Teddy’s CTCH604 Reflection 04.17.2010

Posted by on April 17, 2010 
Filed under Reflections

Teddy’s CTCH604 Reflection 04.17.2010

For class session 04.13.2010

 This week’s discussion started with Carrie Anne’s article on Music Education. It is amazing how there can be so many different approaches to SoTL work. As we could see the decisions to use quantitative verses qualitative research methodologies is still a toss-up! Regardless of the discipline, these two approaches seem to be involved in the basic make-up of any inquiry. The discussion presented to us a third option of research-based inquiry that is known as “arts-based research.” According to the author it is self-reflective through the emergence of the immediate evidence produced through performance oriented attributes. For many years now, I have heard discussions among music scholars and those outside of the field as to whether or not if this type of research is valid. Some agree that it is valid as a result of “discovery methodologies” related to music theory. Personally, I too believe this is conclusive and relative to the mission of SoTL work as defined by the Carnegie Foundation.

Our second discussion was on my article that promotes the use of podcasting to provide timely and useful feedback from tutors to their learners. One of the main problems with this form of extended classroom communication is the time professors would need to read, grade and comment for each student and assignments. Even though the time is reduced significantly in comparison to traditional methods it is still a huge job! I really love the idea that was suggested in class of simply having the teacher to teach and an additional service or services outside of the institution to provide grading and feedback. This seems more proficient and efficient for all involved in the teaching and learning process. Any method that will increase our ability to reflect for longer periods of time on assignments, increase our learning capacity and help us in practicum to better prepare our future work is surely worth a grand investment.  

Finally, I think all discussions converged as we began to stretch our thinking group-wise concerning the music education research, veterans entering college and podcasting feedback issues. Varied views around the table were out-of- the-box and constantly enthralled us. This ecology of philosophically enhanced hypotheses was grounded to current knowledge and inspired by our passions for own disciplines or fields of study. I truly found myself engaged and challenged to listen, learn and explore the input of my colleagues as we all raised the bar of scholarly inquiry within the classroom and the external laboratory of our minds. This was indeed good food for the soul!

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