“What does it mean to be an effective teacher?”
I struggled with this question while teaching middle and high school band and continued to struggle with it when obtaining my master’s degree. I have concluded that one does not simply wake up and automatically feel like one is the most effective teacher. To teach well, and do so effectively, one must have the drive to be better every day at any given skill and be willing to make mistakes frequently. I have figured out that I learn the most by doing tasks (e.g., conducting, rehearsing, practicing, lecturing) and reflecting upon and/or evaluating my performance. This type of learning relates to John Dewey’s four tenets of progressive education: (1) Learning by doing, (2) Discussions, (3) Interactive, and (4) Interdisciplinary. The first tenet is self-explanatory but is also known as experiential learning. An example of this in the band classroom would be to let a student choose the dynamics for a particular section, do those articulations, and decide if it worked well. This leads to the second tenet, discussions. Students can agree and disagree in a civil matter and have appropriate discussions with each other about the subject matter. The dynamic contrast example, once implemented, can be discussed by the class together and they can come to a consensus if the dynamic was appropriate or not for the music. This discussion is also interactive, which is tenet number three. Students interact with each other and with how the music sounds in the environment it was performed. The last tenet, that learning is interdisciplinary, means that what students learn can be transferred to other disciplines. How the students discuss appropriately amongst themselves about the dynamics of a piece of music can be transferred to how they discuss disagreements in their debate class or with their peers.
Another aspect of “What does it mean to be an effective teacher?” is the use of reflecting on one’s performance. For this section of the processfolio, I spent many hours reflecting on my overall performance in my teaching, rehearsing, conducting, practicing my instrument, and lecturing full class periods. Schön’s model of reflective practice is based on the idea that those who are professionals in their field of work can learn from reflecting on their actions, performance, and how they act in certain situations. Throughout this section, I reflect on many videos of my conducting, teaching, rehearsing, lecturing, and performances on my non-primary instrument. This has allowed me to learn from my mistakes as well as notice what I inherently do well. It has allowed me to maintain a more consistent teaching approach while also allowing me to write and reflect on what I would do differently to make my teaching better (reflections).
Conducting
I made it one of my goals to improve my conducting throughout this master’s degree. I was fortunate enough to be a conductor for the Oregon Wind Symphony as well as a private conducting student of Dr. Dennis Llinás. As an aspiring middle or high school band director, improving my instruction through my conducting will lead to greater teacher effectiveness. While taking lessons with Dr. Llinás, I synthesized my notes into what being an effective conductor means to me:
- Show musical aspects through the conducting (accents, slurs, phrasing, dynamics, entrances)
- Conducting should be clear and easy to follow
- Know the score well to the point where it is not needed
- Provide expression in all forms
Video 1: Pas Redouble
Video one, Pas Redouble by Saint-Saens, was my first time conducting a group since being a middle and high school band director. I was nervous, stiff, and scared of making mistakes. I remember feeling like I did not belong on the podium and felt as if I was immensely under-qualified—all of which I felt while teaching middle and high school band. I conducted with mainly my shoulder and arm, my two pattern was hard to follow, I frequently checked the score, and provided little to no expression (in my face and in my conducting). All of which lacked effectiveness and violated all four of the effective conductor rules stated above.
To combat the ineffective techniques stated above, I changed the way in which I held my baton from a pinched “stabbing” grip (Video 1) to a more relaxed, flat wrist (Video 2). Dr. Llinás realized that how I was holding my baton was causing me to use my shoulder rather than my wrist and fingers. The use of my shoulder was leading to a decrease in clarity and general discomfort, physically in my shoulder and arm. Throughout these lessons, Dr. Llinás helped me realize that the most effective way to get students to play what I was showing was to save the arm, shoulder, and my left hand for bigger moments. This challenged me to use my left hand less as well as caused me to focus more intently on what I was doing with my wrist and finger tips of my right hand. Once I had solved how to hold the baton without tension, we then focused on being more expressive with the baton and the left hand. Dr. Llinás would frequently have me sing each part of the melody as well as supporting lines while conducting with both my left and right hand. Not only did this allow me to memorize more of the music, but it also helped guide what I was hearing in my head into what I was showing with the baton. We would also air pattern (breathe and blow through a line) to showcase where the line of a particular section in the music should be going.
Video 2: Laputa – Howl’s Moving Castle
Video two, Laputa – Howl’s Moving Castle by Joe Hisaishi, highlights my growth as a conductor from fall term to spring term. I am less tense, I look more confident, and what I learned in my conducting lessons came through in my conducting. Specifically, my patterns are clearer, I am showing expression with my face, providing accents and phrasing with my conducting, and looking at the score far less (although more than I would like).
Like many music educators and conductors, I am constantly trying to improve my techniques and strategies to be the most effective teacher. Additional future goals for myself to improve my conducting include:
- Use my conducting to show musical aspects in the music (left and right hand)
- General left- and right-hand independence
- Maintain a relaxed, tension free conducting style
These goals, coupled with the improvement I have made throughout the two years of my master’s degree will ensure that I maintain my conducting ability and continue to progress as a wind band conductor.
Rehearsing
The main difference between rehearsing an ensemble and conducting an ensemble is that rehearsing specifically deals with the strategies that I am implementing to have the students achieve the sound I want with a particular piece of music. Conducting is showing students, without telling them verbally, what I want the music to sound like. I chose to separate these categories because after graduating with my bachelor’s degree during the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, I did not have the opportunity to student teach. Not being able to student teach resulted in a lack of confidence in front of an ensemble, and I missed the opportunity to apply the knowledge and skills I had been honing in the last four years of my undergraduate degree program. I went into my first job without the experience that many first-time teachers had. I had to figure out what worked well and what did not. For example, talking louder to get the students’ attention does not work, how to establish a culture within a new program where there is equal respect between student and teacher, being concise and clear with instructions to lessen confusion after stopping the ensemble, and general comfortability as a teacher. All of which made me feel inadequate because I found myself failing more than succeeding. While completing this master’s degree I devised what I need to be able to do to make rehearsal more effective:
- Be able to sing sections parts (as in tune and in time as possible)
- Be able to count/speak all rhythms with appropriate articulations
- Prime the students and explain what I am listening for before playing a certain section.
- Provide opportunities for students to self-assess, evaluate, and apply their own knowledge to fix mistakes
- Speak clearly, concisely, and at a rate that is understandable
My main deficiency when rehearsing is that I go too fast. This does not give students the ability to take in information and digest what I am asking of them. It specifically violates aspects three, four, and five listed above. For aspect three, speeding through rehearsal causes me to forget to give students a reason for working on a particular section, thus they are aimlessly playing rather than focusing on a particular aspect of the music. I have combatted this by forcing myself to prime the students with what I want them to be doing and listening for. Instead of having the ensemble play a section of the music and comment on what they can do better after the fact, I would start by asking them to think about a specific aspect of the music before attempting to play it (click here). Along with priming, I also need to allow myself time after cutoffs to think about what I want to hear students play. Not only does this give me more time to think about what I want them to listen for but it slows the lesson down and gives the musicians time to process how they performed.
The fourth aspect is affected by speed because when I move too fast, I forget to give the students the opportunity to self–assess, evaluate, and apply their own musical knowledge to fix the mistakes. When I hear a mistake, I tend to cut off immediately to address it and tell the students what to do better. To fix this, I have been allowing the students to try a section again and saying, “Before I say anything, do you want a second chance at [insert section of music]?” What this does is tell them that something sounded incorrect to my ear and rather than just telling them what is wrong, I want them to quickly reflect on what we have been working on during a certain section of the music and apply it to what we are doing now. By giving them a second chance, they can self-assess, evaluate what might have been incorrect, and apply their musical skills to the music. Aspect five is what is causing most of my issues during rehearsal. If I can fix my rate of speech, and speak clearly and concisely, students will have an idea of what I am asking of them. To overcome this struggle, I have been giving myself more time before giving feedback after the ensemble plays a passage to think of exactly how to give them information that is clear and easy to understand. What this does is force me to think before I say something and slow down my pace. This leads to the students understanding what I want from them and allows me to feel more confident in my instruction.
Aspects one and two can both be improved by listening to the music with the score frequently while singing along. Specifically, for aspect one, I have been picking certain sections of the ensemble to listen and sing along with and then applying it to the classroom. By singing the parts for the students they get an idea of where the musical phrasing should go and how it should sound dynamically. For aspect two, coming up with words to express certain articulations (Doo, Dah, DahT, Dat, Dot) and ways to say faster phrases (duga duga or tuku tuku) and combining those two (duga duga DahT, takata Tah) give them a reference for what I want it to sound like. Not only that, but also writing these words on the board, associated with the articulations, and with the air column that I want the students to use will increase the chance that they play the appropriate articulations. These rhythms can also be said literally (1 e & a OR Tri-pl-et) to show how the students should be subdividing their fast rhythmic parts (click here). This also shows the students that I have paid close attention to the detail as for what I want articulations and rhythms to sound like as well as the phrasing for longer passages. This type of teaching resembles that of Pestalozzi’s “Object Lesson” where objects or visual aids are a part of the lesson and are used to heighten certain attributes of the teaching. This can also be transferred to playing something for students and demonstrating what I want it to sound like before they play it back. After this is completed, they can associate what they just played with the notes, words, articulations, and rhythms on the paper.
Video 1: Siuslaw High School – Before Master’s Degree
What I noticed after watching this video is that I struggled the most with my confidence as a music teacher and my ability to give instructions that are clear and easy to understand. As mentioned in the opening paragraph of this section, I was thrust into the teaching world with little experience teaching students on my own. At that point in my career, I had one year of teaching online band to both middle school and high school and had yet to establish a culture of respect between myself and my students. It was challenging to get the students to listen to my instructions and I was struggling with feeling as if I was qualified to teach. The other aspect I struggled with, and continue to struggle with, is being concise and clear with my instructions. I tend to talk indirectly to get to a certain point that could have been easily explained with one or two sentences. While teaching at Siuslaw Middle and High School, I found myself learning from the mistakes I was making rather than preparing to stop the mistakes from happening. For example, instead of priming the students with clear instructions before they played a passage of the music, I would have them play it, give a long, unnecessary explanation of what I needed them to do better, and then have them play it again. The long explanation caused them to lose focus which in return resulted in a loss of time and they ended up not remembering what I was asking them to accomplish. The lack of confidence caused me to over-explain information to prove to the students that I knew what I was talking about.
Video 2: Chester Overture – During Master’s Degree
After reflecting on both videos, the main difference I see between my high school rehearsing and the rehearsing I did during my master’s degree, is that during my master’s degree, I finally started to feel more comfortable and relaxed on the podium. This newfound comfort fixed a lot of the issues that arose when I was teaching high school (see above). I am more confident with my instruction and have a wealth of knowledge that I can tap into and apply during rehearsals (analogies, how to fix articulations/dynamics/phrasing, etc.). What has helped me most during this master’s degree is getting the opportunity to try new ideas, apply what I have learned in my applied lessons (practice strategies, conducting strategies), and reflect on my teaching videos to actively combat bad habits. This master‘s degree has heightened my music education knowledge by allowing me the opportunity to apply what I have learned in various classes to my rehearsals.
Secondary Instrument
I picked the trombone as the secondary instrument that I wanted to be more proficient in. I chose it for three reasons. The first being, when I was teaching middle and high school band it was the one brass instrument where I lacked the skills necessary to teach it effectively. I did not know how to use the F attachment appropriately. I thought its only purpose was to make C and B natural easier to play and facilitate fast passages in the high registers (both of which are incorrect), and when students asked me questions about it, I was unable to answer them with 100% certainty. The second reason was because trombone is played in both jazz and concert band (more often than french horn) and I already knew how to play the trumpet. The third reason is because of all the brass instruments that I already know how to play (horn, trumpet, euphonium, tuba) trombone is the most different (no valves) and has challenges that are unique to trombone only. For example, playing natural slurs, adjusting intonation physically with the slide as well as with the ear, and adjusting the slide position when playing in the lower F attachment range. By choosing to become more proficient at trombone, I have enhanced my musicianship as a music educator. With that, I had to perform juries on trombone and be graded on my overall ability to perform well for the brass faculty (Jury Evaluations).
Below is a video of Fantasy for Trombone by James Curnow that I performed for the trombone studio solo night during winter term 2023. This video is a culmination of approximately sixteen weeks of trombone lessons.
Went well:
- Sound quality in the higher range is clear
- Appropriate articulations throughout
- Relaxed slide movement
Needs improvement:
- Tuning/Correct slide positions
- Air support throughout ranges
- Consistency in sound quality through all ranges
- Natural slurs and tongued slurs
While reflecting on my challenges with the trombone, my biggest concern is my clarity in my low to middle range and appropriately moving air throughout the instrument. My individual practice consists of trying to streamline my air throughout the different registers of the horn by doing lip slur exercises. My tone quality tends to suffer and becomes unsupported when I am playing something fast, because the physical facility that is required of the trombone is still new to me, or when playing in a register where the air and buzz balance is different than what I am used to (compared to F. Horn). During my lessons with the trombone professor, Henry Henniger, we would frequently work on buzzing, singing, and air patterning through a line first and then trying it on the trombone. When the airflow or my buzz-to-air ratio was incorrect, we would switch to a scale pattern or lip slur that forced me to move the air with better intention.
In addition to the challenges already mentioned, I also struggled with the frustration of being a well-versed musician but the foreign aspects of trombone holding me back from increasing my ability (e.g. slide positions, low register F attachment, adjusting for intonation in the higher and low range, air needed, physically demanding slide movements). Simply put I would get frustrated at my inability to play repertoire, scales, long tones, in tune, and other “easy” aspects trombone because the instrument was entirely new to me, but I was not a new musician. I had to keep in mind, with help from professors Dr. Eric Wiltshire, Henry Henniger, and Dr. Jason Silveira, that the “easy” aspects of trombone come with dedicated practice but also with time and experience.
The lessons I took during this master’s program have changed my perception of music education by giving me insight into how students could feel when learning a new instrument for the first time and allowed me to apply the practice methods that I preach to my students. These practice strategies include forward chaining, backward chaining, taking passages slowly, alternate ways of approaching range, and working on what is challenging instead of what is easy. Here is an excerpt from my lesson reflections:
[Figure 6]. Selection from lesson reflections on trombone lessons.
This next video is the culmination of two years of trombone lessons.
My performance of Morceau Symphonique, Op. 88 by Alexandre Guilmant showcases my ability to make an instrument that was once foreign to me feel secure. This performance highlights my ability to improve the aspects of trombone playing that I lacked while playing Fantasy for Trombone (see above). I have better sound quality throughout the ranges, am using a more consistent stream of air while playing, and I am more comfortable with different slide positions, especially in the upper register. Now, there is certainly room for improvement. For example, I tend to run sharp when playing trombone because during performances I tense up and default to the air support that is better suited for horn. This challenge arose during my applied lessons and to combat it Professor Henniger had me write in sections that I could use to remind myself what the “ideal” trombone air support and tone sounded like. Examples in Morceau Symphonique are the sections that say “Control” over them (see link above). What I consider to be my biggest improvement is my ability to play fast passages. Compared to the fast sections in Fantasy for Trombone, the fast passages in Morceau Symphonique require a greater technical ability and are far more difficult. Participating in trombone lessons during my master’s degree has made me a better educator by giving me insight to the difficulties of learning a new instrument. This makes me a better educator because I can sympathize with my future beginning band students who are struggling to play instruments for the first time.
Lectures
Before starting my master’s degree, I had zero experience teaching lectures. Most of my teaching experience had been on the podium rehearsing bands or doing presentations in class. Thankfully, this master’s degree has provided me with many opportunities to practice lecturing. The first opportunity I had to attempt lecturing came in the History of American Music Education class, where throughout the term each student gave five 45-minute presentations on different eras of music education history. When taking this class, I noticed that much of what I struggle with when rehearsing an ensemble is also what I struggle with when lecturing. I talk too fast, ramble, and seem disorganized. For me, the best way to work on these deficiencies was to lecture frequently. Thankfully, the History of American Music Education class gave me the opportunity to lecture on five separate occasions and work through those deficiencies before having to give my first full–length lecture.
Having the opportunity to get in front of the classroom and fail/succeed during a lecture caused me to learn how to lecture effectively. That coupled with the College Music Teaching class I took, allowed me to hone in my lecturing ability and reflect on what I could have been better. During College Music Teaching, we discussed how to lecture well, especially as a first-time professor or graduate student teaching an undergraduate class. For this course, we read Colleen M. Conway’s (2020) Teaching Music in Higher Education and chapter eight dealt specifically with lecturing in a classroom. I may have taken this class after the video below was filmed, but it gave me the opportunity to reflect on my lecturing style and understand what I could have done better. Conway breaks down lectures with these headings:
- Setting up the Room and Physical Environment
- Planning a Lecture
- Checklist for Lecture Planning
- Delivering a Lecture
- Materials and Technology for a Lecture
- Assessment of Lecture Material
The video below displays my first attempt at preparing for and executing my first 1 hour and 20-minute lecture by myself. I was fortunate enough to be a teaching assistant for Dr. Silveira’s Music in School and Society class, which meant that I got the opportunity to participate in both in–class activities and lectures two different times. Now, regarding the above list by Conway, when reflecting on this video, I found that I accomplished five out of the six steps to a successful lecture. The only aspect that I did not complete was the “Assessment of Lecture Material.” I was prepared for the lecture, I planned what I was going to teach and how long to give students on each activity, I had a mental checklist as well as a checklist on my computer for when to move on to the next part of the material, I posed questions, had lecture slides for the students to follow, and set the room up so that students could see each other during discussion and also turn and follow the slides on the projector. I also made a conscious effort to sit with the students during the discussion parts of the lecture to put myself on the same level as them. As for the “Assessment of Lecture Material”, I did not have a specific way to measure whether the students understood the information that I presented. However, I understood that this class would have both a midterm and final assessment, where student comprehension and application would be assessed, thus I did not need to assess their retention of material immediately after my lecture. Although, if given the chance to redo this lecture I would have given my students five minutes to reflect on what they learned during the lecture and collected them at the end of class. This allows me to see what the students understood the most and tailor my future lessons to cover what may not have been understood.