Teaching Music in Higher Education

Book excerpt: "This book is designed for faculty and graduate assistants working with undergraduate music majors as well as non-majors in colleges and universities in the United States. It includes suggestions for designing and organizing music courses (applied music as well as academic classes) and strategies for meeting the developmental needs of the undergraduate student. It addresses concerns about undergraduate curricula that meet National Association of School of Music requirements as well as teacher education requirements for music education majors in most states. A common theme throughout the book is a focus on "learner-centered pedagogy" (Weimer, 2013) or trying to meet students where they are and base instruction on their individual needs. The text also maintains a constant focus on the relationship between teaching and learning and encourages innovative ways for instructors to assess student learning in music courses. Teaching is connected throughout the book to student learning and the lecture model of "teaching as transmission of information" (Bain, 2004) is discouraged. Activities throughout the book ask instructors to focus on what it means to be an effective teacher for music courses. As there is limited research on teaching music in higher education, we have relied on comprehensive texts from the general education field to help provide the research base for our definition of effective teaching (Davis, 2009; Svinicki & McKeachie, 2014)"--