Pedagogy

Hymnals as a Cultural Resource

April 3, 2012

I’m waiting out a storm.  We’ve moved everything that could get damaged by hail into the barn.  Since it’s Holy Week, the menacing clouds and thunder seem right in tune. In my lap is a 1956 edition of The Baptist Hymnal. I now have 35 of these, happily rescued from a dumpster by a friend.  [...]

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The Arts Exist To Transform

June 27, 2011

This article states so well the life-and-death importance of the Arts in our lives.  (Note that I wrote “in our lives,” not just our children’s lives.) The author, Ronnie Sanders, a member of the Texas Commission on the Arts, describes the plethora of recent studies that map the beneficial effects of arts’ training on our [...]

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Teaching Within the Family – Part 3

June 9, 2011

While it’s certainly more expensive than teaching one’s own children music lessons, hiring an outside music teacher has much to recommend it.  As I mentioned in a previous post, I taught our oldest two children piano for over two years, largely because of financial necessity.  The push to look for an affordable option came for [...]

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If Mom (or Dad) Teaches Music Lessons

May 20, 2011

I recommend two firm boundaries for parents who teach private music lessons to their own children.  (In my last post, I outlined some of the advantages teaching one’s own children music lessons.) First, fix the lesson time and stick to it.  A specific time obviously helps the music student, but it also helps other family [...]

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Should Mom Give the Music Lessons?

May 16, 2011

Learning to play an instrument is a great way to expose your child to music and its developmental advantages.  Giving your child private music lessons is not the only way, of course.  Curricula that explore the development of cultural movements and ideas, such as Discovering Music, can connect events and solidify an understanding of civilization [...]

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Mnenomic Devices Work

May 10, 2011

I kept two plastic cannons on a shelf in my office at SMU.  Each was two inches tall, and made of flexible green plastic.  The wheels turned and the gun barrel went up and down.  They became known as Dr. Reynolds’ cannons. But wait: these were key props when I introduced the musical term “canon.”  [...]

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A Classical Exercise in Research

February 4, 2011

For decades I taught a course a graduate music course called “Intro to Grad Studies.”  The name always bothered me.  It sounds so bland and unsubstantial.  The proper name for this traditional course is “Music Bibliography and Research Methodology.”  That has more “umph,” doesn’t it? We suffered through this course back at The University of [...]

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Research Then and Now

January 22, 2011

Here’s something that worries me: students who rely on keyword searching as their sole research method.  Do we ever run out of things to worry about when it comes to teaching our children?  No.  That’s the nature of teaching and parenting. I’m serious, I do worry.  I might be driving down one of our county [...]

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