#mufu2013 What I learned: Session 4 - Mark Phillips

Over the last week I have been blogging about the 2013 Musical Futures conference.

Mark Phillips

The last formal session of the first day was given by Mark Phillips, Ofsted HMI and national advisor for Music.

Ofsted have released a number of publications this last year, all available here. If you are a music teacher in any sector in the UK and have not already read these, I would urge you to stop reading this blog and read them now!

There has been a lot of open and frank discussion of these publications and Ofsted wider role on the teachingmusic forums. Again, if you have not signed up to this website do it now.

Meeting Mark confirmed what I had determined from the publications, he is a thoroughly decent and sensible chap, and makes excellent suggestions for how music ought to be taught. I still wonder about "rapid and sustained progress", and will come back to this in another blog post, but Mark was very clear about what he expected from music teachers, departments, schools and their wider partners.

If I could share only one thing from the session, it would be:

THERE ARE NO SUB-LEVELS IN MUSIC.

THERE ARE NO SUB-LEVELS IN MUSIC!

Let's stop for a mid-phrase appraisal. The first 3 notes were a 5c.

Joy of joys, the chosen one come to lead us to Zion! Except that in really it is not quite as simple as that as we all know. There was still much chagrin, in that Senior Management in many of our own schools and those we work with do not seem to be listening to Ofsted's recommendations. There are a number of accounts on the teachingmusic site of documents being placed in the hand of senior leadership and promptly ignored.

I understand the need to input sub-levels from a tracking point of view, but when they are arbitrary to the point that thousands of man hours are being lost across the country as heads of music departments are having to invent something to fit.

We do report sub-levels in our school, though thankfully only once a term. We have no criteria for what a 5c looks like in comparison to a 5a, we just use our best professional judgement based on how many of the statements in each of the NC levels ring true for our students and our SMT are happy to accept our judgement here. There are many inspirational heads up and down the country who talk about professional trust. I think of colossi like @johntomsett who, if his staff are not teaching in the afternoon, he trusts to go home, and do their work when it is best for them and their families. Yet many schools are run on fear (and it is easy to understand whY), and this is where much of Osfted/Gove-bashing is perpetrated. I an not suggesting that the system for inspection is perfect, nor would I suggest Sir Michael would pretend that is the case. But it is a case in point that despite very clear messages from Ofsted which you can read in  @oldandrewuk 's here, staff are still being told that learning outcomes must be shared, or discussed, or developed with the students. There does seem to be some impotency on Ofsted's part in terms of getting this message through to school management regimes.

I did ask the question to Mark: "Would Ofsted use an inspection report comment upon the effective of management, where school diktats were having a detrimental effect on music lessons?" The answer was pretty much no, but Mark was at pains to point just how much of a nonsense it was to spend 15 minutes of a one hour music talking about the music that you were going to make before you made it, which by the way is not appraising music. If I could sum up the rhetoric of "Wider Still, and Wider", it is that music lessons and music teaching and assessment should be musical and holistic.

Just a reminder...

THERE ARE NO SUB-LEVELS IN MUSIC!

Mark also made the valid point that if the excuse is in the interests of fairness and you want Music to report data in the same way as other subjects, then give us the same amount of contact time and let us see less kids.

The other main thrust of his presentation was to challenge the long entrenched inequalities in participation. I had hoped to share his presentation with you but trust me in saying that the statistics were not easy to read. Again there was some contest that this is not the case in all schools, and in fairness Mark recognised this, but on the grand scale, the least affluent students take part in music less than those from better off backgrounds, those who do not speak English as a first language take part in music less than.... You can see where I am going here, LAC, SEN, the same is true. This is something that we need to tackle as a community, and by that I mean all stakeholders in music education, Ofsted, senior management, hubs, teachers, parents, governors and government.

The last name there is important, in one of his better acts, Mr Gove has protected (albeit falling year on year) funding for music through the hubs for the next three years. But as Mark Phillips would ask "So What?"

What are we going to do with this money to make sure that Wider Opps, First Access, FSM and LAC remittance schemes have a lasting and musical legacy for our countries?

I don't have any answers or silver bullets. But I did have an extremely positive meeting with our hub leader, and members of our primary/secondary partnership last night which put the wheels in motion for our plans to address these issues.

What I do know at this moment in time is that Musical Futures has and continues to transform my department. As a means of giving all students access to music, valuing students' existing musical experiences and helping students to see themselves as musicians, this is the driving force of change and progress in our classrooms and practice rooms.

Oh, and one last thing:

THERE ARE NO SUB-LEVELS IN MUSIC!

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#mufu2013 What I learned: Session 3

The third session was with Lucy Green, upon whose research the MF informal learning model was developed.

Lucy is currently studying the impact of adopting an aural learning approach in peripatetic lessons.

C# is NOT the same as Db!!!!!

Thankfully, we have come a long way from the clichéd view of the forbidding piano teacher and battered knuckles.

We started the session by experiencing the same process that the students in Lucy's study went through, that is learning a piece by ear that Lucy had composed. The process was very similar to the original pathfinder project based on 'Word Up' by Cameo.

What was fascinating was hearing Lucy describe the various approaches that students take when asked to copy by ear for the first time. Whilst categorising is always a balancing act between usefulness of grouping data together and maintaining integrity to the individual responses, there did seem to be commonalities between students' responses.

"Learning styles" have been much discussed across the blogosphere, but in this instance the word has real currency, especially when are genuinely multiple means to the end. We were able to listen to some of Lucy's students attempts to play by ear. Lucy described a number of different and common approaches:

• Impulsive - starts to play immediately, fixes quickly on their "own version", plays repeatedly without checking for accuracy, little fear of the task.
• Practical - has a strategy, i.e. uses a scale or related notes to find an anchor then constructs the music from there, listens intently and then responds regularly
• Shot in the dark - hesitant at first, performs isolated notes without connecting to each other or the track.
• Theoretical - Asks questions about the music, seems to want to mentally map the music first before playing.
• Perfect pitch - Plays correct notes straight away, then might display any other style after that.

This was interesting in itself, and I am sure that any music teacher would recognise much of this, especially if they have tried aural learning with their students.

At the end of the session I was left thinking about the way that I connect the learning that happens in my practice rooms with my students and their instrumental teachers and what happens in the classroom. This is also something that has been raised in network meetings in  our hub, and it is something I need to work on for sure.

As a Musical Futures champion school, I couldn't honestly say that all of my peripatetic teachers understand the model, or use their lessons to build upon the learning that happens in our lessons.

I asked myself a number of questions that I imagined a departmental inspection by Ofsted might raise. As a head of department, do I make sure that:

peris all know what students are studying in the class?

peris know/understand the MF model?

peris use MF approaches as appropriate?

peris develop all aspects of musicality, and not just performing?

I have to admit the answers to all of these in most cases was either sometimes, or a straight no. Certainly at Key Stage 4&5, I try to make sure that peris know when performances are coming up and what pieces students should be working on for coursework, but on reflection it strikes me that this is a very polarised use of my peris.

I have to say that currently, I have the best team of peris that I have ever had in my time at Cramlington, and that the responsibility for the above questions lies solely with me.  Again in fairness to them, they do take a rounded approach beyond mere performance, but this is down to their own skills and not any initiative on my part. What is clear is that a more joined up and holistic approach is needed if there is to be a proper link between classroom and practice room.

I think to the videos here, where Ofsted highlight the good practice that Flegg High School (another MF champion) have demonstrated such a joined up approach, through their hub and the head teacher working with a specialist adviser to help him to understand key issues of music education. From the videos it is clear that the music service have a clear idea what the musical needs of the students in the school are, and are able to advise on what would work in their particular context.

As well as addressing the questions above, it would seem sensible that to ask for my peris to be able to observe my classroom as part of their CPD, ideally with some "An introduction to Musical Futures" style sessions too.

Non of this is rocket science, and I am sure that many schools already do this, but this is what I learned.

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#mufu2013 What I learned - Session 2: Classroom Workshops

The first practical session was a chance to look at Classroom Workshops as an approach to whole class interactive teaching.

The Musical Futures guidance for classroom workshops can be found here.

The methodology arose from the work done by the Guildhall Connect programme.

The basic premise is that musicians work as a large ensemble to develop a piece through a collaborative and holistic process, where the key skills of appraising, performing, improvising and composing each inform each the other.


This session was led by the impressive Robert Wells, and followed the usual process of warm-ups which led into whole class work, followed by break-out tasks which fed into the final piece.

There is a discussion thread on the Musical Futures network thread on classroom workshops here. I would not begin to pretend to be an expert, but having used the approach for a while now, I'd like to think I can give some share some advice that has helped me on my way. Already it has been notes how this way of working can seem daunting at first, in my mind this is for a number of reasons:

1. Perceived issues with classroom management - In fact, I have rarely found this to be a problem. Provided you have already established rules for when to play and when not to, the students have little time to think about anything other than music. As you become more used to working in this way, students will spend increasing amounts of time playing/discussing/refining and even the most tricky students seem to buy into it. I think this is in part due to the pace that comes with classroom workshops, but also the sound of 30 people playing together really is wondrous to a disaffected young person.
2. Not having instruments - This is a genuine issue in many schools, but percussive pieces work really well in classroom workshops, and body percussion is instantly available if you don;t have a trolley full of stuff to whack. The voice is also crucial in any music teaching, and Ofsted have recently highlighted an issue with a lack of high quality singing in schools, especially Secondary. The argument that "My students won;t sing" just doesn't cut it I'm afraid. To me, the mind and voice are the first instrument, regardless of any instrumental experience. Singing is cultural thing and so it takes time for it to become pervasive in school, especially with older children. We are nowhere near where we want to be as a school yet. However we ought to be teaching our students to sing and use their voice to understand music. This is where the warm-ups come in. More on that later.
3. How can students be learning? They often seem to be simply playing repeated patterns - Yep, it's great isn't it? I've never sat in a communal space in an African village, but I've seen videos and heard recordings, and I'm just about certain that actually experiencing such music would put to shame anything I have ever managed to thrash out on a stage. Incidentally, it is of great interest to me that as the musicologist Nicholas Cook points out, the people of many African tribes would not understand our concepts of performing, composing, listening or improvising, to them they are all one and the same thing. This is why I love to teach using workshops, it is the time when I fell most able to do holistic music making alongside my students. If you are genuinely concerned that students will perform simply repeated patterns, then address this in the way you plan the sessions. Have some students work on longer phrases, or work on the structure of the piece such that there are demands in variety and technicality that challenge your most able pupils.
4. I am not a very good composer, I feel a little naked - To this I would say from the outset, be sure where you are tight, and where you are loose. That was a great piece of advice given to me by a great man named David Jackson, at the time he was talking about curriculum design but it applies equally here. By that I mean, once you know what you are trying to teach/introduce through the workshop, you can decide what devices/structures are immutable and where you will allow creative input from the students. It is actually rather scientific when you think about it, but to the kids it is magic. In reality it is a trick, as before the workshop starts you should have an idea of some scaffolding musical ideas that will guide the composing process, which could be echoing phrases or two note motifs as in Robert's workshop. For minimalist music you might insist on phase shifting or note addition for example. I think this seemingly boundless opportunity is what scares some teachers, but if you decide in advance, 'What do I want the kids to learn?', the rest becomes more easy, listen to them and guide them in a semi-predetermined direction. Much creativity comes from constraint!

The session with Robert was a timely reminder for me in many respects.

Yes, there were some great ideas for warm-ups, but there is a danger with many of these sessions that we leave with only brilliant ideas for activities we could try. Don't get me wrong, it was genuinely inspiring to work alongside so many other creative and enthusiastic people, and there was a real buzz as we left the conference with conversations about all the things we would try when we got back to school.

However, what is central to Musical Futures is the pedagogy, not the activities. Musical Futures is not and never has been about leaving kids in a practice room, that is just poor teaching. It is about the pedagogies of Informal learning and Non-formal teaching.

So here's why, under the bonnet as well as on the shiny surface, Robert's session (which can be found here) was so brilliant. 

Warm-ups should link to the learning - In particular, copying Robert's movements the beat after he made them tied in directly with the musical intentions for the session; to form consonances and dissonances through echoing of phrases.

We should start from our students' own musical experience - We sang Ba Ba Black sheep as an ensemble, but in completely free time, changing syllable/pitch only when we need to breath. The sound was genuinely breathtaking and at once complex, but all from the simplest and most recognisable of starting points. The constantly shifting textures and note clusters were immediately reminiscent of the stimulus material we listened to before the workshop.

That choice within workshops should be framed - So that the learning intentions are delivered. Once we had decided on the simple two note motifs that would form our theme, Robert gave us break-out tasks, that whilst offering creative freedom i.e. develop a second part in harmony with the first, would always feed back into the final piece in a way that Robert had planned for.

Workshopping can be used to teach any style/genre or tradition - Our break out group actually talked a lot about harmony, that might well have been the lesson, it wasn't in this case but I hope you get the picture. Whilst workshopping musical theatre you may have some students looking at a whole class agreed chord progression, looking for opportunities to use inversions to create idiosyncratic bass movements commonly found in the genre, whilst another two groups may be tasked with the composition of two melodies over the same progression, each using a particular interval, aiming for melodies of entirely different character.

The stimulus piece was Ascent by Schnittke.

I did also discover that I am a guitar feedback inducer, maybe I am made of Kryptonite, or something.

References:

Cook, N (2000). Music: A Short Introduction. Oxford: Oxford Paperbacks.

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#mufu2013: What I learned - Session 1

Last week, for the first time, representatives from Musical Futures champion schools across the whole of the UK converged on a frankly Kremlin-esque diocese in Leeds for the annual Musical Futures conference.

There was so much to take from the two days, it seems sensible to break it down session by session.

Photographs and videos from both days can be found here.

Session 1 - Keynote: David Price
You always know you are going to get something frank, and honest from David. Much of his address focused on a reflection of 10 years of Musical Futures, which at first was a project, then an initiative, an approach and now could be described fairly as a movement. I believe a third of schools in England now run at least part of their curriculum using the musical futures pedagogies.

Most teachers are well aware of the tiresome merry-go-round of initiative after initiative, where the big thing is AfL for a few years, then focus shifts to differentiation or 21st century skills.

Musical Futures longevity for me is as a result of a few simple factors.

Firstly it was built upon sound classroom research and as such was a ground-up model. I don't know many sectors where research and practice are so disparate as education, this was not the case with Musical Futures. Don't get me wrong, I know there are some fantastic things happening, but I would challenge anyone to argue that there is not a significant voice with an "up there/down here" attitude.

In the sciences for example, research and practice are in essence the same thing. How many schools have proper links with their local universities with teachers acting as researchers and the universities with fellows on the ground as it were.

Secondly at the heart of Musical Futures, is the attention to the traditional disconnect between students experiences of music in and out of school. 

Finally, it is impossible to deliver Musical Futures without teaching musically, or as Ofsted would say, music is the target language. The two main pedagogies of Informal Learning and Classroom Workshops are ways of working where teachers play lots and explain little.


At home our students are practically all avid consumers and often creators of music, and yet in many music classrooms they sit behind desks (nothing wrong with this in a non-practical subject) learning from worksheets (you see where I am going here).


David also outlined six imperatives of social learning:

• Do it yourself (autonomy)
• Do it now (immediacy)
• Do it with friends (collegiality)
• Do unto others (generosity)
• Do it for fun (playfulness)
• Do it for the world to see (high visibility)

David is someone with whom I have worked closely over the years, and it was clear to me where his thinking had come from, Much of my own current thinking on education has come from a visit to High Tech High in San Diego, which I have written about often on this blog.

There is always a danger with lists, that they become just that, slogans which are banded  about in schools with senior management crying joyously "Riiiiiiiiight" as they tick off there catch phrase check-list proclaiming about just how much the staff know their stuff.

I think the arts are special. There is an inherent freedom within them to do things a little bit differently. The above list sings projects!

David talked about the next steps for Musical Futures and how we can continue to innovate for another 10 years. One area that I intend to focus on is on how Musical Futures can exist in a Project Based Learning framework.

If we are to continue to thrive and grow as a movement (and it really does feel like that, I have  never been to a conference with such a sense of shared purpose and community), then we need to think about what next. There were pilots for approaches to singing and music technology which I will discuss in later posts.

The conference was genuinely superb, far and away the best music CPD I have ever had, and there were lots of little nuggets, things you could immediately take away and use with your classes and I intend to share these. But on a more important level I hope to use the next few posts to reflect upon how this fits into the bigger picture of Musical Futures continued evolution, and the challenging vista towards which music education is currently peering anxiously.

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