A Constructivist View of Music Education:
Perspectives for Deep Learning
By Sheila Scott
Sheila Scott is associate professor of music education at Brandon University in Brandon,
Manitoba, Canada. E-mail: scotts@brandonu.ca
r. Cruthers enjoys his work as an elemen-
M tary music teacher. He has been at the same
school, Ashley Park, for the past five years.
During that time, he has incorporated content cor-
responding to the nine standards for music educa-
tion (MENC 1996) into his long and short term
planning. This forms the basis for delivery of a
comprehensive general music program. Students
regularly interact with music as performers, com-
posers, and listeners. They are involved in numer-
ous activities common to general music including
singing, playing instruments, improvising and com-
posing. Students gain understanding of music by
examining the cultural and historical contexts that
give rise to music making.
The music supervisor spent the day at Mr.
Cruthers school. After observing students in sever-
al different classes engage in small group work at
several centers, the supervisor praised Mr. Cruthers
for the constructivist approach apparent in his pro-
gram. While Mr. Cruthers was pleased by this com-
pliment, he was perplexed. How can someone
decide they have viewed educational sessions built
on constructivist principles by observing students
for such a short period of time?
Constructivism Defined
A learning theory based on how people acquire
knowledge, constructivism is founded on the fol-
lowing principles:
Knowledge and beliefs are formed within the
learner.
Learners personally imbue experiences with mean-
ing.
Learning activities should cause learners to gain
access to their experiences, knowledge, and
beliefs.
GMT Winter 2006 17
Learning is a social activity that is enhanced by
shared inquiry.
Reflection and metacognition are essential aspects
of constructing knowledge and meaning.
Learners play an essential role in assessing their
own learning.
The outcomes of the learning process are varied and
often unpredictable (Walker and Lambert 1995).
In Websters (2002), view the basic goal of con-
structivism is to place emphasis on creativity and to
motivate learning through activity (p. 418). He
goes on to say learning is seen as more effective
when approached as situated in activity rather than
received passively (p. 418). The key is the context
within which activity is situated. It is incorrect to
label activity-based music education as construc-
tivist merely because students are learning by doing.
To do so reflects a surface approach to constructivist
perspectives. Rather, a deep approach to constructivist
theory requires that learning provides students
opportunities to link new learning to previous
understandings and to interpret this new knowledge
through experience. Deep approaches are examined
here in the following areas: collaborative communi-
ties, questioning, problem solving, and planning for
instruction.
Collaborative Communities
A constructivist music classroom exemplifies deep
learning when students formulate questions, acquire
new knowledge by developing and implementing
plans for investigating these questions, and reflect
on the outcomes. A context for deep learning
requires that teachers and students work together to
create collaborative learning communities that all
perceive as safe and supportive (Dart et al. 2001).1
 Constructivists believe that learning is a social act
where students interpret new understandings of
their worlds in relation to previous knowledge and
experience. When viewed from this perspective, the
classroom becomes a community of individuals
working collaboratively towards shared goals.
Participants contribute to the group from their own
levels of ability, and students help each other to
achieve goals all members view as important within
the given discipline.
This concept fits well with approaches to general
music where students are actively involved as com-
posers, performers, and listeners. Examples are
numerous: students interact within a musical com-
munity when they reflect on the groups perform-
ance of a song they are preparing for an upcoming
school assembly; students interact in small groups
when they refine movements to accompany a
recorder ensemble. Given this, can there be any
doubt that music education is quite naturally con-
structivist education? That depends. Without
knowledge of the interactions among the members
of the community, it is not possible to know
whether these examples illustrate a surface or a
deep approach.
A surface approach provides an appearance of
constructivist inquiry within a teacher-centered
environment: for example, when students are
involved in small groups completing a composition
task where the teacher dominates each step in the
problem-solving process. A deep approach to col-
laborative learning requires that teacher and stu-
dents become co-learners working together to
increase their musical understanding by interacting
with and reflecting on the music making process. In
pushing for deeper learning on the part of the stu-
dents, the teacher acts as a role model by portraying
the thinking processes and tools used by musicians.
For example, Mr. Cruthers began the grade 5 unit
on sound explorations by guiding the class in the
development of accompaniments for the poem
Enchanted River. Throughout this process, he
urged the students to justify their musical decisions
and offered his own rationales for musical choices,
thereby showing students how musicians might
address this problem. While students engaged in
GMT Winter 2006 18
their own sound explorations, Mr. Cruthers became
a coach by encouraging students without interrupt-
ing their own approaches to learning.
While learning communities will never be wholly
democratic, a constructivist approach requires
teachers to consider how to achieve greater democ-
racy within their classrooms by moving away from
teacher-centered approaches and encouraging stu-
dents to lead the decision-making process. The
challenge for the music educator is to find a balance
between the teacher as authority figure and teacher
as facilitator, thereby assisting students in their
quest for new knowledge and deeper understand-
ings in relation to questions and problems negotiated among
the members of a collaborative learning community.
Questioning
A surface approach to learning corresponds to
teacher-centered classrooms in which knowledge is
transferred from teacher to students (Dart et al.
2001). The teacher asks a question and the students
respond. The next turn is the teacher, who may com-
ment on this response and/or ask another question.
In general, students use surface questions to confirm
factual information or to clarify procedures for the
completion of assigned tasks. These questions are
answered with a single correct response. Within this
environment, students assume a passive role as
receivers of information by memorizing facts and
reproducing procedures learned by rote.
Deep approaches to learning suggest that stu-
dents connect subject matter to past experiences,
present interests, and future needs. To reach this
goal, students must actively construct knowledge
for themselves (Dart et al 2001, p. 262). Within a
constructivist learning environment, students
become questioners. They reflect on their compre-
hension, recognize misunderstandings, and ask
questions that will help them understand the learn-
ing situation at a deeper level. As question finders,
students apply their own knowledge and beliefs
when making musical decisions. The teacher facili-
tates this behavior by promoting a classroom
atmosphere where peers generate questions within a
climate of mutual respect. The group accepts all
legitimate questions posed by the group, and all
members of the community are open to new views
and ideas. As facilitators, teachers invite students
questions and wait patiently while they reflect on
their ideas. Students questions are welcomed as a
valuable contribution to the class, not as an inter-
ruption of the lesson.
Deep approaches to learning are reflected in
questions posed by the students wherein they pre-
dict, explain, or resolve confusion in open and
imaginative ways (Chin and Brown 2000). Watts,
Gould, and Alsop (1997) identify three categories
of questions: consolidation, exploration, and elabo-
ration. Students use consolidation questions to clar-
ify their thinking, to explain the reasons behind an
assigned task, and to integrate past knowledge with
new understandings. In a general music class, a con-
solidation question might be: Rondo form is like
ABA form; but we can have as many parts as we
wantABACAD. What do we end on? Students
use exploration questions to expand on their new
understandings and to investigate their assumptions.
Exploration questions include a query such as
How will it sound if the xylophone plays the light
beats and the glockenspiel plays the heavy beats?
Students use elaboration questions to investigate
divergent interpretations or to extend ideas beyond
those presented in class. For example: I liked the
way the xylophone and glockenspiel sounded, but
you thought it sounded funny. Why didnt you like
it? What else could we do?
Students use questions to search for deeper
understandings as knowledgeable composers, listen-
ers, and performers. Questions become a way for
students to integrate past knowledge with new
experiences in ways that lead to expanded musical
ways of knowing. Thus, by posing their own ques-
tions students musical thinking is challenged and
their musicianship advances to more sophisticated
levels.
Problem Solving
Students need the freedom to identify or develop
their own musical problems, to decide what attrib-
utes of musicianship will be needed to work out
their problems, and to decide what procedures they
will implement in their search for musical meaning.
GMT Winter 2006 19
In so doing, students are engaged in musical think-
ing and, as a result, are constructing personal mean-
ing from musical knowledge.
When students work through their own musical
problems they engage in processes similar to those
used by real-world musicians. While problem solving
may employ a combination of listening, performing,
and composing, students often begin inquiries by
focusing on one of these aspects. This initial venture
often leads to additional problems using one of the
other ways of knowing. For example, as a whole
group students sing the song Simple Gifts. They
examine formal structures by listening to Coplands
use of theme and variation in The Appalachian Suite.
Applying this knowledge, students independently
analyze formal structures in music, incorporate these
elements in their own compositions, and perform
their works for the class.
Students who employ surface approaches to
learning are engaged in less reflective thinking than
students who are deeply engaged in their work
(Chin and Brown 2000). Deep approaches encour-
age students to express their understanding (for
example: The cymbals play on the unaccented
beats.) and to recognize misunderstandings (for
example: I figured out why the cymbals sounded
weird. Its because they sound on the off beats.).
Classroom contexts that encourage deep thinking
motivate students to find and correct their own
errors; conversely, surface thinkers tend to rely on
others, most often the teacher, for this support.
Problem solving at a deep level encourages stu-
dents to consider multiple solutions and alternate
ideas (for example: Well play it softly and loudly
and see what sounds the best.), but also allows stu-
dents to know when to ask for assistance. In this
regard, students who exhibit deep approaches to
learning persistently work on their ideas when faced
with roadblocks. On the other hand, students
demonstrating surface approaches tend to give up
as soon as they run into difficulties. Perhaps this is
because someone else will provide the right answer
when they are unable to solve the problem immedi-
ately on their own. A deep thinker is able to inte-
grate aspects of melody, rhythm, harmony and
expression when analyzing a piece of music.
Conversely, students who employ a surface
approach may be limited to a single focus. In gener-
al, learners who use a deep approach explore their
musicianship at an analytical and reflective level;
those who use a surface approach concentrate on
procedures and follow the lead of the teacher or
other students.
Planning for Instruction
From a constructivist perspective, the primary goal
of teaching and learning is not to ensure that stu-
dents have acquired the content of a particular
grade level in readiness for the following grade.
Rather, a constructivist approach provides openings
for students to examine personal questions in
depth. It offers students opportunities to link new
learning to previous understandings and to con-
struct this new knowledge through experience.
Given this, the exact outcomes of instruction can-
not be detailed in advance.
Educators moving from traditional to construc-
tivist perspectives for instruction must decide what
learning outcomes may best be achieved through
student initiated questioning and problem solving
and what outcomes are best addressed through
other means. Music teachers must decide how to
transform step-by-step teaching strategies to
processes of meaningful inquiry and exploration
(Wasley, Donmoyer, and Maxwell 1995, p. 54, italics
added). This does not mean that we abandon direct
teaching, but that direct teaching is balanced with
student centered inquiry. Formal musical knowl-
edge, including information about the rules of
musical practice (both Western and non-Western
idioms) and technical language associated with the
structures of music, may best be taught through
direct instruction. Students then apply this knowl-
edge as listeners, composers, and performers in the
formation of complex musical wholes that emerge
from their questions. Students demonstrate more
advanced musicianship as their musical knowledge
extends and deepens.
Student work is described as guided or open explore their own assumptions and extend their
based on the amount of direction offered by the
teacher. The greater the students role in designing
musical problems, the more open the inquiry. A
GMT Winter 2006 20
teacher may use direct instruction to transmit new
knowledge. Students interact within a constructivist
learning environment when they apply this knowl-
edge toward musical results. For example, a teacher
might show students how composers use unity and
variety to structure a musical work. The students
knowledge of this compositional technique will
deepen when they engage in questioning and prob-
lem solving endeavors: for example, exploring unity
and variety by listening to recorded music and per-
forming compositions that employ this technique.
The amount of assistance provided to students
also relates to their previous experiences with devel-
oping their own questions and undertaking problem-
solving activities around these questions. For exam-
ple, students with limited backgrounds in improvisa-
tion and composition will be provided more direc-
tion than students with experience in these areas.
Teachers may initiate student explorations by provid-
ing specific guidelines related to elements such as
form, timbre, rhythm, meter, or melody. Students
may compose future works without guidelines sup-
plied by the teacher. Throughout this process, the
teachers guidance will fade as students become more
proficient questioners and problem solvers within the
music class (Elliott 1995).
Conclusion and Implications
After exploring approaches that form a foundation
for constructivist learning environments, we return
to Mr. Cruthers. It is not surprising that he was
bewildered by the music consultants praise of his
constructivist music program. Given the complexity
of this environment, it is curious that the consult-
ant assumed she had viewed music classes built on
constructivist principles by observing students for a
short period of time. Nonetheless, what did she see
that led to this conclusion?
The music consultant observed music communi-
ties where students interacted in small group situa-
tions and the teacher acted as a guide. She saw stu-
dents asking questions that allowed students to
musical understanding beyond the content formally
presented by the teacher. She observed students
engaged in solving problems that emerged from
these questions. In short, students were constructing
personal meaning from their musical knowledge.
Such assumptions must be treated with caution.
Music instruction does not reflect constructivist
principles because students are learning by doing.
This represents a form of pseudo-constructivisma
surface approach that gives the appearance of a
constructivist learning environment within a
teacher-centered activity-based approach. Rather,
genuine constructivist environments reflect
approaches for deep learning. This represents chal-
lenges for music teachers who must balance direct
instruction to provide students with relevant infor-
mation about music with opportunities for students
to apply this knowledge toward musical results as
independent performers, composers, and listen-
ersa laudable goal for any general music program.
Endnote
1. Learning communities are viewed here as intact music
classrooms. Other forms of learning communities,
such as those across teaching teams and subject areas,
are beyond the scope of this paper.
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