SmartMusic and what I have learned here this week.
I have had a great week and learned many things from ALL of you. Thanks.
I thought I would take a look at my current teaching practice and how it fits with all of the things I have learned this week. I am thinking ahead to Saturday's "What Software is important to you" demos.
Hopefully this will help me do all those higher order thinking things. Kind of a mini case study.
Background/context on SmartMusic. SmartMusic is a practice tool developed by the MakeMusichttp://www.makemusic.com! company. This is an interesting company that is also the author of Finale, the industry standard notation software. This company is encouraged by the number of subscribers (Schools $200/year and school's students $25/year) to SmartMusic, but at approximately 50,000 subscribers, I think (and they probably would agree) they are way short of where they can be. I have been a user of the program in one form or another since 1994 or so and have watched develop with interest. This week I have been thinking of this progrm through all the lenses of CI 5342, CI 5344, EDPA 5344, EDPA 5309
Technology Planning--
I have been fortunate to have had some wonderful facilities given to me to work with. I have had easy access to computer tools for the last 14 years. I have always had enough power to run SmartMusic.
There have been well timed referendums to help with making sure the equipment is reasonably up to date. I have some real questions after this year about the consistentancy of the funding. Right now that will be dependant on another referendum. It would be much better if this was funded with constant, steady dollars.
Apart from funding, I think the next thing for us will be helping families with reasonable computer access for their kids all hours of the day. The time is not right for 1:1 computing in our district now (we have a large population with no kids that think we spend their money way to fast now.) Maybe we need to start some library type compters that students may check out while we wait for our demographics to change. Or we could push the issue and see what happens. I am inclined to start raising the level of concern and ask the voters for their help.
If all my kids had access to a reasonably fast computer, I think SmartMusic would have a bigger impact. Right now, you can tell who uses it and who doesn't. It would be great to be at the stage where I can assume no digital divide. Make WHEN I can assume there is no divide. It will happen.
K-12 Technology Integration----
How SmartMusic fits into theReplacement,Amplification, Transformational thinking.
I have been working SmartMusic into my curriculum for 10 years now.
Is this learning from or with technology? What would Johannason say?
I think it there is a case to be made for each category of the RAT. Is it replacement? It is because of it does take the place of a piano player at lesson/practice time. Is it amplification? Yes, because of the recording features reinforcing the criticism of performance. Is it transformational? Yes, because it changes the relationship between the teacher and the student with the teacher becoming more of a resource.
Leadership and Vision in School Technology--
Electronic Communication Tools--
Games! SmartMusic fits very well into the Gee game models.
- Active Critical Learning? Yes.
- Is learning in context? Yes.
- Is the learning challenging but not defeating? Yes.
- Is the learning individualized? Yes.
There is an amazing amount of items from Gee's work that fit this program. If you are not using it, YOU SHOULD BE! It is one of the strongest tools I can think of in for use in the new pedagogy.