Taught by the Students: Culturally Relevant Pedagogy and Deep Engagement in Music Education

by Ruth Gurgel

Overview

Within public schools in the United States, students of color are truncating their music education experiences at higher rates than their white counterparts. Music educators have searched for explanations of this phenomenon as well as effective interventions, yet there has been little overall improvement of these statistics. Ruth Gurgel presents and analyzes the perspectives of eight students and their teacher in a pluralistic 7th grade choir classroom at Clark Middle School, located in a large Midwestern urban school district. Through the eyes of the students, music teachers gain insight into the complexity of the engagement cycle as well as interventions that increase and maintain deep engagement.

Ruth Gurgel looks at the intersection of instruction, relationships, and music in the classroom, highlighting how each component affects students. Taught by the Students provides an analysis of music education through the lens of Culturally Relevant Pedagogy, connecting this body of literature to Ruth Gurgel’s research in the music classroom at Clark Middle School.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781475813388
Publisher:	Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.
Publication date:	10/22/2015
Pages:	188
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.80(d)

About the Author

Ruth Gurgel, Assistant Professor of Music Education, is the specialist in Elementary Music Education at Kansas State University. She has taught music in Colorado and Wisconsin and now continues to present her research at national and international conferences.

Table of Contents

PREFACE
PART 1: The Path to Engagement. What Engages Students in Music Class?
Chapter 1: Introduction: Culturally Relevant Pedagogy and Music Education.
Chapter 2. “Why Should I Sing For You?” Student Perspectives on Relationships.
Chapter 3. Hip-Hop in the Classroom: Student Perspectives on Musical Repertoire
Chapter 4. Challenging, Clear, Interesting: Student Perspectives on Instruction.
Part 2: Disengagement: Interpretations, Cycles, and Interventions
Chapter 5. Students’ Musical Behaviors: Talking, Laughing, Singing, Moving
Chapter 6. Guessing Wrong: How Students’ Behavior can be Misinterpreted in the Classroom
Chapter 7. Spiraling Downward: The Effects of Disengagement, Misunderstanding, and “Behavior Talk”
Chapter 8. Recognizing and Reversing the Disengagement Cycle: “Classroom Management” and Student Autonomy
Chapter 9. Lessons to Learn: Music Education, Culturally Relevant Pedagogy and Student Engagement
Appendix A: Research Questions
Appendix B: Methodology and Procedures
Bibliography

Editorial Reviews

Culturally relevant pedagogy is a topic overlooked in most music education programs in the United States. This book is unique because it includes current “real-life” perspectives of students from diverse racial/ethnic backgrounds often forgotten in schools. Perhaps at no other time in our history has the need to better prepare pre-service teachers to more effectively engage students of all cultures been so critical.

Brigetta Miller

Full of real classroom experiences, interviews and observations, Taught by the Students will be a valued resource for preservice teachers, teacher educators and veteran teachers who are looking to build stronger relationships with their students and establish an engaging classroom environment. A practical look into the classroom application of cultural relevant teaching principles, from the perspective of teachers and students, this book provides a glimpse of theory in action.

Travis Hale