L'attirail

INTRODUCTION

Every society, and every school (formal or non-formal) within it, has its own gifted and talented persons. Across cultures and over period in history, such gifted and talented persons have been recognized either through their significantly outstanding positive contributions to society or for some spectacular achievements or positive behavioural manifestation. Children are said to be gifted if their cognitive powers, when developed qualify them to become high level innovators, evaluators, problem solvers, leaders or perpetuators in the complex society in which they live (Oghounu & Oniyama, 2004). They are said to be talented if in the process of doing things, evidences of positive exceptionality and creativity is manifested (Onu, 2002). Sometimes, it is difficult to separate or even distinguish between the two terms since often; one connotes the other (Anih, 2001).

Most countries of the world deliberately and systematically identify and nurture such of their children who are of high intellectual ability. Those who show evidences of exceptional performance or demonstrate very high degree of creativity, memory, motivation, physical dexterity or psycho-motor ability, social adeptness or leadership ability, aesthetic sensitivity or pronounced ability in visual and performing arts, or who demonstrate potential ability in any of these areas (Senate, 1988).

Often times, some of such countries are jolted into action by specific instances or factors like the sputnik which shocked America, or Israel finding herself in the desert or Japan after the Second World War, or Korea after some unfavourable experiences or even some countries planning to dominate world sports and gymnastics (Yoloye, 1986).  Read more...

Music Universe, Music Mind: Revisiting the Creative Music Studio, Woodstock, New York

Most music teachers consider teaching music to their dear students both their profession and passion. Most of them have the heart for arts and music – making each student love learning music and music as a whole. With this kind of outlook and disposition in teaching music, the inspired and motivated music teacher tends to begin his search for consistent improvement in his teaching strategies as well as his effort for personal and professional growth.

Indeed, there is a wide variety of creative music teachers resources that students can certainly enjoy and get excited working on with. According to studies, the integration of audio and video recording in music education has been an effective technique to catch the attention and grab the interest of the learners. This is believed to be an effective tool in raising the level of interest and motivation among music learners.

Current practice in music teaching favors a practical and a hands-on approach in emphasizing performance and composition. The use of recorded music as a teaching resource has tended to take a back seat. However, recordings are the predominant vehicle of musical experience today. As the students are expert listeners to recorded sound, major developments in the access to and presentation of recorded music are opening up new educational possibilities to most of them.

Targeted to be implemented in most music classrooms, the production and engineering aspects of recorded sound to online music libraries and teachers’ experiences of using recordings in the classroom have been randomly practiced and taken into consideration.  Read more...