Week 2 - Post 3 - Week 2 Comment

This is my comment post. I decided to reflect on Nick Oaster's posting on his thesis project.

I have spent most of this week working on the thesis and buying my first house (yikes and yay!). I feel the thesis is coming along nicely and should be able to have it solid by next week sometime. I really wish I could have a couple more months, but such is the nature of school - always pressed for time. The general scope of my thesis is that students lack an ability to self-assess themselves properly. Specifically to my field of music, students lack an objective tool for self-assessment. I see this problem in my students all the time: they perform a song, I ask "How did you do?" They say "I THINK it was good" OR "I GUESS ok" OR "I don't know" OR "good" when it was actually below their normal work or what they could have done OR "bad" when it was actually a good display of musical ability. Furthermore, I saw students just not being aware of what they did, how they performed, or how they presented themselves to the world. There are numerous theories as to why this happens that I discuss in my thesis, but much less is known about actually fixing the problem.

In my thesis I argue that high quality recordings and videos can be an objective self-assessment tool for students. I came up with this solution throughout the program. Spending hours making numerous podcasts and videocasts for various EMDT classes allowed me to see and hear myself. After getting past the anxiety of hearing myself, I was able to notice behaviors, both physically and aurally, that I was not aware of. I started using these tools (the computer/cell phones) in private lessons that I teach - trumpet and voice, and I noticed that all of the students noticed similar behaviors that they too were not aware of. From there, the basis for my solution was set, and I have been using those tools in private and small group settings ever since. Students can listen to themselves, critique themselves, and ultimately, fix themselves.

My Reaction Post

When I was in high school my art teacher had us complete a couple of quick drawing assignments on our first day as an assessment of where we were at. On the final day of class, much to our surprise, we did those same assignments again. Then she let us compare our original assignments, which we hadn't seen since that first class, with our current work. Even students who thought they hadn't made much progress were stunned to see that they had actually improved significantly over time. They had a skewed perspective that was only corrected with tangible evidence of their skill improvement.

I get the feeling that your video taping would give this same view point correction.

Seeing a video of yourself after the fact so that you can step back from the performance and take a fair look at the performance makes so much sense. Sometimes it's hard to have an accurate perspective in the moment, especially in performance-based classes like music. It's so easy to have either your anxiety about performing or that natural high you can get in front of the audience color how you remember how well you did. Video taping lets you step away from those issues and just evaluate the performance as it actually was.

During my student teaching we had to tape one of the classes we taught and I was surprised how many little things about my teaching (both good and bad) I was able to notice through the video that I would have never seen otherwise. Video taping lets you, in a way, be your own audience.