My first thought when meeting Leslie through Skype was that she was well spoken and thoughtful. This surprised me because she seemed quite young looked quite young, which was validated by her response of teaching for only five years. The fact that she was younger actually made me relate to her ore and be able to but myself in her shoes. I appreciated how honest she was with her answers to our questions, from articulating her frustrations with this teaching method to simply saying that she would have a strong enough answer. I agree with her approach to teaching music especially because most students only get a formal music education till eighth grade. However, she did mention that the more formal band stream isn't as popular as the pop music stream. That brought me back to the conversation we had in class about the decreasing interest in classical music. Keeping in mind that there is no "right" answer to this, I think that her and her collegues have created a great music program that relays music to students how it really is, fun and relatable. I don't, however, think that they are creating a more interesting program to promote classical music. This also isn't they're focus. I enjoyed how open she was to technology in her classroom. I've been taught be teachers who believe that there is no place for technology in the classroom. I think that it can be a great help and that there would be less of a "technology problem" or "cellphone problem" if they were encouraged to be used for good and informative purposes in the classroom.
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I really enjoyed Dr. Hopkins lecture. I understood his approach very well although, I felt that he sped through the content quite fast. As I said in my first annotated bibliography, I felt that his lecture was speaking to aspects of education that I already thought needed some sort of reformation. The most interesting part of his presentation was when he showed us the compositions made by beginner instrumental students. Although there was no notation used, it was still some of the most creative pieces of music I've seen. I've sung soundscape and graphic notation pieces in my choir and know how much deeper the expression of music can be when interpreted through the performer's eyes rather than trying to replicate notes on a page. I believed that music and someone's progression in it shouldn't be marked in general and I wanted to know his opinion on this idea. After class I asked him one on one and he told me that he agreed with me, and said that was one of the reasons he took on recreating the curriculum. To create something closer to how music should be experienced while existing in a school system that "academicks" music. He directed me to the book "Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance" to read about that topic and how one person had achieved this.
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