Module 4

Chapter nine dives deeply into cognitive skills and higher level learning. It talks about metacognition, which is the awareness that you can know and understand things. It takes planning, motivation, and evaluating to accomplish goals or solve a problem. Through the strategy KWL, What do I know, What do I want to know, and what have I learned, one can look within identity to bring a student to learn. In order to achieve this, students must know different strategies and have the desire to use them. Students must also know that new strategies can be developed by using creativity. This applies to my field of music in the sense that a student must have the relevant skills in order to be creative in music. This is sort of like good fundamentals in music that can help a player achieve a higher understanding of music. The student must be able to harness the ability to develop work habits. this would definitely apply to students starting in band trying to learn a new instrument. A student must practice regularly in order to become very proficient in their instrument. Students also must be interested in the task. This is helped by me as a teacher motivating and promoting curiosity in, for my case, music. (Woolfolk Pg. 351-352)
Chapter ten studies learning through different fields of education include psychology, philosophy, sociology, anthropology, among others. It all stems from constructivism which explains that there must be some type of social implications that effects the learning process. There are two main categories psychological, which Piaget bases off of self-concept, identity, and individual knowledge. And social, which Vygotsky bases off of social interaction and a cultural standpoint. This chapter then goes into the strategies and methods based off of these ideas.
Chapter eleven talks about social views of leaning and motivation. The main point of this chapter that really stuck out to me was modeling. (Pg. 414-418) It talks about how students can model themselves after people with power or who are well liked; movie stars, rock stars, parents, teachers, older siblings, athletes, etc. I think leading by example and demonstrating how do certain things in music could help a student become inspired and more self-motivated and self efficient. When I was younger I couldn't really read music well, but if I had someone play something for me, I could usually have it down within a couple minutes. I think it was because I had talented teachers showing me how to play things that helped me become a better player. As a teacher, I will be able to demonstrate and show them how to play if they don't understand music well. Some of my students now can't learn by ear or visually, but can only read music. I want to be able to do both; teach music in an objective way (what's on the paper) and teach kids by demonstrating so they can model what I am doing.