Music learning theory (Gordon, 2012)

all learning begins with the ear not the eye. If students cant audiate in major and
harmonic minor tonalities, and duple and triple meter, then if a teacher is trying to teach
students something unfamiliar, they instantly feel defeated and turn to teaching through
the eye, not the ear. [26]

A method is the order in which sequential objectives are introduced in a curriculum to achieve an
objective or goal. [27]
A series of sequential objectives becomes a comprehensive objective: a method.
An order of sequential objectives becomes a method.
When a sequential objective is too complex for students to comprehend, it is best for it to
become a comprehensive objective separated into a series of sequential objectives.
A technique is a way of teaching content. [28] The teaching of sequence is often ignored.
Teachers need to make and meet realistic goals, or adequately determine students
progress. [29] When students do not understand the purpose of what they are doing,
students become unreceptive and the teacher becomes reliant on clever techniques,
making it more difficult for students to respond in a musically evocative manner.
Student motivation comes from success in learning. [31] students are ensured success
when sequential objectives are formulated in terms of skill development, and when
tonalities, meters, tonal patterns, rhythm patterns and harmonic patterns are taught
sequentially.

Music aptitudes and music achievement

Students have different levels of music aptitude
As educators, we are obligated to ensure that students with low music aptitude do not
become frustrated, and students with high music aptitude do not become bored. [44]
When instruction is based on a clear understanding of students musical differences, it can
be expected that students will feel satisfaction and confidence because they have
experienced success

Music aptitude is a measure of ones potential to learn music [44]

Music achievement is a measure of what has been learned in music, ideally embodied in
audiation and applied to instrumental and vocal performance. Technical proficiency is not music
achievement; it is a skill for demonstrating music achievement. [44]

Skill learning sequence

Four music learning sequences [94]
1. skill learning sequence
2. tonal learning sequence
3. rhythm learning sequence
4. pattern learning sequence

Discrimination [95]
when students learn to sing through imitation or from memorizing a score, they learn to
discriminate between pitches and durations
we discriminate by recognizing and identifying comparisons, and relationships between
perceptions

Inference [95]
happen when students are unconscious of what they are learning or even that they are
learning
they are teaching themselves to learn what is unfamiliar by inferring from what is
familiar
the more facts and concepts students can discriminate between, the more inferences they
are able to make.
A teacher can teach students how and what to discriminate, but can only guide students in
how to make inferences

DISCRIMINATION LEARNING

AURAL/ORAL
Provides readiness for every other level of music learning [97]

Steps in teaching tonal and rhythm patterns
1. The teacher first establishes tonality or meter, then performs a tonal or rhythm
pattern using a neutral syllable.
2. students sing or chant back on the neutral syllable
3. ***students leave a pause before singing the pattern back to encourage audiation,
not imitation. Do not pause after the rhythm pattern
4. ***the teacher should take a deep breath before singing, as should students

Do not move to the next level until students can audiate and perform [103]
1. some functional tonal patterns in major and harmonic minor tonalities,
2. some rhythm patterns in usual duple and usual triple, and
3. imitate some songs and chants in those tonalities and meters

VERBAL ASSOCIATION

Aural/oral audiation development of content and context must be taught before verbal
association so students can give internal meaning before external meaning is given to patterns.
[103] in verbal association, names are associated with audiated tonalities and meters.

Content that is named in priority order [105]
Movable-do syllables with a la-based harmonic minor
Rhythm syllables based on beat functions
Proper names associated with tonalities: major and harmonic minor
Proper names associated with meters: usual duple and usual triple
Tonal pattern functions: tonic, dominant, subdominant
Rhythm pattern functions: macro/microbeat, division, division/elongation

PARTIAL SYNTHESIS

Students get comfortable with the A/O and VA levels, and become aware of the intrinsic logic
between pitches and rhythms, and learn to audiate and assimilate patterns into a series. When
students hear a pattern in a series, they audiate it differently depending on how it interacts with
other patterns in the series, and thus learn to audiate pattern relations. [111]

The teacher establishes the tonality or meter before performing patterns for students at
the aural/oral and verbal association levels.
At the partial synthesis level, the teacher does not establish the tonality or meter because
students are expected to listen to the series of patterns and compare them to determine the
tonality and meter of each. One series may be in major and another in harmonic minor,
or one in duple meter and another in triple meter.
Neutral syllables are used at the partial synthesis level so that students use audiation
instead of theory to determine the tonal or rhythmic context. Use of a neutral syllable is a
beginning step in bridging the gap between discrimination and inference learning. [113]

SYMBOLIC ASSOCIATION

[117] students learn how to read and write familiar tonal patterns and rhythm patterns in familiar
and unfamiliar order in familiar tonalities and meters.

Reading tonal notation [122]
Students learn to read and write the patterns they audiated at the verbal association level.
Students are taught to read and write only one or two familiar contiguous patterns
Draw a staff, assign Do, use a Do-signature rather than a key signature [122]
Explain if do is on space, mi is in the space above and so above that
Explain if do is on a line the mi is on the line above and so on the line above
Next point out the location of re, fa and ti
Do is placed on at least two lines and spaces so students can audiate Do as movable
The teacher can then sing familiar tonic patterns using tonal syllables in a major tonality
to see the patterns written without syllables or rhythms on the staff
For harmonic minor, Do is also located

Reading rhythm notation [123]
The teacher establishes meter first
The teacher chants a familiar pattern in 2/4 duple time or 6/8 triple time
The teacher then shows students how it is written in standard notation
The only information given about time signatures is that 2/4 stands for duple meter and
6/8 for triple meter
Beams are used for grouping notes
Students should be shown enrhythmic patterns written in different time signatures

Writing tonal notation [125]
The teacher establishes tonality, then sings a familiar tonic or dominant pattern and writes
it on the board using a familiar do-signature without rhythm, and reminds students where
do is on the staff
Students look at the pattern for a moment on the board then the teacher erases it and asks
the students to write it.
Repeat until students are comfortable writing the tonal pattern.
Additional familiar tonal patterns are added in familiar tonalities

Writing rhythm notation [125]
The same procedure is established for writing rhythm notation, except the teacher first
establishes the meter, and writes it using familiar patterns in a familiar signature.

COMPOSITE SYNTHESIS

Students learn to audiate tonality or meter of one or more series of familiar tonal or rhythm
patterns in familiar or unfamiliar order as they read and write series of patterns. At this level,
students now audiate tonality or meter at the same time they are reading or writing, and read with
contextual comprehension. [126]

INFERENCE LEARNING

In discrimination learning students recognize what is familiar.
In inference learning, students are expected to identify what is unfamiliar using their previous
knowledge of familiar patterns, and by comparing similarities and differences with what they
already know. With continued practice, the number of familiar patterns will increase as students
are continually exposed to new unfamiliar patterns that they will assimilate into their knowledge
base over time. [130]

GENERALIZATION

Generalization AURAL/ORAL
The teacher establishes tonality using a neutral syllable
The teacher performs two sets of familiar and unfamiliar patterns, and asks if the sets
sound the same or different. The patterns are performed only once. If the teacher has to
repeat the pattern a number of times then it becomes imitation.
The same technique is used with rhythm patterns [131]
Students can repeat part or all of one or two sets of patterns.
If students cannot repeat it back satisfactorily, the instruction reverts back to aural/oral
discrimination learning [132]

Students in general find it easier to identify similar sets of patterns. Students with high music
aptitude can identify different patterns more easily that students with low music aptitude. [131]

Generalization VERBAL
The teacher establishes tonality and meter using a neutral syllable
Students repeat the teachers performance of one or more familiar and unfamiliar tonal
and rhythm patterns solo but use tonal or rhythm syllables instead of the neutral syllable
used by the teacher.
If students cannot achieve this, the instruction is repeated at the verbal association level
of discrimination learning, or generalization aural/oral level of inference learning
Students are expected to name the tonality and meter the teacher established using a
neutral syllable [132]

Generalization SYMBOLIC
Reading
Students are expected to read without assistance from the teacher one unfamiliar pattern
out of a mix of familiar and unfamiliar tonal and rhythm patterns
Students should be able to identify the tonality and meter of what they are reading
Students can read either using tonal or rhythm syllables or a neutral syllable
Reading using a neutral syllable requires understanding of the corresponding tonal or
rhythm syllables, so is more difficult. [133]

CREATIVITY/IMPROVISATION

Creativity is based on premeditation
Improvisation is immediate reaction [136]

Verbal association
Tonal and rhythm pattern syllables are a level in discrimination learning and become
techniques to aid in inference learning
At the creativity/improvisation level, only the sound of the patterns are used, syllables
have no musical meaning [138]

Creativity/Improvisation AURAL/ORAL
The teacher establishes tonality or meter using a neutral syllable and then performs
familiar and unfamiliar tonal or rhythm patterns using a neutral syllable
Students respond by performing solo new or different tonal or rhythm patterns also using
a neutral syllable
To begin, all pitches performed by the teacher and in response by the students are of the
same duration, and all rhythms are performed with the same pitch (with speech
inflections)
When students improvise a tonal response, their response includes the same number of
patterns that are in the teachers tonal statement.
Students rhythmic response can have a different number of patterns [138]

Creativity/Improvisation SYMBOLIC
Students learn to read chord symbols or figured bass and perform tonal patterns
corresponding to those symbols using either neutral syllables or tonal syllables
There is no rhythm component for the reading sublevel
Students can also write rhythm and tonal patterns [139]

THEORETICAL UNDERSTANDING

The question of why and how music is perceived, audiated, performed, read, written, created and
improvised occupies central importance.
Music context
Texture: surface and deep structure in music
Intrinsic and extrinsic meaning in music
Foreground, middle ground and background in music
Essential pitches and essential durations
Intervals, half and whole steps, key signatures, measure signatures, letter names, time-
value names and scales
Cadences
Applications of harmonic progressions to melodies
Music form
Differences in scales amongst different cultures
Differences between key signature, keyality and tonality
Differences between resting tone and tonic
Differences between macrobeats, microbeats and rhythm patterns
Usual meter and unusual meter
Modal and mode
Definition of tonality
Definition of audiation

Reference

Gordon, E. (2012). Learning sequences in music: A contemporary music learning theory.
Chicago, IL: GIA Publications.