Joë takes primary school pupils on a fieldtrip to (a digital version of) China
- Music
- Education in Art
‘Create Your Own Terracotta Army’, ‘Build Your Own Forbidden City’, and ‘Paint a Picture in the Style of Chinese Painting Traditions’ are some of the lessons developed by Joë de Visser, a student of Music in Education at ArtEZ Academy of Music in Enschede, as part of her graduation research. “I wanted to develop a series of lessons that cover various disciplines. The school where the lessons were tested was planning to organise project weeks about Asia. To align with this, I created the lesson series on Chinese art and cultural history.”
In this finals story, Joë talks about the versatility of the Music in Education programme, and how it can lead to developing a lesson series for the subject area of artistic orientation as a graduation project.
Music in Education
“The first time I stood in front of a group myself was during a music lesson at secondary school. For the public school music exam, I chose a song that included a choir. I wanted to incorporate these choir parts into my performance, so I had to guide them. I became incredibly enthusiastic and it felt natural. At that moment, I didn't immediately have the ambition to become a music teacher, but after attending an open day at ArtEZ Conservatorium, I started to feel the itch. Once I experienced the atmosphere of the academy, I thought: ‘Yes, this is where I want to continue my studies!’
The auditions for the Music in Education course were online at the time (due to Covid), and I was extremely nervous. After all, it's a conservatory you are applying to. Fortunately, the committee consisted of very kind people who guided me through the process in a supportive manner. I realised they were primarily looking for people they could further develop. Not long after, I heard that I had been accepted, and so I began this course.
From the first semester, I started doing internships at schools, and since then, I have experienced and applied various forms of teaching. I have interned in secondary education and primary education, as well as in special primary education and at a cultural institution. After all these different experiences, I can now say that I am particularly interested in teaching within primary education. For my graduation research, I have written a series of lessons for the upper years of primary education.”
Chinese Art and Cultural History
“The series of lessons I created as part of my graduation research is about Chinese cultural history. Now, you might be thinking: ‘What does that have to do with music lessons?’ What not everyone knows is that the Music Teacher programme also places a lot of emphasis on other artistic disciplines. Besides earning a teaching qualification for Music, you also earn a qualification for Cultural and Artistic Education (CKV) and Art and Cultural History (KUA).
When you start developing a series of lessons, you first research the requirements it must meet. For this series, I mainly focused on the principles of curriculum.nu. For the field of art and culture in primary education, there are several principles, such as: the pupil can express and communicate through the unique language of the arts, the pupil discovers different cultures by observing and listening to art and culture, and the pupil can present individual or collaborative work.
At the primary school where the lessons were tested, students receive a diverse range of arts and culture education. I wanted the lesson series to cover various artistic disciplines of Chinese art and cultural history. Since you could create an entire series of lessons of a single discipline, such as architecture, I chose to focus on one topic from each artistic discipline for each lesson. The teaching material can be delivered by both classroom teachers and specialist teachers. The lessons have now been successfully implemented and tested with positive results. Soon, the lesson series will even be offered on an online music method for primary education!”
Future
“Now that the time is approaching for me to leave ArtEZ Academy of Music, I can look back on a very pleasant and educational period. Teaching has truly become my second nature, even though I found it very daunting to stand in front of a class when I first started at the conservatory. Since the fourth year of the course, I have been teaching music one day a week at a primary school, and after I graduate, I will be doing this several days a week.
Making music is a part of me, but I want to further broaden my teaching skills in the future, so I will soon start a further study at the teacher training college (PABO). Additionally, I will continue to be active as a pianist for a pop choir, with which I rehearse weekly.”
