Art+of+Listening

General Information:

 * Title: The Art of Listening
 * Author of Questions: Barbara Ezell
 * Publisher: [|Zane Publishing, Inc.]
 * Copyright: 1992-1996
 * Platform: Wintel, Mac
 * Peripherals: Speakers, Keyboard, Mouse
 * Grade/Age: Late elementary through Adult
 * Type of Class: General Music, Music Listening, Music Appreciation, Band/Orchestra/Choir, History

Teacher Support:
There is no teacher support offered for this program as it is designed to move at students' individual paces. Additionally, no handouts are provided.

Instructional Content:
This program is a series of presentations on how music relates to cultures, historical events, and human emotions and instructs students in the most efficient manner to hear and understand the foundations of music. Music is presented with pictures to aid in the understanding

National Standards for Music Education Addressed:
 * Standard 6: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music
 * Standard 8: Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts
 * Standard 9: Understanding music in relation to history and culture

Instructional Design and Pedagogical Soundness:
This program is designed as a self-directed tutorial. Instructions, and related information, are read to students while they listen to musical passages and view pictures associated with the music they are currently listening to. Students can locate definitions to terms in a glossary and can also design their own course of study by choosing from a list of topics in the main menu. Questions are also cross-referenced by topic and can be chosen by the student or assigned by the teacher. Pacing is up to the students as individual portions of the presentation can be skipped or returned to later.
 * Sequence of Materials: Good
 * Pace of Instruction: Good
 * Quality of Interaction: Excellent
 * Motivation for Students: Fair

Record Keeping:
There is no form of record keeping available with this program.

Overall Evaluation:
While the information in this program is of a high quality, and the music relevant, exciting, and of a high fidelity, I personally did not find the program very motivating for self study. I do, however, believe that this difficulty could be overcome if the program was presented in a classroom setting under the direction of a teacher, especially in the elementary school level. This is an excellent program to use for music listening, as this may be an aspect of music deficient in primary and secondary school music education. Additionally, I found the extension questions to be relevant, providing excellent closure for each portion of the presentation.

Rating: * * *

Michael Pavlik (4/4/2007)