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How Children AscribeMeaning to Improvisation

and Composition: Rethinking

pedagogy in music educationPamela Burnard

Version of record first published: 19 Aug 2010.

To cite this article: Pamela Burnard (2000): How Children Ascribe Meaning to

Improvisation and Composition: Rethinking pedagogy in music education, Music

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Music Education Research, Vol. 2, No. 1, 2000

How Children Ascribe Meaning toImprovisation and Composition: rethinking

pedagogy in music education

PAMELA BURNARD, School of Education, University of Reading, Bulmershe

Court, Reading RG6 1HY, UK (e-mail: [email protected])

ABSTRACT This paper is taken from doctoral research which sought to discover howchildren engage in and reect on their experiences of improvising and composing. The

study was carried out at a comprehensive Middle School in West London where 18

self-selected 12-year-old children participated in weekly music making sessions. Data

collected over a six-month period included observations, interviews and the examination

of musical artefacts. This paper reports on interview methodology based on construc-

tivist elicitation tools to understand how children ascribe meaning to improvisation and

composition. It was found that children represented these phenomena in three ways: (i)

distinct forms distinguished by bodily intention; (ii) interrelated forms co-existing

functionally in context; and (iii) inseparable processes. The pedagogical signicance of

what is under description here will be discussed.

Introduction

Our assumptions pertaining to improvising and composing are integral to how improvis-

ation and composition are taught. Some writers (Paynter, 1982, 1992) consider compo-

sition to be the preferred means of learning and therefore locate it at the heart of the

music curriculum, at the expense of improvisation. Others consider improvisation to be

a constant companion to the compositional process (Lawrence, 1978), or an impulse

which sets creation in motion (Sessions, 1952, p. 38), and regard the two phenomena

as indistinguishably embedded in the one act of creation (Loane, 1984, 1987; Davies,

1992; Marsh, 1995). Certainly, improvisation is integral to genre-specic styles such as

jazz and blues. However, improvising can also be a term used to describe the essence

of spontaneity as independence from pre-existing styles (Elliott, 1996). Critically, it is

these underlying assumptions which shape our approach to the teaching of improvisation

and composition.ISSN 1461-3808(print) /ISSN 1469-9893(online) /00/010007-1 7 2000 Taylor & Francis Ltd

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8 P. Burnard

Adult understandings of improvisation and composition have been studied extensively

and are largely based on anecdotal accounts which can represent highly specialised

views of the process of musical creation (Wallas, 1926; Ghiselin, 1952; Sloboda, 1985,

1988; Pressing 1988; Berliner, 1994). However, the relevance of adult practice to

childrens musical experience is not clear. The question arises as to the extent to which

childrens experience of improvising and composing resonates with those of adults.There is no systematic body of knowledge (or consensus) pertaining to childrens

experience of improvisation and composition, only contradictory claims that propose: the

existence of different musical processes (Kratus, 1989; 1991; Upitis, 1992); the involve-

ment of distinct abilities (Webster, 1990; McPherson, 1993/4, 1998); and different

aptitudes (Gordon, 1989). Other researchers considered the two processes to be indis-

tinguishable (Swanwick & Tillman, 1986; Loane, 1987).

The earliest seminal studies of children composing made no distinction between the

terms improvisation and composition. Consequently, the term composition was

applied to forms of improvisation, invention and creative music (Swanwick & Tillman,

1986; Davies, 1992). Later writers began to delimit these terms more specically

(Webster, 1990; Kratus, 1994; Barrett, 1996; Folkestad, 1998). However, only a few

studies have widened the investigative focus to include childrens musical thinking, the

nature of their musical experiences and what meanings they attribute to these experi-

ences (Blacking, 1967; Upitis, 1992; Campbell, 1998).

This paper is taken from doctoral research which sought to discover how children

engage in, and reect on, their experiences of improvising and composing. Two

questions guided the investigation: (i) what constitutes the dimensions along whichchildren move between improvisation and composing, and (ii) how do childrens

reections of their lived experience provide insight into the intention which directs their

processes of music making. The paper focuses on childrens meaning making because of

the effect of thinking about what it is to improvise and compose from a constructivist

perspective. It has particular relevance for music educators understanding creative

modes of experience as diverse forms of meaning, and seeks to illustrate the degree of

rethinking we need to engage in if we are to assist children to develop as creators (not

only makers) of music.

Theoretical Perspective

A phenomenological base, theoretically informed by a cognitivistinterpretative

paradigm, provided the present study with its descriptive and analytical focus from

which an interpretation of childrens understanding of their own experience was

developed. Merleau-Ponty (1962) referred to phenomenology as the study of objects and

events as they present to, and appear in, our experience wherein the world is what we

perceive (p. xi). In this way, experience as we live it becomes a function of how we

direct our consciousness in a dialectical relationship toward the world (i.e. revealed by

our attempts to construe events and objects). From this perspective, action (including

pre-reective action) as it embodies intention (which is visible in action) becomes the

focus of mapping childrens worlds of meaning through their experiential descriptions

(Van Manen, 1990).

Important issues concerning the context can also be dened phenomenologically.

Context, according to Wertsh (1985), is grounded in a set of assumptions about

appropriate roles, goals and means used by the participants in the settings whereupon

the activity setting guides the selection of actions and the operational composition of




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How children ascribe meaning to improvisation and composition 9

actions and it determines the functional signicance of these actions (p. 212). Thus, the

importance of distinguishing characteristics of the context (or activity settings) and the

meanings given to intentional acts that characterise improvising and composing, as

manifest through the actions and reections of the children, provided the focus of this

research. Given the interpretativeconstructivist tradition in which the central tenet is to

describe and interpret the phenomena under investigation, an ethnographic approach wasconsidered appropriate to reveal the meanings constructed by children (Schwandt, 1994).

Research Design

An ethnographic approach using a multi-method research plan was designed. The data

were generated from observations of the participants engaged in music making, with the

researcher in the role of participant observer; through interviewing both individuals and

groups in focused sessions; and from the examination of transcriptions of 116 improvi-

sations and 79 compositions.

The study was carried out in a multi-ethnic, comprehensive Middle School in West

London, England over a period of six months. Eighteen self-selected 12-year-old

children participated in 21 weekly music-making sessions. Of the 18 children, there were

12 girls and 6 boys. Fourteen children had received instrumental tuition and ve had

taken graded examinations; four had received no formal instrumental training. There

were 14 of British descent, two Afro-Caribbean and two Asian children. I wanted to

know in what ways these children carried out single event and spontaneous performances

of music (i.e. improvisation) and revised pieces created over time (i.e. composition). Ialso wanted to explore the nature of the relationship between improvisation and

composition from the childrens perspectives.

The eldwork took place over a period of six months and divided into three phases

referred to as the Early, Middle and Late Phase. Each child was given two individual

interviews, which framed the Early and Late Phases. Drawing on the phenomenological

concepts of the noematic and noetic, the study focused on the how-issue, as childrens

ways of engagement, and the what-issue, as childrens expressed interpretation of these

phenomena. However, it is not within the scope of this paper to examine the how-issue.

Instead, the what-issue which mapped childrens worlds of meaning through theirexperiential descriptions, as derived from interview data, will be discussed.

Interview Methodology

A preliminary one-hour interview provided baseline data concerning the childrens

musical background and experiences that inuenced their general musical interests both

at home and school. A constructivist elicitation technique developed by Denicolo and

Pope (1990), called Critical Incident Charting was used to encourage a reective

conversational style of engagement. The children were asked to reect on specic

instances, or critical incidents, which they considered had inuenced the direction of

their musical lives. I asked the children to reect upon their experiences of music and

share stories which tell me about their memorable experiences of music making at

school, with friends and family as well as within the community. Whilst they recalled

these events in their musical histories, I located each narration on different bends along

the length of a winding river, where each bend represented an inuential incident. This

was their musical river. Each bend in the musical river was a manifestation of aspects

of the childs formative experiences in music. Then I asked them to reect upon these




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10 P. Burnard

incidents giving voice to the attitudes and orientations implicit to their musical worlds

and identities.

At the conclusion of the Late Phase, the nal interview provided the children with an

opportunity to reect upon their experiences of improvisation and composition across the

six-month term of the study. An image-based, draw-and-talk technique (Prosser, 1998),

based on respondent verication (Becker, 1998) of the varied forms of representingrelationships between improvisation and composition, was used. The children were asked

to draw an image or pictorial representation to convey some aspect (or aspects) of what

it was to improvise and compose. Then, they were invited to explain in detail how these

pictures related to their own experiences. The specic concerns addressed in this

interview included the critical question: Thinking back over your experience of music

making, what, for you, does it mean to improvise and compose?. The idea was to focus

on the phenomenological issues of what it means to improvise and compose as well as

to enhance the credibility of ndings through triangulation of data sources (Denzin,

1978). The themes arising from the analysis of one source of data (i.e. observation of

action) were compared with the evidence found in another source (i.e. childrens

reection on action), which in turn was compared with the data from the musical

transcription and nally checked against the accounts from the initial interviews.

Analysis of Data

All qualitative research is based upon the interpretation of a selection of the data. In this

study, the segmentation and selection of data were governed by the technique known astheoretical or purposive sampling (Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Strauss & Corbin, 1990). The

general approach adopted was to subject the data to analysis for thematic content using

the method of iterative inductive coding, as described in many standard texts on

qualitative, naturalistic social research methods (Miles & Huberman, 1994).

Analysis of the data collected in the initial interviews was done by hand on printed

copies of the full transcriptions. The data from each musical river was summarised and

presented in a form which could be scanned sequentially; next to each extract passage

placed on each bend in the river, a thematic category was pencilled in the margin of the

page. At this initial stage of data analysis, every descriptive incident about a musicalepisode or encounter contributed to the representation of children voicing their relation-

ship to music. Thus, each musical memory had a potential relationship to the purpose of

the study.

The images and language collected in the nal interviews, representing the childrens

nal reections on improvisation and composition, were analysed in the form of a

picture-by-picture comparison to gain impressions of similarities and differences be-

tween cases. Then, reading and re-reading the childrens explanations in order to identify

any possible relationships tested my visual impressions. When all the drawings had been

compared, a form of relationship was sought. Then, a type of theoretical generalisation

was employed and re-tested against the earlier phases. Many of the children explained

their pictures of improvisation and composition metaphorically, making their meanings

easily apparent, a technique advocated by Eisner (1991), for making public the

ineffable (p. 227).

A variety of validity check procedures included the use of independent referees to

evaluate the credibility of the researchers thematic categorisation of the data. This was

achieved by sending the presentation of data to two independent researchers. The coding

agreement or disagreement was noted and discussed in detail in order to eliminate the




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risk of false coding and to publicly test my interpretation (Denzin, 1978; Lincoln &

Guba, 1985; Becker, 1998).

Introducing Individual Realities as Essential Backgrounds of Musical Experience

This paper proles three children with different instrumental training and performancebackgrounds. An elicitation technique is used to chart their perspective music-rivers.

Each river reects differences in musical identity and beliefs about music making. This

was apparent in the varying extent to which children focus on different facets of musical

experience in relation to their backgrounds. Links between musical biographies and

childrens experience of improvising and composing are developed later in the paper.

Introducing Diane. Diane has played the piano since the age of eight and the clarinet for

nearly two years. She is familiar with performing in both solo and orchestral settings.

She expresses great interest in exploring different ways of creating music on a range of

instruments. Her Dad makes up songs on guitar. At home, she uses her Dads guitar to

just play about. She also makes up little pieces on the piano. Figure 1 shows a precis

of Dianes recollections at different phases of her musical development.

Dianes need to express herself and discover the extent of her artistic capabilities is

illustrated by her individual passion for creating her own music and playing around on

a variety of instruments. Her reluctance to conform and periodic impatience reects her

desire to do something[s] different. She recalls creative encounters which both

stimulated and frustrated her. These encounters play an important role in making senseof music and in establishing her musical identity. She prefers to make her own music at

home, but still values the music she makes in school even though, as she says,

sometimes I get put in groups with people who dont get along very well and then we

waste time arguing. These collaborative encounters serve to reafrm her identity as she

becomes aware of her own music-making processes whose meaning she nds embodied

in personal ownership.

Introducing Tim. Tim has completed ve years of formal instrumental tuition on piano

and has taken graded examinations in piano (Grade 5), violin (Grade 3) and theory(Grade 4). He has also completed two terms of group lessons at school in percussion.

He is a member of the school choir, string orchestra and attended a Saturday morning

School of Young Musicians. According to Tim, he has really got into the rhythm doing

grades and intends to go all the way to Grade 8. His mother is a professional piano

teacher and father plays the guitar, piano, saxophone and banjo. His younger brother also

plays the piano and cello. At home, they have a variety of digital and acoustic pianos.

What strikes me most about Tims recollections is that they are primarily dened in

terms of progress, achievement and competition. Consequently, his river begins and ends

with expressions relating to proper pieces like the Allegro by Bach and the ambition

of getting it right. He also speaks of the pressures of preparing for exams and the

frustrations of having to practise. What is interesting is how he emphasises the salient

issues of experiences that are set by expectations, standards of achievement and success

as characterised by subjective values, particular to a set of goals. Tim is an ambitious

player who reveals his thoughts and feelings in terms of musical training rather than

musical experience. For Tim, musical meaning seems to be based on the highly

structured and sequential learning techniques, which form the basis of his musical

instruction (see Figure 2).




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12 P. Burnard

FIG. 1. Dianes musical river.




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FIG. 2. Tims musical river.




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14 P. Burnard

Introducing Sidin. Sidin is a 12-year-old Asian girl who receives no formal training on

a musical instrument. She is the youngest member of a family who has no instruments

to play at home and Sidin is the least musically experienced member of the group.

She considers that people fall into one of three categories in terms of musical

ability. Firstly, there are those that are really talented and play good music. Secondly,

there are those that are good but need improvement and thirdly, there are those thatlike music but are not good or looked up to. Sidin conceptualises her own reality when

she says:

When I play, I think Im the third type of person but I want to be like others

and play the way they do. I want to play it but I think I shouldnt play it.

Despite her self-consciousness and shyness, Sidin indicates a strong desire to play music

as evident in reections relating to her musical experiences. This is shown in her musical

river (see Figure 3) which shows a precis of her six-page transcription.

The qualities that characterise Sidin are her self-consciousness and low self-esteem.Her great admiration of those with performance skills is a reection of her interest in

music. Her reections relate to private and imagined performance within the security

of her home environment. Clearly, she feels intimidated by performing in a school

context whereas her private musical world is a safe, non-threatening place where she can

nd expression as it doesnt matter if it sounds silly. Part of her fear of public

performance is a result of the difculties with reading notation, which required her to

look at it and think and play it.

In summary, while the musical rivers reveal diverse experiences, they also convey

similarities identied as an interest in playing instruments and a desire to be involved

with music. This was a common characteristic of all the participants recollections. The

musical rivers also illustrate some important issues relating to experiential knowledge

of music. These representations highlight the inuence of prior experience on artistic

activity as ways of knowing that involve reection, production and musical perception

(Gardner, 1989). These different ways of knowing seem to be inuenced by the sources

of their knowledge and motivation. Tims production and perception skills are the result

of specialist instrumental training. On the other hand, Diane strongly identies with the

production of her own music, whilst Sidin focuses critical judgement on her ownmusic-making and considers herself to be the least musically skilled of the group. Music

is integral and yet differently situated in the lives of these children. Thus, it is important

to examine the ways in which different children make sense of their experiences of

improvising and composing (Van Manen, 1990).

Representing Experiences of Improvising and Composing

The three children (Diane, Tim and Sidin) drew the following forms of representation.

They do more than recount experiences. They also convey possible interpretations

of the nature of improvising and composing, and perceived relationships (Van

Manen, 1990). The images demonstrate three forms of relationship between improvising

and composing. These images fall into categories of experiencing differences,

interrelatedness, or sameness. It was found that children experienced improvising

and composing differently according to context (i.e. characteristics of the activity setting)

and intention (i.e. directed by specic orientations). Most of the children described

improvisation and composition as distinct forms distinguished by bodily intention,

whilst some experienced them as interrelated forms, co-existing functionally in context.




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FIG. 3. Sidins musical river.

A few children regarded them as inseparable processes, highlighting a sameness in

orientation.

Experiencing Difference

The following drawings by Diane convey improvisation as a kind of continuity in action

whilst composition is expressed in terms of xing thoughts by setting parameters. Figure

4 shows a vivid depiction of improvisation as, metaphorically speaking, a roller coaster

ride and composition as a ow chart of xed action sequences. The roller coaster

ride reects the momentum of a short-lived and fast-paced experience in which you

just play and it keeps going until you nish. The metaphor offers a potent way of




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16 P. Burnard

FIG. 4.

representing the temporal quality of being carried forward. What seems to make the

experience of improvisation possible is that, from the starting point, the player engages

in a process of focusing on a continuing impulse of ongoing activity in which s/he is

thinking in action.

Drawn again by Diane, the compositional image in Figure 5 conveys a multi-direc-

tional rather than uni-directional mode. The arrow directions, geared toward building

structures, indicate a back-and-forth movement of revising parts in relation to the whole,

as a way of forming a musical Gestalt. As shown in many images, reection as the act

of thinking back over it speaks of composition as a process of revision and rehearsal.Figure 5 makes explicit the setting of limits by bracketing the musical events into

segments. Clearly, the intention was to build a structure as I was thinking back over it

to the beginning to make sure it went with the middle then I worked out the end.

The arrows show the compositional path of revision, shifting back and forth across

bracketed segments as she sorts, selects and assembles the piece.

Experiencing Interrelatedness

Drawn by Tim, Figure 6 conveys visual images that are conceived largely as a journey

toward a composition which is generated through improvising. The mutuality is shown

by way of the improvisation which starts with a pattern Ive played before [Tim

points to the straight line], progresses to bursts of going higher and then lower

[Tims nger follows the curved lines] and then you stop [Tim hits the precise

point on the page]. The composition is described as a proper piece which incorporates

a bit of structure and a bit made on the spot and a bit more structure. These images

create the impression of improvisation in the service of composition as a closely

associated, role-related activity. Composition begins with improvisation and it is impro-

visation which acts as the creative catalyst to externalise musical thoughts. Similarly,

many adult composers improvise as an important tool for realising ideas (Lawrence,

1978). However, whilst Tims compositional process emphasised formation and revision

of ideas, as the result of thinking reectively about relationships within the whole piece,

there were moments of improvisation during the repeat performances of the revised

piece. Thus, improvisation and composition are interrelated in all aspects of the process

of performance.




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FIG.

5.




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18 P. Burnard

FIG. 6.

Experiencing Sameness

In contrast, Sidin considers that there is no difference between improvisation and

composition (see Figure 7). She explains:

Improvising and composing [are] no different, they are the same piece to me.

I can spend a lot of time playing around trying to settle ideas. Its supposed

FIG. 7.




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FIG. 8.

to get better when you spend lots of time on it but I get so nervous when I

perform. I keep losing my ideas and all of a sudden Ill forget what Im

supposed to do and think Im going to play something wrong. Everyones

going to hate it. So now when I lose my ideas all of a sudden, I dont look

up and see what everyone is thinking and stop, I say I dont really care what

anyone else thinks, Im just going to play on with my partner. I never used

to play pieces in front of anyone but now I play with my musician friends and

whatever I play comes up good. [Source: Final Interview]

Sidin is an inexperienced player whose unwillingness to take risks means that shedeliberately seeks to play with others. Her performance fears can be attributed to a

myriad of factors (some of which were reported in earlier chapters). For example, she

makes a distinction between externalising ideas (playing around), the internalised work

of memory (losing my ideas) and maintaining continuity in performance (look up

and see what everyone is thinking and stop). In other words, she used to encounter a

complex interplay of cognitive and performance difculties, mechanisms in which the

music was sounded out, selected, grouped and recalled or lost in subsequent perfor-

mances. Despite these skills-related issues, Sidins fear of memory lapses and perform-

ance errors diminished with increasing support of playing partners whom she could trust

and who trusted her. Sidin found collaborative settings allowed her to feel less

vulnerable for reasons that were more social than musical. Thus, it was the interdepen-

dence between improvisatory and compositional processes, where one depends on and is

inseparable from the other, as mirrored by the musical partnership, to make pieces afresh

in performance.

As in the case of Sidin, there were other children who expressed a similar perspective.

One further drawing by a participant called Katya will provide a further illustration of

the importance of intention where the creation of music is concerned. Katya (who shares




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20 P. Burnard

a similar musical background to Diane) has played the piano for four years and clarinet

for two years. In Figure 8, we see two versions of an intersection which reect Katyas

performance-directed desire to make pieces afresh. She explains:

Improvising is different ideas jumbled up coming in from all directions. Its no

different to composing cause your ideas come from different places and they

meet in what your playing. They are not really set because youre always

improvising in some ways. I like changing my ideas around. Its not about

remembering it. [Source: Final Interview]

These remarks illustrate several issues about improvisation. Firstly, the experience is

characterised by spontaneity making the music fresh, free of the need for memorisation

and fear of making mistakes. Secondly, that the process of performance is, by nature,

improvisatory means there is little need to encode or set the music in memory. Thirdly,

the sameness becomes a manifestation of musical divergence as innite combinations

of ideas come from all directions or from different places. Finally, the image of anintersection suggests a musical convergence of all these ideas at a place where sound

meets and play exists free of expectations about remembering it. Unlike the previous

images, improvising does not represent a stage of a process that is going on to another

point but rather, represents the continuity of each moment being led up to and led away

from.

Sidin and Katya represent aspects of similar experiences in as much as both are

concerned with a desire to perform, a passion for sound and reluctance towards

memory-directed composition. Interestingly, Katya is a keen and experienced performer

whilst Sidin is as keen but much less experienced. For Sidin, it makes no difference

if pieces are planned or not. In the ux of things, the details become apparent only in

the contingent and precarious moment of performance. Improvising and composing

come to represent a similar process because they are interlaced and overlapping, in the

service of each other; as the direct outcomes of the vagaries of performance. By bringing

a sharper focus on performance the intentions underlying improvising and composing

become inseparable and mutually dependent. At the intersection, improvising occurs in

the service of composition to generate a divergence of ideas and, similarly, composing

occurs in the service of improvisation to establish a divergence of ideas. Thus, neitherexperience is marked out from the other in the streams of ideas.

A Model of Childrens Experience of Improvisation and Composition

It was apparent that improvising and composing seemed to be as much about the

childrens relationship to musical activity as improvisation and composition were to each

other. These formed relationships that comprised:

1 Improvisation and composition as ends in themselves and differently orientatedactivities;

2 Improvisation and composition as interrelated entities whereby improvisation is used

in the service of making and performing a composition; and

3 Improvisation and composition as indistinguishable forms that are inseparable in

intention.

Thus, it emerged that the children incorporated improvisation into the compositional

process. However, their underlying intentions resulted in different ways of experiencing

improvisation and composition. Figure 9 is a shaded Venn diagram that depicts the three




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FIG. 9. A model of the relationshi p between improvisation and composition.

forms of relationship between improvisation and composition. From a childs perspec-

tive, the relationship between improvisation and composition can be described as

follows: (i) distinct and separate (see lightest areas); (ii) interrelated (see shaded areas);

and (iii) indistinguishable, where no distinction is apparent (see darkest area).

This study highlighted the diversity of childrens understandings of both the nature

and relationship between improvisation and composition. Surprisingly, musical training

was a less critical determinant of the ways of experiencing improvising and composing

than the creative intention.

Implications For Teachers: rethinking pedagogy

The ndings contained a number of implications for teaching. For instance, childrens

willingness to improvise and compose is a function of creating an environment where

children can express their creativity. By starting with activities that are not too far

removed from the childs immediate experience, creativity becomes integrated within the

childs existing musical experiences and skills. Furthermore, by locating children in a

range of musical settings they come to recognise the multidimensional nature of music

resulting in greater valuing of what they already know, think, and can do.Inevitably, teachers have their pre-conceptions regarding improvising and composing,

which must inuence their pedagogic approach. However, the ndings from my research

suggest that it is advantageous to apply the potential of both improvising and composing

to enhance the social dimension of music learning which recognises the signicance of

childrens perspectives. For learning should be perceived as meanings negotiated

amongst learners as well as between learners and their teachers. Teachers should,

therefore, try not to impose their values but rather encourage the children to discuss and

develop their own.

Our aim as music educators should be to facilitate a form of music education that

focuses on genuine experiences of children being improvisers and composers rather than

acting out a pre-dened model. Subsequently, we must encourage and assist the children

to think critically and creatively. As Dewey (1916) claimed each [individual] has to

refer his [sic] own action to that of others and to consider the actions of others to give

point and direction to his own (p. 87). Children should be encouraged to: (i) discuss

what it is that is intrinsic to their own musical experience; (ii) identify themselves not

only as music makers but as music creators; and (iii) encouraged to reect on what it

is to improvise and compose.




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22 P. Burnard

If we acknowledge the importance of the words of children then they will socially

construct the ways they compose and improvise in the classroom. Sharing understanding

will help the children to recognise why they are doing a certain activity and what they

are doing, leading to an awareness of how they are doing it. Thus, by giving children

the opportunity to articulate their understandings we enhance learning.

It was Polanyi (1966) who said that within the domain of human knowledge, we canknow far more than we can tell (p. 4). This view reects the experiential nature of

learning and the importance of incorporating reection in the curriculum. Children

should be encouraged to talk about, reect upon and write about (in reective journals)

their musical experiences in order to help make meaning of their learning. The ndings

from my study indicated that all children, irrespective of musical backgrounds, have the

potential to think explicitly about music experiences. Thus, teaching improvisation and

composition should incorporate: (i) examining past and present assumptions about what

it is to improvise and compose; (ii) encouraging children to be more reective by asking

children to think about how as well as what they improvise and compose; (iii) ensuring

the starting points for improvising and composing are based on childrens existing

knowledge and experience; (iv) ensuring children have the opportunity to select from a

wide range of instruments; (v) sufcient time for children to clarify conceptual

modication or changes and to test and extend ideas through their actions and

reections; (vi) a clear distinction between critical appraisal and interpretation of

improvised and composed outcomes; and (vii) opportunities for children to confer

meaning on the creation of their own music and musical experiences.

Without doubt, teachers will meet with some difculties when they try to apply thereective methods discussed in this paper. However, it is important for teachers to

prioritise time for reection in the curriculum. It is hoped, that once children and their

teachers reect on what improvising and composing means to them they will become

better equipped and more likely to envisage what they could come to mean within and

beyond the classroom.

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