Read the chapter on Transfer in Robert Duke’s Intelligent Music Teaching: Please post 1 blog post by midnight on 4/8 and 2 discussion posts on our Student Teaching Blog by midnight on 4/10 about an idea you found particularly interesting or helpful.
One part of the chapter that I found particularly interesting is Duke's part on the principles of transfer. Duke points out that it is important for teachers to know the principles behind how their instrument works and principles of musicality in order to sequence their teaching so that their students understand the principles and apply them to other situations. Duke said, "Again, many of their principles are not articulated explicitly during the course of instruction, but teachers who understand the principles they are trying to convey to their students will teach differently (and more effectively)than will teachers who simply teach their students what to do in each phrase of each piece as if there is no connection between the phrases and the pieces that students learn to perform." Teachers that understand the principles of music teach with a long term focus in mind. They are not merely trying to get their student through a piece and on to the next piece, but they are trying to use the piece to teach principles that will help the student in later pieces.
I liked that quote that Duke used too. We as teachers need to keep that end goal in mind! It's important not to just "teach through the piece" just to move on. We not only need to understand this as teachers, but we need to explain this to the parents. Parents especially need to understand this since they are prone to compare their child to others.
Great comments! To me this chapter seemed to touch on the wrote vs. note argument. We can't teach how to push the buttons in order to make them sound like the black spots on the page, we have to teach them how to play the violin in a context where they are working on something more that making it through the piece.
Duke had many valid points in this chapter. I've never thought about the subject of transfer and how we need to be able to understand what we're doing. The analogy he used with the roller blading and ice skating really hit home for me because the only reason I can ice skate is because I learned how to rollerblade first. This chapter definitely got me to think about how exactly we learn. There always has to be background information to anything we learn, and that never really clicked with me until now. This was a deep chapter.
it is really amazing to think about the transfer of knowledge. But it can potentially be very frustrating if our students don't seem to be showing the results we are looking for. This is when we need to remember that we are teaching people not a curriculum. Everybody has a different way of learning/applying knowledge and we need to be alert to what works for our students.
I thought Duke’s concept of transfer was very interesting. It is a lot like the video that Miss Pabon showed us about the MIT graduates who could not figure out how to make a light bulb work using a battery and a paper-clip. They were unable to transfer the explicit instruction from their classes to a simple activity outside of class. Effective teachers help their students learn how to apply the knowledge to a variety of situations. Duke gives several ways that teachers can better facilitate transfer. Two of them stuck out to me. First, teachers should ask themselves why their students should learn a particular skill now. This question trims the fat off subjects and focuses the instruction on the important things that students can more readily transfer. Second, teachers should try to give their students more contextual variety. This gives students the opportunity to see and experience information transferred. Teaching with a large contextual variety would take a lot of work though.
I'm finding out in one of my classes, the value of a teacher asking the question "why?". I find that when I ask this question, it helps me get rid of the extra things I want to include that are not necessary, and include those things which will help the student succeed.
This was such a good chapter. This not only applies to how we teach, but even in our own practicing. We need to be able to see how different techniques that we are teaching our students are contributing toward the end goal. If they cannot use the skills in the future, then why are we teaching them that specific technique? I love the quote that he put in that says, "Learning is what you're left with when you've forgotten everything you've been taught." This can be applied to us in our own practice time too! This past year, I have discovered different scales or little techniques that I have learned over the years and applied them to one of my specific pieces. For example, if I was having an intonation problem in a piece, I would find the scale that matches it, practice the scale, and see how much improvement there was in the passage! We need to keep in mind as teachers, we need to make sure that what we are teaching our students can transfer over into a piece later.
Teaching for transfer is great. When teachers keep this idea in mind when planning and teaching lessons, the lessons will have so much more direction to them and flow between the lessons. Teaching for transfer requires teachers to have an end goal in mind. Without an end goal, teachers can get into the rut of just getting through as many songs as possible, instead of structuring the lessons so that the student learns the concepts needed for playing the violin well.
This chapter seemed to be the heart and soul of this book. It seemed to be the biggest problem that the author wanted to face in writing this book. This chapter made more sense in a classroom setting, but there were still great truths to be learned. The biggest thing I took out of the reading is that we as teachers should be teaching to the end goal, not to the assessment. We need to have the goal in mind during every lesson in order to make sure they know what to do with the techniques we teach them. I was also struck again with the knowledge that everyone learns differently. This presents a special problem for the teacher seeking to teach transfer because s/he would have to know how that student learns best in order to be able to teach him/her how to apply it.
One part of the chapter that I found particularly interesting is Duke's part on the principles of transfer. Duke points out that it is important for teachers to know the principles behind how their instrument works and principles of musicality in order to sequence their teaching so that their students understand the principles and apply them to other situations. Duke said, "Again, many of their principles are not articulated explicitly during the course of instruction, but teachers who understand the principles they are trying to convey to their students will teach differently (and more effectively)than will teachers who simply teach their students what to do in each phrase of each piece as if there is no connection between the phrases and the pieces that students learn to perform." Teachers that understand the principles of music teach with a long term focus in mind. They are not merely trying to get their student through a piece and on to the next piece, but they are trying to use the piece to teach principles that will help the student in later pieces.
ReplyDeleteI liked that quote that Duke used too. We as teachers need to keep that end goal in mind! It's important not to just "teach through the piece" just to move on. We not only need to understand this as teachers, but we need to explain this to the parents. Parents especially need to understand this since they are prone to compare their child to others.
DeleteGreat comments! To me this chapter seemed to touch on the wrote vs. note argument. We can't teach how to push the buttons in order to make them sound like the black spots on the page, we have to teach them how to play the violin in a context where they are working on something more that making it through the piece.
DeleteDuke had many valid points in this chapter. I've never thought about the subject of transfer and how we need to be able to understand what we're doing. The analogy he used with the roller blading and ice skating really hit home for me because the only reason I can ice skate is because I learned how to rollerblade first.
ReplyDeleteThis chapter definitely got me to think about how exactly we learn. There always has to be background information to anything we learn, and that never really clicked with me until now. This was a deep chapter.
it is really amazing to think about the transfer of knowledge. But it can potentially be very frustrating if our students don't seem to be showing the results we are looking for. This is when we need to remember that we are teaching people not a curriculum. Everybody has a different way of learning/applying knowledge and we need to be alert to what works for our students.
DeleteI thought Duke’s concept of transfer was very interesting. It is a lot like the video that Miss Pabon showed us about the MIT graduates who could not figure out how to make a light bulb work using a battery and a paper-clip. They were unable to transfer the explicit instruction from their classes to a simple activity outside of class. Effective teachers help their students learn how to apply the knowledge to a variety of situations.
ReplyDeleteDuke gives several ways that teachers can better facilitate transfer. Two of them stuck out to me. First, teachers should ask themselves why their students should learn a particular skill now. This question trims the fat off subjects and focuses the instruction on the important things that students can more readily transfer. Second, teachers should try to give their students more contextual variety. This gives students the opportunity to see and experience information transferred. Teaching with a large contextual variety would take a lot of work though.
I'm finding out in one of my classes, the value of a teacher asking the question "why?". I find that when I ask this question, it helps me get rid of the extra things I want to include that are not necessary, and include those things which will help the student succeed.
DeleteThis was such a good chapter. This not only applies to how we teach, but even in our own practicing. We need to be able to see how different techniques that we are teaching our students are contributing toward the end goal. If they cannot use the skills in the future, then why are we teaching them that specific technique? I love the quote that he put in that says, "Learning is what you're left with when you've forgotten everything you've been taught." This can be applied to us in our own practice time too! This past year, I have discovered different scales or little techniques that I have learned over the years and applied them to one of my specific pieces. For example, if I was having an intonation problem in a piece, I would find the scale that matches it, practice the scale, and see how much improvement there was in the passage! We need to keep in mind as teachers, we need to make sure that what we are teaching our students can transfer over into a piece later.
ReplyDeleteTeaching for transfer is great. When teachers keep this idea in mind when planning and teaching lessons, the lessons will have so much more direction to them and flow between the lessons. Teaching for transfer requires teachers to have an end goal in mind. Without an end goal, teachers can get into the rut of just getting through as many songs as possible, instead of structuring the lessons so that the student learns the concepts needed for playing the violin well.
DeleteThis comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteThis chapter seemed to be the heart and soul of this book. It seemed to be the biggest problem that the author wanted to face in writing this book. This chapter made more sense in a classroom setting, but there were still great truths to be learned. The biggest thing I took out of the reading is that we as teachers should be teaching to the end goal, not to the assessment. We need to have the goal in mind during every lesson in order to make sure they know what to do with the techniques we teach them. I was also struck again with the knowledge that everyone learns differently. This presents a special problem for the teacher seeking to teach transfer because s/he would have to know how that student learns best in order to be able to teach him/her how to apply it.
ReplyDelete