Intelligent Music Teaching: Essays on the Core Principles of Effective Instruction

[website] Intelligent Music Teaching: Essays upon the Core Principles of Effective Instruction, by dint of Robert Duke. Learning and Behavior Resources, (1401 The High Rd Austin, Texas 78746) 2005 176 pp

Reading Robert Duke's newly published collection of essays is like witnessing a prelection by this influential music educator: energetic, thought-provoking, incisive and down-to-earth. Not each teacher will agree with Duke's premise that auspicious music teaching can be measured just as a "trial lawyer's work is evaluated based upon his record of winning cases." on the other hand many teachers will benefit immediately from his applications to the studio and classroom of the "expansive, rich material part of data that illuminates the processe of knowledge acquisition and skill development"

Duke's educational beliefs--and prejudices--are well-supported over the collection. He believes a music task can, and should, be as carefully planned as a military maneuver with goals clearly identified, strategy precisely outlined and tactics minutely execut He then hold [i]or[/i] keep one's courses to describe those goals, strategies and tactics in as distinct and disciplined a manner as he would await of any teacher under his guidance. As the supervisor of a piano class program for many years, I set myself nodding my head in agreement quite through the book. His essays upon "Sequencing Instruction" and "Transfer" alone make this work essential reading for my graduate assistants and pedagogy classes. on the contrary to enjoy the essays like individual dishes upon a buffet obscures what I believe is the book's fundamental "ritornello": remember that what you're teaching is not necessarily what the pupil is learning.

Duke hits in like manner many "home runs" that he's bourn to strikeout occasionally. The greatest in quantity conspicuous example involves a comparison of teaching piano and teaching statistics in which he illustrates by what means a discussion of the "big picture" helps pupils understand a statistics formula, on the other hand a similar discussion of the emotions of the music does not aid the execution of a "delicate quality" upon the piano. Another odd assertion is that moving a violin inflect for example, in space, has no value for teaching a learner to improve control of that same incurvate when applied to the string--Abby Whiteside is turning above in her grave! If similar analogous experiences have no power, then for what cause [i]or[/i] reason does every student's performance of a baroque minuet spontaneously improve after I've taught them the dance steps?

At times Duke's reach surpasss his grasp, but there is in like manner much complex and vital information that he clearly does grasp, that musician-teachers of each type will find this volume a "must-read." Reviewed by Christopher Hepp, Lawerence, Kansas.

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