Alison M. Reynolds

Transforming Music Teacher Education Through Service Learning

Service-learning initiatives have become prevalent on the campuses of higher education. In teacher education, preservice teachers involved in educational partnerships that are service-learning based respond to the needs of a community partner, apply pedagogical knowledge and skills they have acquired in their coursework to real-world problems, and engage in critical reflection. Service-learning offers preservice teachers increased opportunities to develop their teaching practice and teacher identities and provides a backdrop for preservice teachers to develop personally and become socially integrated into the field of teacher education. In this article, we provide descriptions of four service-learning contexts for music teacher preparation. We discuss the role of service-learning in transforming preservice music teachers, their music teaching practice, and the community partners they served. Finally we present challenges to engaging in service learning in music teacher preparation, characteristics of meaningful service learning work, and discuss the transformative potential of service-learning in music teacher preparation.

Service-Learning in Music Teacher Education: An Overview

What is Service-Learning? Service-learning is a teaching and learning paradigm that incorporates experiential learning. That is, students apply knowledge and skills they have been learning in the classroom in realworld settings as a service to members of a community. Throughout the experience, students engage in structured reflection about their service and learning, and all stakeholders (students, teacher, and the community members) mutually benefit from the partnership. Ideally, students realize they are valuable resources for the community and will elect to engage in civic activities in the future.

Construct Validity of the Children's Music-Related Behavior Questionnaire.

The purpose of this research was to investigate the construct validity of the Children’s Music-Related Behavior Questionnaire (CMRBQ), an instrument designed for parents to document music-related behaviors about their children and themselves. The research problem was to examine the hypothesized factorial structure of the questionnaire. From a national sample, parents of children 5 years old or younger returned 616 usable questionnaires. Items were parceled, and the model was subjected to a confirmatory factor analysis to assess the goodness of model-data fit for a one-factor solution using the parcels as indicators. Internal consistency of subscale reliability estimates ranged from α = .77 to α = .97. Three multiple fit indices suggested that the one-factor model adequately fit the data: standardized root square residual (.028), comparative fit index (.968), and Tucker-Lewis index (.955). Greater knowledge regarding parents’ observations of music’s role in children’s development may help researchers, practitioners, parents, and policy makers collaboratively consider how best to meet musical needs of young children in childcare and school settings.

Serve and Return: Communication Foundations for Early Childhood Music Policy Stakeholders.

ABSTRACT Serve-and-return interactions between a young child and caregiver are cited as integral to healthy child development and language development. In this article, the authors assert that serve-and-return interactions offer a relevant model for policy development in early childhood music education. They share contemporary evidence that music learning and development begins in the womb, continues during infancy, and needs to be prioritized in preschool and early elementary years. Next, they trace the policy landscape for early childhood education and music education in the United States since 2008. Although the landscape has remained stark, the authors offer recent glimmers of possibilities and conclude with actionable steps for improving early childhood music education policies.

Elementary General Music Teachers and Professional Development: Kindling the Spark, Fanning the Flame, and Keeping an Eye on the Fire

What does it feel like to be a music teacher? In this chapter, I credit a Chinese music education professor’s story with sparking my research into how elementary music teachers in the United States describe feeling like a music teacher, and meaningful professional development. I share two of seven music teachers’ stories, adding the voice of the second teacher’s principal. I also share how my Chinese colleague’s declaration of change inspired change within me, thinking about my feeling like a music teacher, considering new questions about professional development for experienced music teachers, and continuing to seek a work-life balance.