Music education deals with four activities including singing, instrumental, listening and creative activities, but today’s school setting is biased towards the area of singing. Realistically, it is difficult to lead the class, attaching the same wei...
Music education deals with four activities including singing, instrumental, listening and creative activities, but today’s school setting is biased towards the area of singing. Realistically, it is difficult to lead the class, attaching the same weight to the four areas; however, appreciation is the foundation of music, which is an area that should actively be exercised at school. Despite appreciation class has several educational benefits, it is not actively exercised.
The form of Sonata is an important element to the extent that it must be included in music textbooks. For effective instruction, this study analyzed and investigated the background of the era of Classicism, its musical characteristics and the form of Sonata. Concerning the selection of theme songs, this study analyzed 18 integrated textbooks, focusing on common theme songs in the form of Classical Sonata and chose “Beethoven Symphony No.5” and “Haydn Piano Sonata No. 50,” included as common theme songs in three textbooks, including Kumsung, Taesung, and Chunjae (Eun-gi Min et al.) used the most in the school setting.
This study investigated a teaching plan, applying Robert M. Gagné’s nine instructional events to the area of appreciation in middle school music curriculum with the third grade and inducing learner-centered performances so that the class is effectively achieved in the school setting. The teaching plan applying Robert M. Gagné’s nine instructional events is summarized as follows:
First, in the step of attention, the instructor arouses learners’ interest and makes them concentrate by showing materials related to the class. At this time, the method of presenting audiovisual materials related to theme songs is most effective.
Second, letting learners know the objectives. At this time, the instructor ensures learners to recognize the objectives of learning by reading them out loud and helps them proceed with learning towards the presented objectives.
Third, stimulating learners to recollect several things learned previously. In this step, if the contents of the class are connected to those in the previous class hours, it is the best type of stimulation of the reproduction of previous learning.
Fourth, presenting the contents to be learned newly to learners. It is desirable to present materials that can stimulate learners in relation to the contents of learning of each class hour, to show them the teacher’s demonstration or to let them listen to theme songs.
Fifth, appreciation class is a step in which the instructor tells learners the composers of theme songs, the characteristics of the times and their tonality for appreciation, which is the step of introducing the concepts they must know.
Sixth, the instructor allows learners to perform the abilities required for the objectives of learning themselves. Instead of being content with a lecture-type class, the instructor should present the contents of activities so that they can perform the activities themselves.
Seventh, feedback should be provided concerning the results of learners’ performances. Through the feedback, they understand the things they should improve and realize the efforts necessary for achieving the objectives of learning.
Eighth, the step of evaluating whether learners can learn in the next step by evaluating the degree of achievement of the objectives of learning. Problems are solved through group activities, or learners are asked to fill out and submit a simply formative assessment sheet.
Ninth, what is the most important in the class is that it should provide learners with an experience so that they can maintain and apply the contents of learning for a long time. If they learned the form of Sonata, they should be able to understand the structure of the form of Sonata, appreciating theme songs.
Applying the nine instructional events, this study designed a teaching plan consisting of a total of five class hours with the historical background of Classical music, its musical characteristics, the delivery of professional knowledge about works and activities that learners can perform themselves as its main contents. This aims to broaden learners’ understanding and discernment in music by understanding the kinds of music and historical backgrounds through their activities, instead of the appreciation class which is biased toward listening.