Arts and Cultural Education in Iceland : Professor Anne Bamford

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Other music schools felt that local funding rules prevented group teaching and that in fact group teaching was preferable. The following vignette (12.1.6) is from a regional music school that has undertaken research into group teaching and also working more closely with schools. Vignette 1.12.6The children learn more quickly This is a large music school with over 540 private music pupils. The school also runs 150 preschool music lessons. They like to work inside the compulsory school and the pre-primary school and work alongside the regular music teachers. Their funding comes 50% from private sources and 50% from the local council. When working in schools, they split the class in half and have around 8 pupils. This is optimum and better than private lessons as the children learn quickly. The music school director explains: We are trying to put an emphasis on group playing. We find even for piano the children learn more quickly.” We have private lessons too. We allow the teachers to choose where they want to work, either in group lessons or private lessons. It works well to give choice as some of the teachers love working in the schools and others don’t like it. It is based around the talent of the teacher and their own way of dealing with music learning. Our instrumental work in schools is based around the recorder. I have been arguing for much more flexibility in music schools. We should be able to use our professional judgement, not be tied into teaching one way or another. We try to put the pupils first.” In keeping with this idea, the school has a policy of giving preference to young children. They work in schoolsand go around to the small villages. They allow the children to choose instruments, but in practical way have to sometimes limit the choices especially in smaller villages. We are not a rich area here. I would like all children to have an hour a week of music, but at the moment, 50% only do 30 minutes per week. Parents have to pay 58,800 ISK for one hour per week for the year, but only 37,300 ISK for 30 minutes per week. We provide all the preschool music lessons for free. We would like to see the policy of the municipality change so we can offer group teaching, so children can have more time and it would be cheaper. We did a survey with the teachers and 25 out of 35 teachers said they would be very happy to teach group classes during school time. Only 5/35 said that they would not like to do group teaching and would only want to do private lessons. Our job is to serve the community. I would like this school to be and arts school not just music. I could think of so many ways this could work, but the rules do not allow the funding for that idea. I think mixing the arts could make it more fun. If we stop to think of it, maybe only 1% of our pupils will actually become musicians. The other 99% need good arts education. In government supported music schools, the salaries of teachers and administrators are paid by the local government under an agreement formed in 1989. The salary of music school teachers varies according to their experience, qualification an hours worked, but is generally around the same level as teachers working in the compulsory school. Places in the music school are available from around the age of 3 for pre-school music, but in most cases, instrumental music education tends to begin around 8 years of age. Many music 40
schools have waiting lists of children wishing to start music lessons. This is especially the case in the area of singing and guitar, where demand seems to be in excess of supply of teachers. Most music schools have developed their own pattern of offerings. These can include a range of in-school and out-of-school lessons. To accurately map these offerings is quite difficult as they not only vary from one school to the next, but also at different ages within the school as the following example highlights: In pre-primary school the children get one 30 minute lesson per week. The six year olds get 2 x 30 minute small group lessons per week. The seven year olds choose an instrument (e.g. accordion, piano, violin and guitar). The 8 year olds get one hour individual lesson. Nine year olds get 2 x 60 minute lessons. These lessons are all free. We provide African drumming lessons for nine year olds and grade seven also get African music. These are whole class lessons given during class time and are free. But pupils can also do additional music lessons that are individual and paid for by the parents. Grades eight to ten can choose a music elective and most pupils do choose it because music is very popular. Children can apply to the music school for private lessons and these can be done during school time too, but for these they have to pay. It costs around 26,000 ISK for 18 weeks. This covers a one hour private lesson per week. In total we have 356 pupils in the music school across all programmes. Of these, more than 50% of the students do additional private lessons. While historically, music schools have had little direct contact with schools, this pattern is changing. Many music schools are now working in very close collaboration with compulsory and secondary schools and pupils are able to attend the music school during school time. Staff from the music school may also teach group music classes and pre-instrumental lessons within the general school. This is particularly the case for younger pupils. Specialist music teachers in the music schools are generally reluctant to teach in the compulsory school. They feel that “it is hard work and low salaries”. Many schools “lack the facilities” and do not “support the music teacher”. The following quote from a teacher educator for music education in schools suggests that there are different training requirements for class or group teachers in compulsory schools compared to those teaching individual lessons in music school contexts: I think the music teacher education within the education department is better for music teachers in the compulsory school. We teach them how to teach music in bigger groups and how to motivate students. We also talk about how to reach students from a range of abilities. I think music has changed a lot. But music education is still expensive – it is quite luxurious really. Students coming from the conservatoire are not prepared to teach in the classroom. There is a big difference between teaching a private musical instrument lesson compared to communicating music to a whole class. Teachers need skills in evaluation and how to cope with a wider range of more varied types of students. Music needs to become more integrated into the school. The arts subjects still remain isolated. They have been the same for decades. The problem is, when we talk about ‘integrated arts’ then it is an excuse for everything to be minimised and then you can’t teach the skills. It is really frustrating. The common core gets reduced. Teaching hours get reduced and then you can’t attract good teachers. A small number of music schools are physically based within the compulsory school buildings or site and pupils are able to move freely to their instrumental lessons in the music school. While this pattern has generally been well-received by all, some music school teachers have expressed concern that teaching within the general school is often poorly regarded with low levels of specialist equipment, isolation from peers and lack of genuine integration with the general school context and staff. There is a desire for collaborations between regular schools and after schools with the intention that closer links would be mutually beneficial but there is also concern that the pattern of funding for such collaborations is unclear. Where music schools are working within the compulsory school, they appear to find this way of working very rewarding with mutual benefits for all, as the following vignette (1.12.7) from a music school embedded within a compulsory school suggests: Vignette 1.12.7 A very positive effect on the culture of the compulsory school We are very lucky. This school was built around the principle that the library and the music school would be actually at the centre of the school. 41
Page 1 and 2: Arts and Cultural Education in Icel
Page 3 and 4: Acknowledgements This research woul
Page 5 and 6: Helga Rut Guðmundsdóttir Helgi Vi
Page 7 and 8: 5.4.2 Talent developement..........
Page 9 and 10: practices, but in reality there are
Page 11 and 12: Chapter 1: Introduction and overvie
Page 13 and 14: school type to which the comment re
Page 15 and 16: A future study could examine specif
Page 17 and 18: The number of pupils with a foreign
Page 19 and 20: pre-primary school teachers were so
Page 21 and 22: Figure 1.5.3: How useful is the Nat
Page 23 and 24: The conclusions from this report in
Page 25 and 26: primary level exceptional students
Page 27 and 28: ‣ Schools and colleges should be
Page 29 and 30: Increasingly, schools are becoming
Page 31 and 32: here, it is a good cooperation. We
Page 33 and 34: In terms of suggested improvements
Page 35 and 36: There are 300 hundred pupils in thi
Page 37 and 38: Figure 1.12.2 Accessibility of the
Page 39: e active in a range of local profes
Page 43 and 44: Going to local schools… well we t
Page 45 and 46: in theatre. The students really lov
Page 47 and 48: We had a great show. The teachers d
Page 49 and 50: lot of satisfaction out of the proc
Page 51 and 52: Chapter 2 World Benchmarking 2.1 In
Page 53 and 54: Chapter 3: Responses to quality 3.1
Page 55 and 56: Figure 3.2.1 Compulsory school coll
Page 57 and 58: In the survey, dance schools report
Page 59 and 60: The school is participating in the
Page 61 and 62: visitors. The diverse and ‘quirky
Page 63 and 64: A smaller group of girls performs a
Page 65 and 66: Figure 3.3.6 Pupil performances in
Page 67 and 68: way the children’s artworks were
Page 69 and 70: has always been and it is 20 or 30
Page 71 and 72: ‣ Funding should encourage risk t
Page 73 and 74: music sector could be less constrai
Page 75 and 76: Conversely, the accessibility of ou
Page 77 and 78: Vignette 3.7.4 Every day there are
Page 79 and 80: Despite the geographical challenges
Page 81 and 82: In visual arts we mainly assess acc
Page 83 and 84: We try to do professional developme
Page 85 and 86: This vignette from an academic in t
Page 87 and 88: in offering adult education. Other
Page 89 and 90: demanding more of our schools and t
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It was argued that the arts may not
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(teacher a professional photographe
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There is a lot of respect amongst p
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“The popularity of pop music is g
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Others would argue that the connect
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interrelationship with nature and c
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From this summary, it can be seen t
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training of senior secondary arts t
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Vignette 5.2.4 Our selection proces
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There is a lack of connection betwe
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During the research, various school
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The following sections are other as
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For older pupils, there are electiv
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Before I came here no-one was doing
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Creative and cultural industries Mo
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While the previously listed recomme
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Arts and Cultural Education in Iceland : Professor Anne Bamford

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