Fluid Pedagogy: Nurturing Personal Creativity (original) (raw)
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The introduction of the Australian Curriculum has augmented a series of implications for the cultivation of personal creativity within secondary music teacher pedagogy in their local environment. In particular, rigidity is ostensible in fostering creative potential from student outcomes within a national standards framework measured against that of the highest international countries while providing locally relevant student centred individual learning plans. From the paradigm of a poststructuralist lens, I intend to argue the case for a ‘fluid’ pedagogy, largely influenced by Freire and ‘Critical Pedagogy’ , for the facilitation of senior secondary classroom music (that resonates within the unique discipline of the Arts domain). I propose that ‘Fluid Pedagogy’ (differing from Critical Pedagogy which is an interactive method varying from ‘Fluid Pedagogy’) espouses responsive teaching practices that nurture individual and collective creativity to inform our national curriculum. In doing so, the collective education of our secondary students could initiate relevant transformations that reflect intrinsically motivated creative potential, evaluation of potential for creativity [EPoC] , innovation and education through divergent and convergent thinking , experimentation and play.
This paper will justify and outline a systematic approach for the design of Fluid Pedagogy Negotiated Curriculum (F.P.N.C.). F.P.N.C is structured to support the development of creative potential in secondary school music students, thus attaining master student outcomes at various stages of development. Fluid Pedagogy is a responsive student centred organic teaching method I have designed to nurture creative potential with intrinsically motivated experiences that create master student outcomes. This paper establishes that the process of experiencing such student outcomes is essential and informs unique Negotiated Curriculum from students' formative self-evaluations and teacher formative assessments. The paper will align relative curriculum models, ethical philosophies, pedagogical theories, instructional methods, formative self-evaluation and intervention with Fluid Pedagogy Negotiated Curriculum. A critical view of the definition of 'Master Student Outcomes' is explored and contextualised for the purpose of this model as well as what Master Students look like at various stages of development through Secondary School. The tension from navigating between fluid student centric organic scaffolding, and measurable summation of Master Student Outcomes, that align with mandatory curriculum, are addressed with formative teacher intervention and formative student self-evaluation.
Integrating Creativity into the Curriculum: A case for Electroacoustic Music Pedagogies
This paper draws upon the author’s recent research to discuss creative learning activities integrated into the teaching of electroacoustic music within a traditional classroom context. Several specialised learning activities, designed to help students learn through exploration and experience, are outlined within a context of constructivism. This article builds upon work by Seddon & O’Neill (2003), Nilsson & Folkestad (2005) and Cipriani, Core & Giri (2015) seeking methods of teaching that increase the accessibility of electroacoustic music through experience and the learning of technological skills. Small groups undertake an open-ended task that combines theoretical skills and technical understanding: compose a piece of work that relates to their experiences at school, using sounds recorded themselves. Students discuss their thoughts about electroacoustic music in each activity, shedding light on their experiences grappling with a new musical form. Each activity develops skills in recording, listening to and composing with sounds, whilst also inspiring critical discussion and analysis. This paper attempts to document 'best practice’. Early findings show that students develop an increased awareness of music possibilities, along with a shift towards considering electronic and real-world sounds to be ‘musical’. The author’s wider research considers primary education experiences with electroacoustic music when introduced within a traditional teaching environment, exploring any impact on the student’s perception of it. Discussions are analysed to explore what learners feel constitutes ‘music’ in this context, deducing from this how their engagement affects their learning. This project hopes to continue efforts to integrate electroacoustic music into ‘traditional’ music education contexts to increase accessibility and the potential audience.
Becoming and being a musician: The role of creativity in students’ learning and identity formation
Students develop knowledge of themselves, their peers and their creative thinking and practice through a complex set of negotiations and experiences. Most students at a conservatorium enter with a long experience of music making in school, co-curricular activities and the home. They have learned to practice, to perform, and to think in musical ways; but at the tertiary level they have made an extra commitment to the ideal of becoming a professional musician. Students’ musical identity is in a fluid state as they develop from expert musical learner to novice professional musician. This transition is informed by students’ study experiences, which in turn inform their formation of professional identity and their negotiation of the relationships between the personal and the professional. In this study we explored the role of creativity in students’ learning and identity formation. The study was located at an Australian conservatoire where creativity is considered a graduate attribute and is also used as an assessment criterion. The study explored creativity as a single dimension of students’ developing professional ideas. Students were invited to participate in a discussion of what creativity means in relation to their learning. The discussion had minimal intervention by a facilitator, with students taking the lead on the discussion’s direction and outcomes. Using a linguistic approach, this paper examines how students negotiated views on creative thinking and practice. It shows how the forms of music students played or composed, and the affordances of their degree programs, mediated students’ creative activities. The discussion indicates what students see as the utility of creative practice or thinking for their future careers. Of interest are the moves and countermoves made between the students as they discuss elements of musical activity, thinking, performance, perceptions of musical genres and potential work environments. The moves and countermoves represent a form of knowledge transfer and co-construction in action.
Defining creativity for a more pluralist approach to music education
This paper responds to recent calls in the literature for a need to understand better the musical literacies surrounding popular electronic music in music education. It seeks to make a case for broadening the terms teachers (and syllabus-writers) use to understand the creative processes of traditional composers and DJs. It proposes that such engagement with these new musical cultures and practices is key in the establishment of a genuinely pluralist music education that would engage the great majority of students who currently reject music study in schools despite music being such an important part of their personal identity.
Creative learning and communities of practice: Perspectives for music education in the school
International Journal of Community Music, 2013
This article discusses processes and practices of creative learning in musical education in schools, reflecting on the contributions of this approach to the construction of communities of musical practice in the classroom. The discussion is based on a case study carried out in a primary school in Porto Alegre, in southern Brazil. In this study, the creative learning is triggered in group composition activities, through collective musical presentation and criticism of the students’ productions. The music teacher created the conditions needed to establish an environment of social relations that favours the construction of a community of musical practice in the classroom. Over time, these forms of social participation configure an engaged and committed community of musical practice, sharing ways of making and thinking about music. Detailing this proposition, the role of the composition activities, presentation and critical in the articulating process between the dimensions of creative learning are analysed, considering the children’s perspective and the teacher’s role in this process, reflecting on opportunities for teaching music in schools.