Alan Anderson, Lecturer, School of Social & Workplace Development, Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW 2480 aanders1@scu.edu.au
Allan Ellis, Associate Professor, School of Social & Workplace Development, Southern Cross University, Lismore, NSW 2480 aellis@scu.edu.au
A search of the Web for the terms ‘music’ and ‘teacher’ located over 1.5 million sites however on closer inspection of a sample, very few provided evidence of comprehensive use of the latest Web Technologies. Both Web technology and music teachers themselves have some way to go before the teaching and learning of all aspects of music on the Web becomes viable for distance education; much less a preferred alternative to face-to-face tuition. In the light of developing technologies and pedagogical approaches, this paper makes some recommendations as to how music teachers could make better use of the Web both now and in the future.
A search of the Web for the terms ‘music’ and ‘teacher’ located over 1.5 million sites however on closer inspection of a sample, very few provided evidence of comprehensive use of the latest Web Technologies. Both Web technology and music teachers themselves have some way to go before the teaching and learning of all aspects of music on the Web becomes viable for distance education; much less a preferred alternative to face-to-face tuition. In the light of developing technologies and pedagogical approaches, this paper makes some recommendations as to how music teachers could make better use of the Web both now and in the future.
Searching the Web using any popular search engine and the key words ‘music’ and ‘teaching’ leads to a prolific number of relevant sites. A search using Google ™, for example, located "1 - 10 of about 1,680,000 [sites] in 0.19 seconds" [HREF 1]. An analysis of a sample of these sites revealed that they generally fall into two broad categories:
Within category 2 four sub-categories can be distinguished:
a) sites that include Web-mounted text and pictures from tutor books that can be read online or downloaded [HREF 10];
b) sites that include sub-category a) characteristics plus interactive features like quizzes [HREF 11] [HREF 2];
c) sites that include characteristics of sub-categories a) and b) plus they allow the viewer to listen to and in some cases record music online [HREF 3], and
d) sites that include characteristics of sub-categories a), b) and c) plus digital video files [HREF 4] [HREF 5].
Category 1 sites urge students to attend an actual music school or private teacher to obtain materials and face to face tuition. While these sites are useful to inform students about the range, price and availability of music tuition and resources in particular locations, they are of little benefit to students in regional and remote areas. In contrast, Category 2 sites are designed to teach as well as distribute music teaching resources via the Web. These sites can therefore enhance learning opportunities in regional and remote areas as well as day to day, face to face tuition in schools and private studios. The development of such Web sites is timely because during the 1980’s and 90’s many centrally coordinated school band programs were dismantled and this lead to inequitable outcomes for children in regional and remote areas (Anderson, 1999; Anderson & Geake, 2000). Numerous children have been left with little hope of receiving guidance from a professional music teacher. Some schools have taken to contracting suitably qualified private music teachers to teach on an itinerant basis, but there are limits to how far these teachers can travel. Furthermore, as noted by Hoffer (1989), few music teachers are proficient in teaching all instruments so the likelihood of managing to cater for all students with a handful of itinerant instrumental teachers is slim. Clearly, the Web can help by giving students of any particular instrument, improved access to appropriate resources and instructions on how to use them.
Looking at the usefulness of each of the Category 2 sub-categories in turn: Sub-category a) is useful in terms of providing students with a virtual encyclopedia of print based resources to read on demand. Often these are simply pre-existing resources that have been moved to the Web with little consideration given to how they could be better displayed or sequenced in the online environment. Often the result is that people tire and lose interest in the site. This is the case especially if the content could just as easily have been read from a hard copy book.
Research into online learning tells us sites that allow for a higher level of interactivity with the content help to engage the learner for longer periods (Newton & Ledgerwood, 2001). Web sites in sub-category b) provide just that, in the form of interactive multimedia quizzes and graphics, which can be animated at the click of a mouse. For instance, some of these sites have virtual buttons to press that activate audio-visual files of a particular piece of music. The student can analyse the music by listening to it, and by looking at it, as a moving bar line and shading scrolls across the corresponding music notation. One good example of this is the ABC Baroque site [HREF. 2]. This site provides free of charge, downloadable software, including an animated score (music notation) of the first movement of Handel’s Concerto Grosso, Opus 6 No. 5, in D major [HREF 11]. The score shows the parts that particular instruments play, and the student can rewind, forward or pause at a particular point in the piece.
Sub-category c) sites contain elements of a) and b) plus they allow students to compose, record and listen to music online. These sites often contain links to free of charge software such as music notation, sequencing and mixing programs with built in tone generators [HREF 3]. These sites help students to develop aural perception skills with respect to rhythm, melody and harmony. Needless to say, possession of these skills is of prime importance to the composer or instrumentalist (Weigert, 1997; Fitzgerald, 1999). Finally, sub-category d) sites integrate digital video files, typically of teachers demonstrating particular instrumental performance techniques.
Sub-category d) sites represent a significant step forward in the usefulness of the Web for music teachers. QuickTime™ files and various compression codecs can be used to transfer or stream video [HREF 6]. This means the action involved in instrumental performance can be captured in full motion and in a format that can be edited, delivered via the Web using a desktop computer, and replayed anytime at any location. As proposed by Anderson and Ellis (2001a) the current generation of desktop video technologies can therefore improve the delivery of music instruction in the short term and in due course may facilitate a paradigm shift in music education.
One of the challenges for music students attending traditional Master Classes has been to get a good view of the teacher/master’s technique. First there is the obvious problem of sharing a small space with a small crowd of interested onlookers, all eager to find the optimum viewing position or platform. Second is the fact that the optimum position keeps changing according to the particular technique that the teacher happens to be demonstrating. One often has to watch the performer’s body position and left and right hand simultaneously to fully appreciate what an instrumentalist is doing to produce a particular sound. Usually, this means dividing attention between the two hands; watching each hand separately and at times trying to see what both are doing simultaneously. In the case of some instruments, e.g. drums, electronic organ and piano, the feet are involved as well. Film and VHS music instruction videos have already shown that image capture with several cameras simultaneously can make things easier for the viewer. For instance, a split screen effect can be created to show multiple views of the same action from different angles. This is significant because learning the correct action and positioning of the body, limbs, hand, wrist and fingers is critical to the student musician’s development of performance skills. For instance, a common problem with respect to most instruments is the drooping of the wrists and fingers or the positioning of the body or limbs in way that restricts free movement of the wrists and fingers. Therefore, for instruments like piano or snare drum it is useful for the student to view the movement of the teacher’s wrists and fingers from a horizontal plane as well as vertical. In some cases, it is useful to have an overhead view (Anderson & Ellis, 2001b). Naturally, these combinations of angles allow the student to see more than could normally be seen by observing a live performance from a single location. Of course, even with a split screen view it is not easy to view the action in each screen or window simultaneously. VHS video will allow the viewer to rewind and look at the action in a different screen or window on each replay. However, digital video makes the task much easier as one can scroll forward and back, frame by frame, without distortion of the image. Furthermore, one does not have to wait for a mechanical action to be completed before viewing the next frame, as would be the case with a VHS machine.
Animation technology can be used to emphasise or enhance selected actions. For example, a Web site can support animations that, for example, might show larger than life guitar fretboards and moving dots. eMedia [HREF 4] produce a range of guitar instruction CD-ROM’s which feature an animated guitar fretboard showing fingering positions changing as the music plays. These CD-ROM’s also feature a software generated Digital Metronome, an Automatic Tuner, and Record and Playback buttons for the student to record his/her performance. As mentioned earlier in relation to sub-category c), the Web can now support this kind of software application. One example is Hotfrets [HREF 5]. Like eMedia’s CD -ROM’s, the Hotfrets site uses annotated animations of a guitar neck and fretboard with dots to show where the player’s fingers should be positioned on particular strings and frets. This is a significant development beyond the traditional, static, one dimensional chord diagram found in guitar tutor books. Some of the animations discussed here show clearly which strings move and the extent to which they move when the guitarist does a particular technique, for example, a string bend to vary the pitch of the note being played. They are also used to show the fingers moving to different positions corresponding with the melody or chord being played. The Hotfrets site also includes short video clips of accomplished guitarists performing various techniques. Of course another advantage to the student is that the animation or video file will not tire and nor will the sound quality degenerate, irrespective of how many times or when the student chooses to replay it. This is a benefit for the teacher who would normally have to repeat a particular technique many times and at different speeds for students who find it difficult to pick up. Slow motion video can be produced and delivered via the Web just as easily as real time video files. This makes it easier for the student to pick up techniques used to play high-speed passages which the teacher may not find easy to slow down for demonstration purposes.
QTVR gives the teacher preparing resources and ultimately the student even more flexibility. 360 degree panorama vision, and zoom features, give the viewer a better opportunity to pick and choose which angle they care to view the action from [HREF 12; HREF 6]. This has positive implications for the Master Class scenario mentioned earlier although there would need to be considerable investment in preparing such resources.
A pilot study (Anderson and Ellis, 2001b) revealed that it is now feasible for individual music teachers to enhance their day to day teaching by creating their own Web site and integrating QuickTime videos for streaming to students. Anderson’s Web site was created with links to a streaming server at Southern Cross University. QuickTime videos of Anderson and research participants - playing a variety of instruments - were put on the streaming server. Students were given the URL of the site and asked to access it from off-campus and on-campus locations to see if it helped to guide them in their inter-lesson practice. The sample of students and teachers involved in this part of the pilot study was too small in number to draw generaliseable conclusions, however, some observations are worth reporting:
The exercise helped to demonstrate to participants the utility of the Web to facilitate inter-lesson practice and as an asynchronous means to teaching students in remote areas. Subsequent trials are planned for 2002 over a longer period with more students and teachers involved.
Some participating teachers expressed their reservations about using the Web as more than a supplement to traditional one-on-one or small group tuition. The main concern for these teachers was that some of the advantages of the traditional approach to teaching musical instruments face to face at close quarters might not easily be transferred via the Web at its current state of technical development. The advantages these teachers spoke of included:
These characteristics of applied music teaching are well documented and have been shown to have a positive impact on student learning (Anderson & Geake, 2000). However some of these concerns should be addressed as desktop videoconferencing compression continue to improve and broadband technology becomes increasingly available to the general public. As reported by Anderson and Ellis (2001b) some of the above mentioned music teachers who initially held reservations were later encouraged by their first encounter with teaching instruments by desktop videoconferencing. In spite of some concerns about the limited videoconference frame size, teachers found they were able to use both verbal and visual communication skills to encourage their students. It was particularly interesting to note the before and after effect when one teacher found himself momentarily out of the camera view. He and his student commented on what a dramatic difference it made to their sense of isolation from one another. Both agreed that visual cues such as changes of facial expression are an important aid to the learning process. This is not surprising given that research by Mehrabian (cited in Carlopio et. al. 2001, p.19) has shown that body language, gestures and facial expression constitutes around 55% of the message in every day communication environments. It is reasonable to assume that this statistic would be similar in the context of music teaching. Certainly, the experience and comments of several participants confirmed this when they commented on getting into shot and the difference a reassuring smile could make. In sum, digital video streaming and videoconference technology is likely to have a significant impact on the feasibility of teaching all - not just the theoretical - aspects of music via the Web.
The precise details of improvements in technology are uncertain however several trends are clear. It is widely accepted that connectivity speed will continue to increase and the geographic availability of high-speed connectivity will also improve; computers will become more powerful, hard disk capacities will increase, and computer screens and digital cameras will improve in resolution. Further advances in technology will address the time-lag and echo problems which are characteristic of current desktop videoconference systems. When this is achieved musicians will be free to participate in real-time synchronous performances online with other musicians at different sites. Clearly, these changes will have a major impact on Music Education and the Music Industry as a whole.
With the benefit of real-time multi-site videoconferencing, via easy to use Web interfaces, it should be easier for teachers to teach larger groups of music students simultaneously. The fact that students are located at different sites (be it next door or on opposite sides of the world) has some unique benefits. For instance, teachers and students would have control over what and whom they choose to see and hear during a shared (multi-site) videoconference. The benefits of this kind of technical facility have long since been proven through the use of earlier technologies like keyboard labs and in recording studios (Kendall, 1990). The main advantage to the instrumental ensemble teacher is having the ability to isolate the sound of individual students and their instruments during a performance without stopping or interrupting the whole ensemble. In fact, individual students would not need to be aware of when they are being monitored. This scenario highlights one of the advantages of having each student sitting at their own desktop computer in various remote locations as opposed to teachers trying to teach an entire class located in front of one larger-scale room-based videoconference terminal at the remote site(s). Indeed, Maki (2001, p. 1213) has established that teaching music in a class room environment is often problematic in that "the teacher doesn’t always see or hear all the pupils [so] participation during lessons is not always well recognised." Sometimes the teacher may wish to isolate the sound of all or just one of the brass instruments or woodwinds for example to see and hear what or whom is going wrong. Monitoring this way can also help to grade the performance of individual players for assessment purposes.
A few years ago, Whateley and Russell (1997) predicted that university Music Schools will shift away from full-time staffing in favor of providing students with virtual access to satellite session staff (e.g. master musicians whose touring commitments restrict opportunities to visit education institutions in person). To that end professional music teachers around the world will probably adapt their teaching studios, tour buses and the like to make the most of computer based communications technologies. Many are likely to have their own Web site advertising synchronous and asynchronous tuition and fully automated e-commerce facilities, making it convenient for students to pay lesson fees online. Teachers will be able to maintain their own data bases of FAV’s (Frequently Asked for Videos) as well as Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ’s). As discussed earlier in this paper, such video files would typically contain various views of essential instrumental performance techniques being performed. Using a password allocated by the teacher’s site (probably issued upon receipt of payment by electronic means), students would be able to download or stream pre-packaged video lessons as required. Students could refer to these video/lesson packages during their inter-lesson practice. Any difficulties or questions the student may have in relation to a particular technique could be put to the teacher either by email or during a live (synchronous) lesson conducted by videoconference.
Technical issues like the amount of traffic on the Internet; indeed any packet switched network, will always affect the quality of video conferencing. Therefore, some students may prefer to pay more for the option of a videoconference lesson via a designated line in order to be sure of getting a high quality/optimum speed videoconference link with little or no time delay. This would make it easier for the student to play in real time with the teacher in a ‘call and response’ solo scenario. When the student is learning to do improvised solos in response to the teacher or other musicians, this kind of interaction is essential and difficult to simulate by simply playing along with a pre-recorded video or audio CD.
The advent of reliable, full screen, full motion desktop computer-based videoconferencing seems likely to become a reality within this decade. This will prove to be the missing link music teachers have been waiting for in terms of providing comprehensive and effective music teaching via the Web. However, there is no harm in speculating about what might occur even further into the future. Since most inventions begin with an idea followed by the development of technology to make the idea a reality, it is worthwhile considering what music teachers and students could make use of if technical restrictions were not an issue.
Returning to the plight of the distance education student: One factor that can lead an isolated music student to give up, is the lack of people to perform with. Imagine, then, a three dimensional, fully interactive, Star Trek style, Hologram deck consisting of virtual band members or virtual representations of one’s favorite celebrities or fellow students at another computer videoconferencing/hologram deck terminal thousands or tens of thousands of kilometres away! The idea would not be to draw people away from live performance and interaction with real people but it would surely facilitate practice. As mentioned earlier, the technology needs to meet the demands of the end user. At the same time, end users (music teachers in this case) need to communicate their requirements to those technology developers. Clearly, there is no harm in dreaming and promoting such ideas into reality!
Numerous music teachers are now making use of the Web to promote their music teaching services and resources. However, the sample of Web sites discussed in this paper provided little evidence to suggest that music teachers are making comprehensive use of the latest Web Technologies. This could be due to a lack of technical expertise on their part or it could be related to their perceptions of what good music teaching involves. For instance, some teachers may be waiting until Web-based videoconference technology allows them to teach in much the same way they always have done: that is, face-to-face, either one-on-one or in small groups.
Until technical issues are resolved to their satisfaction this group may not be willing to invest a lot of time or money in setting up to actually teach online. Indeed, this may be why the majority of music teachers on the Web seem to be using it for advertising off-line services more than actually teaching via the Web.
As the performance level of desktop videoconferencing via the Web improves it will further enhance the utility of the Web for music teachers. However, asynchronous delivery is clearly the most efficient way for teachers to reach more people via the Web. The technical gaps are closing as digital video and animation software has now made it possible to produce high quality, self-paced music teaching and learning resources. Therefore, pioneering music teachers are bound to do well if they develop beneficial partnerships whereby technology designers can provide them with what they need to make the most of the Web for teaching music. Sites which in the future manage to exploit all of the features of the categories mentioned in this paper, plus those which digital video streaming technology and data base search offer (to get the right visual information), will surely set the standard for music teaching and learning via the Web.
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http://groups.google.com/groups?q=music,+teaching&hl=en&sa=N&tab=wg (verified 23/2/02)
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Alan Anderson and Allan Ellis, © 2000. The authors assign to Southern Cross University and other educational and non-profit institutions a non-exclusive licence to use this document for personal use and in courses of instruction provided that the article is used in full and this copyright statement is reproduced. The authors also grant a non-exclusive licence to Southern Cross University to publish this document in full on the World Wide Web and on CD-ROM and in printed form with the conference papers and for the document to be published on mirrors on the World Wide Web.