Peer reviewed
ERIC Number: EJ709204
Record Type: Journal
Publication Date: 2005-Jan-1
Pages: 8
Abstractor: ERIC
ISBN: N/A
ISSN: ISSN-0027-4321
EISSN: N/A
Fostering Revision and Extension in Student Composing
Wiggins, Jackie
Music Educators Journal, v91 n3 p35 Jan 2005
In many ways, the nature of the community where the learning takes place determines student success in creative endeavors. It is important to recognize that the teacher is not the only one in the room who may have interesting ideas about how to revise or extend students' ideas. Peers share ideas freely with one another, and students are often more receptive to suggestions from peers than they might be to the same suggestions from an adult. The teacher's ideas are usually valued as coming from a more knowledgeable expert, one of many experts in the community. When a teacher makes a suggestion in an environment in which everyone is making suggestions, it is readily accepted--even welcomed or intentionally sought. Students working as part of an interactive community would also surely know if their group had produced work that did not meet the parameters of the assignment, because someone in the classroom would be aware of this and tell them. When everyone is working in such close proximity, informal comparisons occur constantly. The problem of students producing work that does not meet requirements can be resolved early in the process in a setting where students are aware of what others are doing throughout the process. It is not that students who are not doing the assignment as well as they might will be found out by their peers. It is more that as students engage in this mutual effort, they tend to care about what others are doing and attempt to find solutions to other students' problems as a matter of course--so that no one will be left behind or embarrassed when students eventually share their compositions publicly.
Descriptors: Musical Composition, Revision (Written Composition), Feedback, Music Education, Music, Scaffolding (Teaching Technique), Teaching Methods
MENC Subscription Office, P.O. Box 1584, Birmingham, AL 35201. Web site: http://www.menc.org.
Publication Type: Journal Articles; Reports - Descriptive
Education Level: N/A
Audience: N/A
Language: English
Sponsor: N/A
Authoring Institution: N/A
Grant or Contract Numbers: N/A