Exploring student engagement and teacher practice: Developing language to discuss music in the classroom

Abstract

In the last fifteen years, there has been significant interest in adopting informal or student-directed music teaching approaches originating from out-of-school contexts, and bringing these into the classroom to address persistent concerns about levels of student dissatisfaction with school music. A student-directed approach to classroom music education is epitomised by the Musical Futures informal learning model. Musical Futures is a practical, experiential approach to music education where students primarily learn through immersion in music making as composers, performers and listeners. The Musical Futures approach is concerned with pedagogy, it is not intended as a complete music curricul..