattningar i musiklärares dialoger om ensemblespel på gymnasiet
- 2010
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Doktorsavhandling (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)abstract
- The purpose of this thesis is to analyse music teachers’ collegiate discourses on ensemble playing with regard to dialogically expressed criteria and conceptions of quality, and to relate these criteria and conceptions to the national governing documents for upper secondary ensemble education. The study has two theoretical perspectives, that is, a didactical perspective and a dialogical perspective. The research setting as well as the research questions are clearly didactical, whilst dialogical theory is used both as a foundation for the research method and as an ontology against which the findings are interpreted. Topic analysis, which is based on a dialogical theory of sense-making according to which meaning is constituted in a double dialogical process between interactants, situation and socio-cultural traditions is the method used. Four groups of music teachers have discussed video excerpts of popular music ensembles from ensemble classes, and these discussions have been analysed with respect to topics displaying conceptions of musical and didactical quality. Topics are created through communicative projects, in which two or more people display a mutual understanding of what they are talking about. Thus, all conceptions of quality elicited from the participant groups of ensemble teachers are the result of intersubjective sense-making. The results show that the ideal of informal music-making is so strong that the groups describe teacher intervention as detrimental to musical progress. Very little is said about the sounding music, whereas physical expressivity, autonomy and joy of playing are prominent topics. The apparent lack of music-specific, “contextual” criteria and the low valuation of the teachers’ work are discussed as possible threats to the existence of music as a subject in the national curriculum.
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| 40. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-, et al.
(författare)
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Teaching for learning or teaching for documentation? : Music teachers' perspectives on a Swedish curriculum reform
- 2015
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Ingår i: British Journal of Music Education. - Cambridge : Cambridge University Press. - 0265-0517 .- 1469-2104. ; 32:1, s. 37-50
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study analyses ten Swedish music teachers’ descriptions of how a new music syllabus and a new credit scale have influenced their practice. In the new curriculum, grading is introduced in year six and not, as previously, in year eight. We have therefore focused on the effects of this change on school years five to seven. The new syllabus is much more precise and explicit than the earlier one, and it is reported to have strongly affected both teachers’ and pupils’ work in the classroom. Teachers are facing a number of dilemmas when trying to combine the demands of the syllabus with their conceptions of quality in music education.
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| 41. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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The Birth of a Denkstil : Transformations of music teachers' conceptions of quality in the face of new grading criteria
- 2016
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Ingår i: Nordisk musikkpedagogisk forskning. - Oslo : Norwegian Academy of Music. - 1504-5021. ; 17, s. 197-225
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The aim of this study is to investigate and describe how a new music curriculum with defined content and assessment criteria can influence music specialist teachers’ style of thinking and conceptions of musical quality regarding lower secondary students’ creative music making.The research questions are:How is composition defined in the teachers’ dialogues?What conceptions of quality are expressed in the teachers’ evaluations of the compositions?To what extent do the teachers’ knowledge requirement-based assessments differ from their first, spontaneous appreciation of the pupils’ creative music making?The findings indicate that creative music making is a poorly delimited concept that can be used both for a musical idea and for a whole performance. In the teachers’ initial assessments of the students’ compositions, they revealed a common style of thinking based on an artistic insider-understanding of musical qualities. However, when they started discussing the compositions from the standpoint of the new curriculum and its knowledge requirements, this style of thinking was largely abolished. It was replaced by a new style of thinking in which evaluative judgments were carefully avoided in favour of factual descriptions. These findings suggest that explicit criteria can have a strong impact on the conceptions of quality that are developed within a school culture. In the case of music education, this could result in a style of thinking and a teaching that differs dramatically from both lay and professional conceptions of musical quality
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| 42. |
- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Till en kritik av tydlighetsdokrinen
- 2013
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Konferensbidrag (refereegranskat)abstract
- This presentation is an attempt to highlight, criticise and refute the naïve view of verbal, especially written language as clear and unambiguous that is promoted by, among others, the Swedish minister of education and the Swedish national agency for education. In my view, a critique of this doctrine of verbal clarity (tydlighetsdoktrinen) is pertinent and timely, since the international trend towards new public management includes an increasing emphasis on auditing, risk management, marketisation and pupils/students as customers, all of which are premised on criteria and activities being unambiguously expressed in plain language. In schools as well as in higher education the doctrine underlies legitimate demands that goals and criteria in syllabi shall be transparent, that is, shall give the reader a clear understanding of what he or she is expected to learn and know. The doctrine is also at play when the quality of higher education institutions and schools is ranked; the legitimacy of these rankings lies in the supposition that the measurements and assessments underlying the rankings are clear, trustworthy, transparent windows that provide objective information about actual and relevant qualitative differences. Of course, optimal clarity must always be strived for in communication and education, which makes it difficult to question the doctrine of clarity, but the key problem with the doctrine is that it is grounded in a flawed, not to say incorrect understanding of verbal communication. In the Swedish school system, clarity (tydlighet) has become a prestige word associated with theories about learning, good teaching, public control and objectiveness and fairness in marking. However remote the doctrine is from how language actually functions, it influences all education through the assessment regimes that are based on it and whose results are treated as clear summative evidence of the overall quality of the assessed activities and organisations, be they kindergartens or universities. The doctrine of verbal clarity is promoted as a means to raise quality and increase the nation’s international competitiveness as knowledge society. However, since the doctrine denounces all language that is not open and clear to the public and demands of teachers on all levels to make themselves unambiguously understood, the obvious risk is that complex qualities and qualities that are difficult to define verbally are likely to be excluded from teaching and marking. The Swedish school inspectorate has for example recently suggested that writing essays shall no more be included in national assessments since marking essays is a matter of judgement and thus not sufficiently unambiguous, objective and transparent. I claim that, in order to be didactically fruitful, clarity must be redefined in a more realistic and productive way, that is, as the result of situated dialogical work within thinking communities (communities of practice). In music education, apart from music being a non-verbal form of expression, there often seems to be a reluctance to sully the immediate musical expressions and impressions with words. However, given the increasing pressure to adapt to the doctrine of verbal clarity, it is important that music teachers approach the problems of talking about music from a musical perspective. Otherwise they will probably not be able to resist the pressure to narrow their teaching to the easily describable and measurable. It might even be that this pressure is a strong enough threat to overcome some romantic ideas about music, including musical talent, that have hindered music teachers from developing a professional discourse that deals with the subject content in a musically meaningful way. In this process, collegiate cooperation is key, a cooperation in which it is essential to differentiate between exoteric and esoteric musical qualities and knowledge, the latter denoting such qualities and knowledge that are not directly accessible from without, but can be understood only from within the Denkstil of music. The recognition of clarity as context dependent refutes the simplistic and naïve view of language that is presently promoted by the Swedish government and is a way to counter tendencies that otherwise will impoverish education. As opposed to the monological idea that language can fully capture what it is denoting, I suggest that the metaphor of accompaniment can be enlightening when talking about musical qualities. In music, an accompaniment does not replace the song or melody, but contributes to its’ meanings by putting it in perspective. Accompanists, as well as the accompaniment as such, can be more or less tight or “true” or sensitive to the meanings and intentions of the soloist or the solo part. By talking about music when it happens, by letting dialogues accompany music in real time, productive metaphorical work can be done among music teachers, a work in which the musical senses may be sharpened and a musically meaningful language can develop. To summarise: schools and universities worldwide are increasingly burdened by a naïve doctrine of verbal clarity, the offspring of which I suspect will be a narrowing and levelling of what is taught and learned. This doctrine might be successfully countered if verbal clarity is redefined as the result of situated, cooperative, dialogical work. Within music education I suggest that such work can benefit from using spoken language as accompaniment to music and music making. Given that this is a good idea, what part can music education research take in this pursuit?
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- Zandén, Olle, 1956-
(författare)
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Tydlighetsdoktrinen : en kritisk betraktelse
- 2014. - 1
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Ingår i: Blickar. - Växjö : Linnaeus University Press. - 9789187925344 ; , s. 221-244
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Bokkapitel (övrigt vetenskapligt/konstnärligt)
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- Zimmerman Nilsson, Marie-Helene, 1967-, et al.
(författare)
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Choral discipline or curriculum implementation? : Exploring Singing in Swedish Secondary schools
- 2019
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Ingår i: Finnish Journal of Music Education. - Helsinki : Sibelius Academy. - 1239-3908. ; 22:1-2, s. 59-69
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Artikkelissa tutkitaan laulamista Ruotsin yläkouluissa ja kysytään poleemisesti: kuorokuria vai opetussuunnitelman toteuttamista? Useissa länsimaisissa kouluissa laulaminen ja kuorotoiminta ovat musiikkikasvatuksessa marginalisoituneita. Näin myös Ruotsissa, vaikka laulaminen muodostaa ydinsisällön peruskoulun (K-9) opetussuunnitelmassa. Laulamisen sijaan rockbändin käytännöt ovat hallinneet ruotsalaista musiikinopetusta yläkouluissa (lukuvuodet 7–9) lähes viiden vuosikymmenen ajan. Tässä artikkelissa kirjoittajien tavoitteena on tarkastella, miten laulaminen konstruoidaan ja legitimoidaan yhtäältä yläkoulun ja toisaalta musiikkipainotteisen yläkoulun musiikintunneilla, sekä kuvata miten osallistujat positioidaan opetustilanteissa. Teoreettinen viitekehys perustuu sosiaaliseen konstruktivismiin. Empiirinen materiaali koostuu videoiduista oppitunneista kahdessa ruotsalaisessa koulussa, joista toinen on normaali valtion yläkoulu ja toinen musiikkipainotteinen yläkoulu. Tuloksista nousee esiin kaksi erilaista luokkahuonekäytäntöä. Laulaminen kuorotoimintana kuvastaa musiikkipainotteisen yläkoulun toimintaa, jossa kuoroharjoittelu keskittyy musiikillisiin näkökohtiin. Laulaminen opetussuunnitelman toteuttamisena kuvastaa toisen yläkoulun käytäntöä, mikä tarkoittaa, että laulamisesta tulee väline opetussuunnitelman tavoitteiden toteuttamiseksi. Lopuksi käsitellään näiden käytäntöjen vaikutuksia yläkoulujen opetukseen kasvatuksellisesta näkökulmasta.
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