VCU news

By Blake Birdwell

John Dewey, 20th-century philosopher and educational reformer once said, “If we teach today’s students as we did yesterday’s, we are robbing them of tomorrow.”

At Virginia Commonwealth University, professors and teachers in the strings department, who were known as faculty in yesteryear, today refer to themselves as coaches. They have pioneered a new method of teaching students to teach themselves. By incorporating the time-honored athletic ritual of “watching film,” students analyze video recordings of themselves performing as part of a more effective, real-world, student-centered learning model.

“The idea of using a sports methodology for our classes came to me while I was following the VCU basketball team’s success and reading about Shaka Smart’s coaching,” said Susanna Klein, assistant professor of violin. “It took me back to my high school swim team time, when we used video regularly to work on our strokes.”

That’s one thing that most highly successful athletes have in common: They watch themselves over and over again — and then just once more — to figure out why they aren’t performing the way they want.

But musicians, for as long as anyone can remember, have been taught one way, with the teacher always at the center of learning. Traditionally, the student plays, the teacher listens, the teacher comments. Rinse and repeat.

Yet, according to Klein and many other professors, that tried-and-true method wasn’t how they got to where they are today.

“When I became more student-centered myself, I learned so much more, because I knew what to ask,” Klein said. “I knew what my priorities were. I wasn’t waiting on someone to define me.”

Klein pursued this idea of student-centered learning that most music educators use personally, yet never find implemented in music education. Klein was able to purchase five full-length mirrors, three iPads, and journals inspired by sports journal advocate Richard Kent, through a grant from VCU’s Center for Teaching Excellence (now the ALT Lab).

Students record notes on such things as their mechanics and posture in the supplementary journals, as well as various weekly writing prompts that allow students to think deeply about why they play the way they do. These prompts lead students to write with responses ranging anywhere from “my hands were cold” to “my roommates are stressing me out.” All of this in an effort for students to “own their own stuff, their own attitudes — to learn how they learn,” Klein said.

As this sports methodology is still in its fetal stages on the third floor of the James W. Black Music Center, Klein’s ideology and passion have been welcomed with open arms and are sure to flourish in a new generation of musicians from VCU.

“She’s always encouraging us to think in big, dynamic ways,” said senior violin performance major Chanel Hurt. “She never stays narrow-minded to one strategy.”

Dewey would be proud.

 

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