SEED projects 2020 – Designing for learning

Post-graduate pathway in Music education

Dr Millie Locke

Drs Millie Locke and David Lines (Creative Arts and Industries)

The overall project involves the design of a Postgraduate Diploma in Music (part-time/distance) in Music Education. This follows feedback that the school has received from music teachers asking for postgraduate study options complementing their professional activities. Therefore, this degree is envisaged as a combination of on-campus and online learning designed for practitioner music teachers.

The School expects new full time students to be generated through this initiative and the realisation of the potential to positively influence pedagogy in schools. The new Postgraduate Diploma in Music will consist of six courses, with three offered in a blended model for the first time in 2020. The two core papers (MUS762 & MUS763) will each involve an integral, on-campus, 6-day workshop in the Orff music education approach. As a result of my research profile in this field, the established links I have with Orff New Zealand Aotearoa (ONZA), and the leadership role that I have in this organisation, I am confident that, with the support and opportunities offered by the CLeaR fellowship, I can design and trial in 2020 the first of these courses combining theory and practice.

To complement these courses and to ensure a two-year part-time programme (pathway) is available, two further courses (MUS760 ‘Themes in Music Education’ and MUS767 ‘Music Education Research and Practice’) will need to be developed for 2021. To ensure up-to-date content for these new courses, an academic literature scoping exercise and selective review needs to be undertaken to facilitate the design and delivery. A SEED grant was used for research assistance to support the scholarship of teaching and learning. The academic literature scoping exercise was aimed at canvassing academic literature published in the last 20 years related to the proposed content of the two courses with a view to identifying possible and desirable ways of structuring that content given the objectives of the courses, online delivery, pedagogical innovations, the likely clientele, and the time allotment.

This aim is represented as a series of recommendations constituting the conclusion of a selective review of the relevant literature. The review also contributes to the selection of appropriate course readings, both prescribed and recommended. Relevant topics include: creativity in music education, voice education, contemporary and popular music education, and bicultural music education and cultural diversity in the Aotearoa context.