Music Teacher Training to Build a Musical Community

Introduction

Abeles, Conway, and Custodero (2010) point out that successful music teachers collaborate with other teachers and musicians and construct networks both in schools and in the community. In this chapter, I would describe how novice music teachers and future teachers experience a sense of learning from each other and practice to collaborate in the course of music teacher training. An ideal music teacher training for future teachers to be able to collaborate musically, and construct collegial relationships with other fellows to learn from each other’s differences. This chapter describes how the author facilitates peer-to-peer learning and collaboration in a classroom of teacher training course in a Japanese university. Collaboration is the key for a successful music teaching and learning that involves local musicians, teachers, neighborhoods and other schools can strengthen teacher education program by offering interactive opportunities (Akutsu, 2019). The present chapter also introduces a school-wide and local community collaboration among university, elementary school, kindergarten, and community to create a large musical show. In essence, music is the best way to build a community. “Professions are comprised of groups of individuals whose work is connected” (Abeles, Conway and Custodero, 2010, p.317). Ultimately, this book locates the purpose of music education to build musical communities.

To Build A Community In Teacher Training Courses: Cultivating Individual And Collaborative Creativity

Burnard (2012) points out that “music learners, in general, are taught to play and are encouraged to perform, but not to compose” (p.1). As a result, teacher training courses stifle room for “variety, independence, creativity, and sense of identity” (Burnard, 2012, p.1). Although music education for P-12 children in Japan, in general, emphasizes the interaction with the environment to nurture children's creative potentials (MEXT 2018), music teacher training is somewhat outdated. A critical issue in music teacher training courses in Japan is that most teacher training programs overlook creative aspects of music learning and teaching and collaboration among learners. Yasuda and Nagao (2010) examine the relationship between the popularity of the piano in Japanese kindergartens and day nurseries and the piano teachers' interest in early childhood education training in Japan. Similarly, Shinkai (2012) criticizes that the emphasis of Japanese teacher training for music education tends to lean on acquiring piano related skills by focusing on performance technique exclusively. Most of the time, education majors study the piano in private instruction or collective group piano instruction and spend a vast array of time to practice the piano in a solitary manner.

In the chapter, the author illustrates how students who own different musical backgrounds, skills and preferences in musical styles are challenged to compose. This chapter puts a special emphasis on each learner with a unique background to learn from each other. This section focuses on how Japanese students who enrolled in the music course of the early childhood teacher training program, and how they learn creative composition individually and in group settings.

The following section is based on a case described in the study by Ito, Tsuji and Akutsu (2019). The participants are non-music major university students who major in early childhood education ages 20-21 on average. Most of them are females who pursues early childhood professions. The author is not a composer, and he rarely composes in his life; however, the author takes a position to offer a structure and a fundamental idea for everyone to become able to compose.