THREE ELEMENTARY GENERAL MUSIC TEACHERS’ APPROACHES TO SINGING WITH THEIR STUDENTS

Abstract

Instructional processes comprise three basic components: planning, delivery of instruction, and assessment. Educators frequently reflect on the relationships among those components to choose the most effective approaches to increase student learning. Teachers’ continual assessment of student knowledge and understanding through reliable, valid measures critically propels teachers’ effective instruction forward. Constraints on funding for public education have resulted in larger class sizes and smaller budgets for the arts, as well as a heightened focus on standardized testing, less instructional time, and fewer resources (Slaton, 2012). How, then, are music teachers effectively assessing student achievement while grappling with those challenges? To fill a gap in the research literature, the purpose of this research was to explore singing voice development assessment practices that public-school elementary-general-music teachers use with their students. The following overall question guided this research: What can we learn from three kindergarten through fifth grade general music teachers about their approaches to singing with their students? I sought to document three teachers’ singing voice development processes and assessment techniques. Recognizing that this study took place during the COVID-19 pandemic, I also sought to document participants’ perceptions of the benefits and challenges of the techniques they shared, especially as they grappled with teaching singing in new learning models that were emerging; and adaptations they were using to safely and effectively guide students’ singing voice development—whether they were teaching their students virtually and/or in person. For this study, I chose symbolic interactionism as a theoretical lens and an interview-only design. Upon approval from Temple University Institutional Review Board, I invited the three participants who consented to engage in three semi-structured individual interview conversations to explore singing voice development assessment techniques, and benefits, challenges, and adaptations of those techniques, especially as they grappled with teaching singing in new instructional models that emerged as a result of COVID-19. After participants completed member checking of each of their transcripts, I used a content analysis approach to the data to identify emerging codes. Four themes summarized participants’ approaches to singing voice development assessment: teachers rely on their (a) personal philosophy formed from influences and values, (b) planning processes and objectives, (c) interactions with their students through selected techniques and tools, and (d) having time to make necessary adaptations in their singing voice development assessments. The key idea emerging from the study: the three teachers prioritized providing worthwhile musical experiences for their students. They situated singing voice development and assessment as one piece of their broader general music curriculum. A symbolic interactionist lens informed my themes and key idea by placing the context of teachers’ interactions in the forefront, and my understanding of how their experiences have shaped their views. While findings from this study are not generalizable, readers may find them transferable. Potential applications for other music teachers’ assessment practices include the following six examples: using a variety of tools to model appropriate use of singing voice, implementing pattern instruction to develop and assess singing voice, incorporating opportunities for individual singing, providing students with performance experiences, maintaining consistency in changing instructional models, and focusing on informal assessment through observation and questioning techniques. Future researchers can continue to shed light on how teachers approach singing with their elementary general music students by learning about factors outside of teachers’ instructional processes that impact singing voice development assessment, and how music teachers adapt their processes for singing voice development assessment in emerging instructional models.