Dr Rachel Hocking

In March 2009, the Music Council of Australia was commissioned by the Music Education Advisory Group to undertake a national audit of mandatory music subjects currently run in preservice primary teaching programs. The aims of the audit included:

1. To establish a baseline from which future measuring of the increase or decline of
   music in such courses could be undertaken.
2. To authenticate anecdotal evidence on the situation of music in preservice primary
   teaching programs.
3. To determine current accreditation requirements of primary teachers.

These aims relate to Recommendation 3 from the National Review of School Music
Education:

R.3 To improve the standard of pre-service music education for all generalist classroom teachers.

Recommended actions
The Australian Government

R.3.1 Explore ways to encourage universities (and other providers of teacher education) to provide more time for music education for pre-service teachers.

R.3.2 Refer this report to NIQTSL to consider in their upcoming work on teacher education course accreditation and standards.

Universities and Schools of Education (and others preparing teachers)

R.3.3 Enhance or transform courses for generalist classroom teachers to ensure that:

• There is sufficient dedicated time for music education; and
• Student teachers develop and demonstrate knowledge, understanding and skills in their own music making as well as teaching music Graduating/Beginning Teachers.

R.3.4 Demonstrate the currency and relevance of their knowledge, understanding, skills and values about music education[2].

 

The audit follows preliminary surveys of online university handbooks of mandatory music courses for preservice primary and early childhood teacher programs, undertaken by the Music Council of Australia in February 2008, which demonstrated that 19 universities out of 24 measured[3], placed less than 2% of value of a total degree on mandatory music for primary teaching programs. However, this figure does not "measure quality of education, musical or pedagogical aspects taught, or abilities of students when they graduate."[4] This current audit aims to inform these unknown areas so that a fuller picture of the current situation of mandatory music in preservice primary teaching programs is known.

Teacher accreditation, teacher training programs accreditation, and curricula aims are also examined to determine where decisions about music in education originate. It is possible that what is being measured in this audit is not only the situation of music in teacher training programs, but also the expectation of music educational standards and responsibilities from government with the outcomes being seen in teacher training programs, and ultimately in the schools themselves. The preference to merge music into the subject of creative arts reflects research and pedagogies in teaching the arts, but also meets budget-saving and timesaving requirements. But the disadvantage of this is that music fundamentals may be overlooked by interdisciplinary teaching, and subsequently, benefits of music are almost inevitably are lost.

Structure of the Report

The issue of mandatory music for preservice teachers is a shared issue that involves teaching institutions, curriculum writers, teacher registration boards, and government. The way these organisations contribute to how and what music is taught to preservice primary teachers is outlined in the section on “Accreditation and Curricula”. A survey of mandatory music in preservice teacher programs, titled “Primary and Early Childhood Programs in Online Handbooks 2009/2010”, gives the basic descriptors of the subjects concerned as published in universities online handbooks for 2009/2010. Overwhelmingly these are subjects that cover arts rather than being specifically on the discipline of music. In “Examples of Past Handbooks 1989, 1990”, examples of comparable subjects from ten and twenty years ago are also given so that trends towards the current situation can be observed.

The “Audit of Current Arts/Music Education Subjects” then is presented question by question, with responses from arts/music lecturers given and analysis made. Universities have been of great assistance with the audit, and their help has been greatly appreciated.

Following these responses, conclusions and future directions are given.

View the report.