Collaborative Learning in Higher Music Education: Insights from Music Education Research

In higher music education, learning in social settings (orchestras, choirs, bands, chamber music and so on) is prevalent, yet understanding of such learning rests heavily on the transmission of knowledge and skill from master to apprentice. This narrow view of learning trajectories pervades in both one-to-one and one-to-many contexts. This is surprising given the growing body of knowledge about the power of collaborative learning in general, underpinned by theoretical developments in educational psychology: the social dimensions of learning, situational learning and concepts of communities of learners. Collaborative Learning in Higher Music Education seeks to respond to the challenge of becoming more conscious of the creative and multiple dimensions of social interaction in learning music, in contexts ranging from interdisciplinary projects to one-to-one tuition, and not least in the contemporary context of rapid change in the cultural industries and higher education as a whole. It brings together theoretical papers and case studies of practice. Themes covered include collaborative creativity, communities of practice, peer-learning, co-teaching as co-learning, assessment and curriculum structures. Chapters illuminate reasons for enabling collaborative learning, and provide exemplars of innovative practice and designs for collaborative learning environments in higher music education. A central purpose of the book is to scaffold change, to help in meeting the rapid changes in society and to find constructive stepping stones or signposts for teachers and students.

Helena Gaunt is the Assistant Principal (Research and Academic Development) at the Guildhall School of Music & Drama in London, and a National Teaching Fellow (2009). Her current research focuses on one-to-one and small group tuition in conservatoires, orchestral musicians in the twenty-first century, and the role of improvisation (verbal and musical) in developing professional expertise. She is an Associate of the Centre for Musical Performance as Creative Practice (CMPCP) funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council, co-editor of Music Performance Research, and a member of the Editorial Board of the British Journal of Music Education. She chaired the Forum for Instrumental/Vocal Teaching for the International Society of Music Education from 2010 to 2012, and co-directs the Innovative Conservatoire, an international project dedicated to developing reflective practice, research and innovation in the conservatoire sector. Heidi Westerlund is Professor and Vice Director of the Doctoral School of Music Education, Jazz and Folk Music at the Sibelius Academy, Finland. Her research focuses on the theory and practice of cultural diversity, popular culture and democracy in music education as well as of teaching and learning in higher music education. She has published widely in international and national journals and has written numerous book chapters. She is a member of the editorial board of the International Journal of Music Education, the British Journal of Music Education and Music Performance Research, and she is the editor of the Finnish Journal of Music Education. Heidi has served in the leadership of national and international organizations, such as the International Society for Philosophy of Music Education, and has organized several international conferences.