In this inquiry, I examined how young children use their personal, social and material resources to solve a music notational task. I asked 13 children, ages 5-9 to notate a song they learned the previous week, sing it back, explain what they did and then teach the song to a classmate the following week. I used Lightfoot and Davis' concept of portraiture as a qualitative research methodology to collect, code, analyze and interpret my data. Data included the children's invented notations and videotaped transcripts of their actions as they created their notations and taught the song to a classmate. Sociocultural Vygotskian developmental theory, activity theory and Bakhtin's dialogic theory provided the interpretive lens through which I examined how the children used their resources as mediational tools to complete the task. / Findings revealed that children who had no previous music training used increasingly sophisticated representational strategies to notate a song, and that they were able to refine their notations when singing the song from their notation, teaching the song or when prompted by an adult or a peer. I concluded that the peer-peer situation was a motivating force for triggering a recursive process of reflections-on-actions and knowing-in-action. Classmates' questions, comments and their singing played a critical role in moving the children to modify their notations and their singing, verbal explanations and gesturing in ways they did not do alone or with me. / Analysis of the children's notations, verbal explanations and teaching strategies provided insights not only into what they knew about music, but also their appropriation of the cultural conventions of writing and their aesthetic sensibilities, as gleaned from their choice of symbols, colours and how they presented their symbols on the page. Interviews with parents, teachers and school principal provided contextual background for interpreting the children's notations and how they approached the task. This study shows the value of adopting a social constructivist approach to teaching the language of music. It also demonstrates that researching the products and processes of children's invented notations from a social constructivist perspective enables more detailed portraits of children's musical and meta-cognitive understandings.

There is no abstract available for this thesis.

There is no abstract available for this thesis.

The purpose of this collaborative inquiry (CI) dissertation study was to examine pedagogical strategies designed to open Western classical music to improvisation. Piano teacher-participants formed a collaborative inquiry cohort as co-researchers to design and implement pedagogical strategies for use with their piano students, ages 8 to 10. Improvisation appears to occupy a limited role in practices commonly associated with Western classical music. Since the body of evidence found in Western music history and performance practice reveals traditions that encompassed improvisation, this study was designed to challenge existing pedagogical models associated with Western classical music through experimentation and improvisation. The prior attitudes and practices of the three participants were assessed through introductory interviews, as well as the collection of videos of teaching practices and preliminary survey data. Three two-hour in-person sessions of the cohort took place, interspersed with interviews and the sharing of video excerpts and co-researcher memos and blogs in an online forum on Canvas. During in-person sessions of the cohort, pedagogical strategies were designed and revisited through reflection following participants’ teaching experiences in their piano studios. Participants explored musical improvisation within a creative community by investigating the processes and experiences of treating Western classical music as an impetus to creative thought and improvisatory realization by their students. Findings illuminate patterns of interaction that illustrate the function of strategies for musical creativity and the applicability to pedagogical practices. Several overarching themes, addressing the purpose of the study, emerged through my analysis of data, pertaining to the dynamic nature of music, call and response as formative, and knowledge and novelty as means and ends. Participants demonstrated distinct operational definitions of improvisation, each of which appeared to connect to a model of awareness and responsiveness through the expression of interrelated themes. Whether spontaneously generated or chosen intentionally, limitations promoted improvisation as the exploration of novelty, advancing and emanating from a knowledge base. By revealing pedagogical practices that demonstrate heuristic models for experimentation through variability practices, this study illuminates patterns of interaction that open works of musical art to the sociocultural activity of improvisation, through which a multiplicity of meanings can take form.

"In this study, the term 'Instrumental' will be used to include not only the usual instruments of the orchestra and band, but also 'melody instruments' such as tonnettes, flutophones, and other similar ones. The piano will not be included in this study because there is less need for more literature for this instrument at the elementary level than for others"--Introduction. / "August, 1954." / Typescript. / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Music." / Advisor: Robert L. Briggs, Professor Directing Paper. / Includes bibliographical references (leaf 46).

"The purpose of this study is to provide some insight into the problems faced in the field of instrumental music instruction in the elementary schools of Tallahassee, Florida, and to suggest some possible solutions to problems facing personnel connect with the program. It is designed to acquaint the supervisory staff of the county with the needs of this area of instruction and to inform the incoming instructor as to what constitutes the situation with which he will be faced"--Introduction. / "May, 1955." / Typescript. / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Music Education." / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 38-39).

One of the most immediate problems confronting the instrumental teacher of today is that presented by the string section of the orchestra. In the years between 1925 and 1935 the number of string orchestras. In the high schools of this country gradually dwindled until in most small or medium size high schools and in a great many of the larger ones it disappeared entirely. However, it is now encouraging to note that the increased emphasis being placed on the string program in teacher-training institutions is producing direct results in the development of a re-awakened interest in the public school orchestra. In many schools where no string program existed a few years ago there is now evidence which shows that a return to orchestral study is well on its way to becoming an important curricular functions. / "August, 1954." / Typescript. / Advisor: Robert L. Briggs, Professor Directing Paper. / "Submitted to the Graduate Council of Florida State University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Music Education." / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 37-38).

No description available.

The purpose of this thesis is to integrate for the prospective teacher still in college, and the teacher in service, the theory and practice of the leading band teachers in the country through the medium of the ensemble class method.

No description available.