Sampler from the Autumn 2002 issue

How Do You Make Learning Experiences FUN - For Yourself And For Your Students?

Issues and Ideas:
Perspectives in Pedagogy
Kathleen Murray, Editor

In Kathleen's Murray's PERSPECTIVES IN PEDAGOGY column in this issue, her three writers, Michelle Conda, (Associate Professor of Piano at the Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music), Andrew Hisey (a faculty member of the Oberlin College Conservatory of Music), and Joan Reist (Immediate Past President of Music Teachers National Association), address the question: "How do you make learning experiences FUN-for yourself and for your students?"

Ms. Reist's article begins with these words:

It's my opinion that the primary goal of teaching should be to keep students totally engaged in the learning process, to find ways to keep them intrigued, excited and constantly challenged but not befuddled. I believe that a competent teacher guides students to take responsibility for their own learning and enables all students to be independent learners-to think for themselves and be sufficiently armed to explore and discover music on their own. I also believe that if these factors are present, learning to make music can certainly be termed "fun"-and so can the process of teaching!

She goes on to make the following suggestions:

• Make lessons student-centered and directed
• Ask thought-provoking questions.
• Design the lesson to be a model for home practice.

Get students involved with other students in music-making and learning activities

• Offer as many cooperative learning opportunities as possible.
• Keep lesson procedures fresh and have a variety of activities and formats.
• Provide a variety of musical events at every lesson.

Getting the whole family involved

Joan urges teachers to get the whole family involved with music-making and learning, encouraging us to establish "family music times" for listening and sharing. If the whole family is involved in the music-making project (and this can also be true of spouses of adult students), there's little doubt that all the participants will think of what they're doing as "fun!"

Andrew Hisey offers the following comments about "fun":

• Fun almost always involves exposure to something new.
• Fun almost always involves active participation.
• Fun almost always takes place in an engaging environment.
• Fun almost always takes place in the company of people we like
• Fun almost always involves success or a reasonable hope for it.

What is not fun?

Andrew also discusses things which are deemed not "fun", and he concludes that most of them could be stated simply as the opposite or absence of the universal elements of "fun" suggested in the list above.

He also discusses some of the things he tries to do in his teaching to make learning "fun" for both his students and himself

• I laugh a lot.
• I strive to achieve a balance between routine and surprise elements in any learning session.
• I work for variety: in physical energy level, in locus of focus, in the intensity of concentration that is needed to participate fully.
• I engineer opportunities for students to feel successful.
• I try hard to "let go" sometimes and let students interact with each other while I observe, but refrain from actively guiding them.

Andrew Hisey concludes his article with these thoughts:

"Fun" is such an amalgam of so many factors that it can be conjured in dozens of ways. I even have "fun" finding new ways to have more "fun!"

Michelle Conda's article on "having fun" begins with these words:

Last Tuesday I walked into my evening piano class a little sad­it was "Fat Tuesday" of Mardi Gras and I was missing the festivities. I opened the door, and what did I see? A cake, Mardi Gras beads, and eye masks! Let the good times roll!

 

Now, that was fun! But my adult group piano classes are always fun. I never fail to leave more energized and happier than when I arrived. The most amazing part of this to me is that I've been teaching these same classes for over twenty years!

For the purposes of this article, Michelle asked her adult students what makes the learning experience fun for them. Their answers fell primarily under the following three categories:

1. The Group Setting

2. The Use of Technology

3. The Teacher

Michelle also included in her article some of her adult students personal comments related to "fun" and piano-playing:

• "First, of course, is that I really do want to learn to play for personal enjoyment."
• "(I like) learning new things and how to do things, including how to practice."
• "Piano lessons are somewhat of a dream-come-true for me. I am 52 years old, and I have always wanted to learn how to play the piano."
• "I have discovered a real joy immersing myself in playing and I want to learn and improve."

Michelle's article ends with these remarks:

How could the "joy" possibly wear off for me? And there is nothing more fun than good, clean joy!

Michelle has included some photos with her article

These pictures are of my Piano II class through the University of Cincinnati Communiversity program. Even though you can't see it clearly, several students made an effort to dress up for this picture in "piano motif." It reminds me of the Piano IV class I had that gave me a "cowboy" theme party when I decided to start my doctorate at the University of Oklahoma. Who can fault a good sense of humor!

Click on a photo to see a larger image