Abstract
Tertiary music educators are faced with challenges associated with the enactment of curricula in pre-service education courses within time constraints. As a result, considered choices need to be made regarding content and pedagogical approaches based on what they deem to be valuable, memorable and transferrable. Using narrative methodology, two tertiary educators across the Tasman share their views about what they prioritise in their music education courses and how these choices are informed. Both authors face similar challenges, and share the view that the teaching of music goes far beyond entertainment. They uphold that music education provides a rich context to develop not only knowledge, skills and understandings about music itself, but also to address social, cultural, linguistic, cognitive and affective domains of learning, to name a few. This article looks at some of the ways the authors effectively support beginner teachers to address the music components of their respective national curriculum statements. While constraints of time in teacher education programmes is not a new phenomenon, the intention of this article is to highlight the benefits of music education, and encourage other educators to critically reflect on choices made in their own teaching contexts under challenging constraints.
Highlights
Initial teacher education has a long history in both Australia and New Zealand
Educational changes instigated by Government political reforms in Australia in the late 1980s resulted, in a more unified national system of initial teacher education (ITE), including the amalgamation of Colleges of Education with Universities (Aspland, 2006)
The deregulation of teacher education, the introduction of a competitive market, the changes in funding policies in the 1990s, and the shift to a greater focus on research saw all teachers’ colleges eventually amalgamate with universities (Kane, 2005). These reforms in teacher education in both countries which drew neoliberal education and marketisation together with educational reform in the tertiary sector, have had a considerable impact on the context in which university academics and teacher educators work, and on the design of ITE programmes (Coaldrake & Stedman, 1998; Kane, 2005). This included how music and arts education were to be considered, which is the focus of this article, situating itself in the discipline of Music as one of the performing Arts areas within the Bachelor of Education Primary in each of one New Zealand and one Australian university
Summary
Initial teacher education ( known as pre-service education) has a long history in both Australia and New Zealand. These reforms in teacher education in both countries which drew neoliberal education and marketisation together with educational reform in the tertiary sector, have had a considerable impact on the context in which university academics and teacher educators work, and on the design of ITE programmes (Coaldrake & Stedman, 1998; Kane, 2005) This included how music and arts education were to be considered, which is the focus of this article, situating itself in the discipline of Music as one of the performing Arts areas within the Bachelor of Education Primary in each of one New Zealand and one Australian university. Our situation is not novel, and we share our stories with many other music educators facing similar challenges
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