Oberlin Conservatory of Music

OBERLIN COLLEGE

OBERLIN CONSERVATORY OF MUSIC

MUSIC EDUCATION DIVISION

Program Approval Report

Submitted December 1, 2005

Jody L. Kerchner, Ph.D.

Associate Professor and Director of Music Education

Education Unit Director

NCATE SECTION I. CONTEXT INFORMATION

NCATE #1.1: Description of any state or institutional policies that may influence the application of SPA standards.

The unit purpose is to prepare professional music educators within the context of the values and goals described in its mission statement (excellence in education through musicianship, pedagogy and scholarship). The Music Education Program at Oberlin College is aligned closely to the standards stipulated by the National Council for Accreditation of Teacher Education (NCATE), the National Association of Schools of Music (NASM), the North Central Association of Colleges and Schools (NCA), and the Ohio Department of Education (ODE). Standards set forth by NASM serve as the unit’s SPA (See attached “NASM Standards for Baccalaureate Degrees in Music Education”, NASM Handbook (2005-06), pp. 83-86.)

Standards dictated by these accrediting agencies are considered in all decisions regarding curricular design, instruction and assessment, selection of teacher candidates, selection of faculty, and the faculty’s professional activity within the department and in the profession. NCATE, ODE and NASM assessment standards have also influenced how the unit assesses teacher candidates, faculty, and program. It is without any state or institutional limitation that the unit implements the NASM standards.

In recent years, however, there have been several changes in the unit’s program due to changing NCATE and ODE standards. These standards have directed the unit’s analysis, interpretation, and use for program improvement since 2002. ODE’s requirements to include plans for diversity and technology have been implemented by the unit. It designed specific diversity and technology plans in 2002. ODE also required mandatory courses in reading/literacy. A course, “Reading in the Content Area” became required for in-coming students as of January 2003. While the course is a Winter Term (January) project, the course meetings and content have been approved by ODE as the equivalent to a three-hour course.

NASM Standard 1: Curricular Structure.

The Music Education Division’s curricular structure, content, and time requirements enable teacher candidates to develop the range of knowledge, skills, and competencies expected of those holding a professional baccalaureate degree in music education. The undergraduate curriculum meets the following NASM requirements: musicianship and performance, 50% of the total program; general studies, 30-35%; and professional education, 15-20%. See Table 1 for the Music Education Division percentages.

Table 1. Required Courses, Credit Hours, and Percentage of Total Program Hours.

Curricular Area / Required Courses in Curricular Area (Vocal and/or Instrumental Emphases) / Total Credits / % Total Program Credit Hours
Musicianship and Performance / Principal Applied Lessons (21),
Secondary Applied Lessons (4-8), Ensembles (7), Conducting (4), Aural Skills (4), Music Theory (12); Instrument classes (4-8), Music History (3) / 62-66 / 50%-53%
General Studies / Principles of Education (3), Educational Psychology (3), Music History (7), Reading in the Content Area (3), Courses in Arts, Communication, Philosophy, Literature, Mathematics, Science, Social Sciences (18+); Music Elective / 37 / 30%
Professional Education / Introduction to Music Education (1), Choral/Instrumental Methods classes (2-4), Practicum in School Music Experiences (2), Teaching Music to Children (3), Teaching Music to Adolescents (3), MusicPlay Lab (1), Instrumental Programs (2), Winter Term School Intern Project (0), Student Teaching (12-17) / 28-31 / 23%-25%

NASM Standard 2: Program Content.

In addition to the common core of musicianship and general students, the Music Education Division teacher candidates develop their pedagogical, professional, and musical competencies to exceedingly high levels of achievement (See Section I, Table 8 and Section IV, “Assessments and Findings”). Musicianship skills, pedagogical theories and professional ethics/behavior are discussed and practiced in class. However, an important feature of the Oberlin music education experience is the number of quality field experiences in which teacher candidates practice their skills and implement theories and methodologies with “real” student learners (See Program Approval, Section 1.2, Table 1). Prior to teacher candidates being admitted formally into the Music Education degree program, they observe and practice teach during several music education and applied study courses—Introduction to Music Education, Practicum Experiences in Music Education, Elementary Conducting, and Choral Conducting. Prior to student teaching, teacher candidates observe and practice teach choral, orchestral, instrumental, PreK MusicPlay, String Preparatory, elementary and middle school general music, and marching band students. The observations and practice teaching span K-12 public school and community outreach music programs (PK-adult). Furthermore, each course has a peer-teaching (in-class, clinical) component during which teacher candidates teach and observe their peers teaching. The culminating “practice teaching” field experience occurs during teacher candidates’ full-time student teaching assignments (see Table 8).

The Music Education Division seeks to foster the development of teacher candidates’ attitudes and dispositions relating to human, personal considerations and to social, economic, and cultural components that give individual communities their identities. These attitudes and dispositions are assessed throughout the various conducting and professional education courses. The observation rubrics used in field experience teachings and in-class peer teachings, in addition to the Practicum and Student Teaching assessment rubrics, include assessment criteria for these attitudes and dispositions.

NASM 3d: Professional Procedures.

NASM 3d.4 The Oberlin Conservatory offers advanced undergraduate study in the areas of conducting, composition, and theoretical/historical analysis. Table 2 indicates advanced courses in each area.

Table 2. Advanced course offerings at the undergraduate level.

**Conducting / **Composition / **Theoretical/Historical Analysis
APST 350 Intermediate Instrumental Conducting, APST 351 Advanced Instrumental Conducting, APST 360, 361 Advanced Choral Conducting, MUED 305 Band Repertoire / COMP202, 203 (Composition Classes 3-4), COMP 210 Composition Seminar, COMP 300 Orchestration; COMP 310 New Music Workshop / MUTH325 Counterpoint, MUTH340 Form & Analysis, MUTH342 Rhythmic Theory, MUTH343 String Quartet, MUTH 352 The Romantic Symphony, MUTH 374 Trends in Contemporary Music, MUTH 375 Music of Stravinsky, MUTH 415 Analysis & Performance, MHST 318 Women Composers, MHST 331 J.S. Bach, MHST 332 History of Film Music, MHST 353 Studies in Opera: Opera in the US since 1950

**Prerequisites must be fulfilled prior to gaining instructors’ consent for upper-level (advanced) courses. Based on the Oberlin College Course Catalog, 2005-2006.

NCATE 1.2 Description of the field and clinical experiences required for the program, including the number of hours for early field experiences and the number of hours/weeks of student teaching or internships.

The unit seeks coherence of its values—excellence in education through musicianship, pedagogy, and scholarship—throughout the experiences that it provides teacher candidates inside and outside of the Oberlin Conservatory of Music. The unit seeks to place candidates in diverse instructional settings (i.e., rural, suburban, urban settings), with cooperating teachers who hold and demonstrate similar educational and musical values and who have developed solid music education programs. The schools vary per size, socio-economic status, cultural diversity, and location (e.g., rural, suburban, urban).

Prior to establishing teaching partnerships, laboratory settings, or observation/practice teaching relationships with music teachers in the local public schools, the Field Experience Coordinator visits each teacher and videotapes portions of her/his classes and rehearsals. The unit faculty reviews the videotapes and evaluates teachers’ demonstration of content knowledge, musicianship, pedagogical content knowledge, classroom manner, and evidence of student musical learning. The unit identifies potential cooperating teachers as music educators who are seasoned professionals—knowledgeable about and skilled in teaching music to young people—and a positive presence among her/his colleagues. The licensed cooperating teacher can meet the individual needs of all students and those of a student teacher by designing developmentally appropriate and sequential learning experiences for all.

Other criteria for cooperating teacher are: 1)minimum of three years successful music teaching experience in chartered schools, 2)ability to design a carefully sequenced plan for candidates’ continued pre-professional growth, and 3)willingness to participate in college-provided orientation and in-service opportunities as requested. Furthermore, unit faculty attempt to match best “fits” between cooperating teachers and candidates according to candidates’ musical, pedagogical and classroom management abilities and candidates’ requests for a particular type of teaching setting or music program (Music Education Student Teaching Handbook, p. 11).

The unit recognizes the importance of compatible cooperating teachers and candidates and the context of the educational setting in the development of candidates’ identities as “music teachers.” The unit is on a quest to provide its students with the strategies and experiences that stem from multiple perspectives of teaching, that help students and candidates make connections between skills and knowledge bases and the "broad picture" of creative musicianship, pedagogy, and scholarship.

From the first semester during the freshman year, candidates observe the Music Education faculty as it works with individual community outreach programs. A list of field experiences and outreach programs is found in Table 1.

NASM 3d: Professional Procedures.

NASM 3d.1 All music education methods courses and field experiences are supervised by the four, full-time faculty in the Music Education Division. Each faculty member has taught many years in the K-12 public schools prior to their teaching in higher education. (See Program Approval, Section I.6.c, Table 8, “Unit faculty expertise and experience”). The two professional development courses that are taught by qualified non-unit faculty and staff are Educational Psychology (taught by two, full-time, tenured College of Arts and Sciences faculty) and Reading in the Content Area (staff). The Music Education Division also employs a part-time instructor, a former public school teacher and counselor, who assists with the supervision of field experiences. All faculty members maintain a positive professional relationship with local public school systems. In fact, the faculty place its students with cooperating teachers in the area schools as a component of their music methods courses.

NASM 3d.2 See NCATE Section 1.2, NASM Standard 2; Table 3 (below); and NASM 3d.1 for field experience procedures and site/cooperating teacher selection.

Table 3. NCATE 1.2a: Clinical/Field-based Experiences in Music Education.

Experience / Location of Experience / Clinical Hours
(in-class) / Field-based Hours
(in public schools)
MUED 100 (Yr.1 or 2) / Private instrumental/voice lessons, Conservatory of Music / 3 / 3
MUED 101 (Yr.1) / Unit outreach programs, Oberlin, OH / 4 / 4
MUED 102 (Yr.1) / Lorain Co., OH, school districts practicum experiences / 2 / 22
MUED 103 (Yr. 2) / Oberlin Conservatory/String Preparatory Program / 2 / 2
MUED 201 (Variable) / Murray Ridge School, Elyria, OH, music therapy / 4 / 4
MUED 206 (Yr.3) / Oberlin Conservatory Women’s Chorale / 4 / 4
MUED 300 (Yr.3) / North Ridgeville Middle School General Music Lab / 3 / 9
MUED 301 (Yr. 3) / Eastwood Elementary School, Oberlin, general music classes / 4 / 5
MUED 303 (Yr.3) / MusicPlay, Oberlin Conservatory of Music, PreK music classes / 0 / 30
MUED 304 (Yr.3) / Oberlin High School, instrumental lessons / 3 / 4
MUED 305 (Yr.3) / Oberlin High School and College Community Winds (outreach program) / 2 / 2
Professional Orientation to Student Teaching (MUED 400) (Yr.4) / Northeast Ohio school districts / 0 / 3 weeks;
approx. 120 hrs.
MUED 400 (Yr.4) / Northeast Ohio school districts / 0 / 10 weeks; at least 400 hrs.
Conducting classes (APST 260, 261, 262) (Yr.2) / Outreach programs; conducting / 10 (APST 260), 10 (APST 261), 10 (APST 262) / 0 (APST 260); 3 (APST 262)
Instrument classes (APST 235, 272, 273, 274, 275, 276, 277) (Yrs. 2, 3) / Oberlin and surrounding school districts instrumental lessons/sectionals / 0 (APST 235), 4 (APST 272), 4(APST 273), 3 (APST 274), 3 (APST 276) / 6 (APST 273), 3 (APST 274), 3 (APST 276)
EDUC300 (Yr. 2 or 3) / Oberlin schools (observation) / 1 / 2
Winter Term Music Education Intern Project (Yrs. 2 or 3) / Public schools anywhere except teacher candidate home school district (teaching intern) / 0 / 160
Winter Term Reading in the Content Area Project (Yr.1) / Oberlin schools (observation) / 3 / 3
Summer Experiences (Yrs. 1-4) / Organized camp/summer school (teaching in various music education venues) / 0 / Varies per student

NCATE 1.2b. Narrative description of field experiences required for ALL music education majors (*) and music education outreach programs.

*Art of Teaching/Introduction to Music Education (MUED 100, 101)

During this first course in the music education major sequence, class members observe the Music Education faculty teach or rehearse at their respective laboratory settings (College-Community Winds, Northern Ohio Youth Orchestra, String Prep Program, MusicPlay, Oberlin Youth Chorale/Women’s Chorale).

*Practicum in School Music Experiences (MUED 102)

Practicum in School Music Experiences is designed to provide music education majors with an early field experience and to enable them to begin to view educational settings from a teacher's perspective. Teacher candidates begin by observing and proceed to work individually with small groups of students or together as team teachers of small instructional segments.

*Winter Term

One required Winter Term is “Reading in the Content Area.” In this course students observe elementary and secondary school students in reading classes in local public schools. Another required Winter Term Projects must be a full-time field experience at a school other than her/his home high school, preferably not in the Oberlin area. The teacher candidate may serve a variety of functions, including observing, tutoring, coaching, serving as a teacher aide, etc.

String Preparatory Program (MUED 103) This program, offered to children in grades four and five, is staffed by Conservatory students who have qualified by completing the String Pedagogy course. Both music education and string performance majors participate as teachers of individual lessons and as observers and aides in group musicianship classes taught by the director. In addition to classes and lessons taught at the Conservatory, the program includes satellite sites in arts magnet elementary schools in nearby cities, to which Conservatory students drive once a week and teach individual lessons and a group class to participating children.

The program's curriculum emphasizes singing and movement as they relate to string development in the early stages. As a student progresses, composition skills and improvisatory techniques are developed. Concerts are demonstrations of student progress, with an explanation of the pedagogy employed; they often include parents' participation.