05/23/13

First Update to 100 MEMT List

I am very excited to announce that the 100 Music Ed Majors on Twitter list has officially received its first update! With this first update, we welcome seventeen fantastic Music Education students to our network. You can view the members of our network on our 100 MEMT Official List Page. Also, don’t forget to check out the Homepage for the project. You can follow this list at the official Twitter Listing for the 100 MEMT list! If you aren’t a student, we encourage you to still consider following these people; they are the future of music education!
[Read more...]

100 Music Education Majors Tweeting!

Happy New Year! It’s time to get 100 Music Education Majors Tweeting for 2011!

Music Educators, encourage your students to get on Twitter, and Music Education Students, here is how you can participate! [Read more...]

Join the Web 2.0 Music Classroom!

Perhaps you’ve heard the buzz about the exciting turns music education is taking. Utilizing web 2.0 tools and applications, music educators are finding it easier to discuss and collaborate with each other about music education regardless of distance. These tools are becoming more and more like an online classroom for teachers and students everyday. Unfortunately, a newcomer to these technologies will feel quite overwhelmed when trying to become part of this online community. That is where MusicEdMajor.Net comes in! This article will explain the basics of starting to learn with the ever-growing, online community of music educators. Included are basic overviews of multiple ways Web 2.0 is being used for music education collaboration. MANY articles are linked to as well to give you an more in-depth view of the specific categories. So, if you come across a newcomer to the Web 2.0 world, point them here! If you have other questions or additions, feel free to comment! [Read more...]

HOW TO: Get Started on #MusEdChat

The Web 2.0 world has been expanding rapidly over the past year or so, and if you haven’t jumped on board already, now is the time! In addition to the newly-launched MusicPLN, a fast and easy way to get involved in a Professional Learning Network that will get you immediate results is to participate in a #MusEdChat – a weekly twitter chat for, by, and about music educators!

One of the biggest obstacles I have heard for people interested in participating in #MusEdChat that participating requires a basic knowledge of Twitter. In order to combat that issue, I’m going to use this post to walk you through how to get set up to participate in #MusEdChat quickly and easily. Enjoy!
[Read more...]

Welcome From Music Ed Week!

Music Education WeekHello, all! I come to you from the Mariott Crystal Gateway hotel in Arlington, VA, where I am getting ready to meet up with Justine Dolorfino, Brigid Moran, and Andrew Ritenour to live-blog MENC’s Music Education Week! While I wait, I want to give you a brief update of what’s on the agenda for the next few days. Don’t forget, thanks to SoundTree, you can catch all the updates at the Music Education Week Landing Page. [Read more...]

SoundTree to Sponsor LiveBlog From Music Ed Week

Music Education WeekI am pleased to announce that, for the second year in a row, MusicEdMajor.net will be live-blogging from MENC’s Music Education Week in Washington D.C. from June 25-29. This event will be the 4th live-blog here at MusicEdMajor.net, and for this event, we are pulling out all the stops. We have created a live-blogging team of four people, and are extremely excited to announce sponsorship from SoundTree to help provide you with live updates throughout the event with wireless broadband access.

Check Out the Live-Blog Here [Read more...]

The “Conference Effect”

Flickr Photo by Gaelic ArtsThis is a re-post of an article I wrote on my personal website a while ago. In light of some recent discussions I’ve had, I felt it had merit here. Stay tuned for a few other posts from the andyzweibel.com archives in the coming weeks!

I just recently was talking to a close friend, who is a graduate student in the Frost School of Music at UM, pursuing a DMA in Instrumental Conducting. She is also a graduate assistant with the marching band, and a TA for the Frost Symphonic Winds and Wind Ensemble. As a future band director, she recently went to the College Band Directors National Association (CBDNA) convention in Austin, Texas. She came back with a new found inspiration, and attributed it to the experiences she had at CBDNA, which made me think abut my experiences after returning from conferences. I’ve realized that what my friend is experiencing is similar to what we all tend to experience after an event such as CBDNA-something I have come to call “the conference effect.”

On the most basic level, “the conference effect” is the sense of inspiration and excitement for the profession that many people (in this case music educators) tend to feel after spending a day/weekend/week immersing themselves in what they love at a conference. I know the feeling myself, and I know that many of the music educators reading this know it as well. When you return from a conference, you feel revitalized-almost like a new person, and ready to take on whatever challenges may approach you. In my case as a student, conferences are the times when I find myself wishing I could actually be out in the field, teaching, right away. However you react specifically, this heightened level of inspiration motivates us all to be our best in the days and weeks following the conference.

It is important, though, to keep in mind the effect that timing has on this inspiration. I have only ever been to three different music education conferences: the Midwest clinic in Chicago in mid-December, the FMEA conference in Tampa in early-January, and MENC’s Music Education Week in June. Midwest, while extremely enjoyable, comes just at the end of the semester and the beginning of the holidays, so when the conference is over, I tend to find myself extremely inspired, but with nothing to do but twiddle my thumbs for the rest of December. Music Ed Week, while also enjoyable, runs into the same problem, as it takes place during the summer holiday. FMEA, on the other hand, occurs just before the spring semester begins, and I find myself beginning each spring semester with a renewed excitement for what I am doing, in part because of the lasting effects of this inspiration I get from the conference. This has been even more obvious the past two Januaries, when I had the opportunity to spend the week in between FMEA and the beginning of classes working with a high school band in LaBelle, FL at a school where a close friend (and recent UM alum) teaches. By the time the conference was over and my week of working in a real-life situation was through, I was prepared to do whatever it took to get myself teaching right away.

I’m sure any person who has been to a conference in their field has had experiences like mine, where they have felt a renewed excitement for their profession in the days and weeks following the conference. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it’s likely that we are more productive in this period than we are in any other, as a result of this excitement. So the real question is-how do we artificially create this “conference effect,” and the productivity that comes with it, when there is not a conference to inspire us? If we can somehow trigger this motivation without actually going to a conference, we can increase the caliber of the work we do throughout the entire year, instead of just for a few select weeks after conferences.

Let’s examine what types of activities take place at these conferences. For music education, specifically, we can narrow it into three main activities: learning, networking, and concert-going. Generally, any music education conference will include each of these three aspects. Attendees go to sessions where they learn about a specific subject, they speak to other professionals in their field and network with them, and they attend concerts put on by performing ensembles over the course of the conference.

So, how can we recreate each of these in our daily lives to artificially create the “concert effect”?

  1. Learning-Now that the Internet has improved the way we share information, there have been tons of blogs set up in which educators share their thoughts and ideas on the field. By subscribing to these blogs and reading the new entries, we can stay informed and continue to learn even when we’re not at a conference. For a great place to start looking for music education blogs to subscribe to, check out the 100 ME Bloggers, organized by Dr. Joseph Pisano.
  2. Networking-Networking can be difficult when you’re the only music teacher in your school, but the advent of Web 2.0 technologies and Social Networking tools have changed that. Dr. Pisano has a great list of music educators to follow on Twitter, and if you’re interested in more discussion, consider participating in our weekly #MusEdChat on Monday nights!
  3. Attending Concerts-There’s really not a great techie-answer to this one, but my only suggestion is: go see concerts! Whether it’s a school band in your area, the local community band, or the symphony orchestra in your closest city, continue to expose yourself to music performances, and listen to them critically!

Hopefully these tips will help everyone be able to re-create “the conference effect” in their every day lives. Do you have an experience with this effect? Do you have a great story from a conference you’ve been to? Thoughts on my ideas? Leave a comment!