What generative technologies reveal about education.

Today marked the third time in 2 weeks where I have told the story of jam2jam and described the idea of generative technologies in education. When I was in Europe last year I first encountered discussions that revealed the rarefied nature of my own experiences with music education and technology and the fundamental problems of day to day teaching that I had failed to recognise.  What also became apparent was how this technology  exposed impediments to uptake of technology and the need for teachers in particular to feel a comfort with the metaphors embedded in the design of technologies. Earlier this year I blogged here about  the ‘comfort and control’ of  a math teacher from a former Eastern Block country who taught using chalk and a blackboard in a traditional mimetic and teacher directed way. What continues to fascinate me about this video was the comfort and control over the subject he was teaching, the command of the medium of communication (Chalk on a blackboard) and the fundamentally human and respectful relationship between the teacher and the students.

Sadly I rarely see these qualities in classrooms today. Mostly I don’t see the esteem and respect that this setting and formal relationship afforded. I see teachers having difficulty with managing diverse cultures and abilities, struggling with achieving institutional outcomes and with a relationship of the medium of communication that is not confident or in control.  I am not advocating for a return to the kind of approach I saw with the Math teacher but I am suggesting we seriously need to examine how we can provide teachers with the same sense of relaxed, friendly, human and respectful relationship this teacher had in the teaching of students.

 

With jam2jam my first encounter of these problems happened in Europe. Music teachers saw the generative aspects as initially very useful and saw the engagement that it afforded. As time passed they became fearful. Firstly something that is engaging does not require teacher control so many felt redundant rather than liberated to be able to engage with meaningful dialogue about music making. Secondly because of the generative nature of the technology they felt the experience lacked the ‘authenticity’ of practicing hard to play an instrument. Finally the network aspects of ‘jamming’ online evoked fears about internet use, internet safety and security.

I must say this shattered my blue sky view of re-framing Discovery learning melding it with the musical practice of ensemble performance and improvisation. This was however the beginning of this illusion shattering. Music education and its relationship with technology is patchy at best. Computer based technologies whilst having the amazing capacity for ephemeral musical experiences and products to be recorded as artefacts  and the capacity to allow music to be present in the conversation about music is still a contentious issue.  We are still concerned with the technology itself rather than how it might be applied to education and musical expression.  We teach Music technology courses rather than make music using new instruments and widen our expressive range. After all common Practice Notation, the trumpet valve and the Piano hammer were perhaps the most significant technologies for western music but only CPN afforded its own courses in musicianship and representation.  The trumpet valve and the piano hammer transformed the expressive nature of western music and increased the range of expression and provided what Seymour Papert called a cognitive amplifier.

For our team working with the ideas that: a computer was an instrument, that we can perform with computers, That we can add visual media the performance, that we can form ensembles with both computers and acoustic or electric instruments, that a user of any age or ability could create a seriously professional sounding media performance and  that we could do this on a network in real time was perhaps too many changes in the one package. Even to DJ/ VJ’s who perform with live performance of music and images the idea that the source materials were not defined looped samples but ‘note level’ music with associated timbres and the possibility of sounds within a style as shaped by gestural and transformational choices is also innovative.  Jam2jam simply puts a visual interface on top of Andrew Sorensen’s Impromptu language. Impromptu is used by Live coding community to perform electronic music by writing computer code. In a sense Papert’s Logo/Lego has similarities to what we intend for jam2jam. Logo was a computer language for children using Apple computers and Lego blocks to add construction to the process of learning and designing. With jam2jam we place a an expressive but simple children’s GUI on top of a complex LISP based computer language and allow musical structures to be built by children who collaborate in real time to make music and media performances, capture them and then share them online.

A blog posting criticising OLPC I responded to some time ago asked what happened to Papert’s educational thought and his innovative use of computers with children? What happened I think is that it bypassed schools altogether and became the Mindstorms Robot and the educational innovations of Constructionism.

 

 

 

 

 

I feel arrogant making this comparison to our project but it seems to me that teacher’s failed to engage with Logo/Lego in any significant numbers, schools never invested in the technology and curriculum developers never recognised the validity of the argument that this approach changed the way children thought and provided significant access to disengaged children to mathematics and to programming.

Yet in my own life I saw teachers who thought and acted on these ideas and engaged with the technology and the evolution of their approach to teaching. Like Papert I witness exceptional talented and passionate teachers who do this, inspire children, lead change and innovation and traverse the policy and educational impediments to do so. Hence my blue sky view!

It is when I go into ‘ordinary’ schools around the world or attend teacher conferences rather than academic/research conferences that I encounter the shattering experience. I find it difficult to understand why discovery learning isn’t in the classroom teachers vocabulary yet it is a 1959 idea that I began using in 1978 as part of my ‘training’ as a music teacher. I find the idea of ePortfolio assessment NOT referring to the work of Gardner’s Arts Propel when I had used been lucky enough to apply these ideas in a classroom in 1990.

In a Web 2.0 world all of these ideas arise again and the discussion is about student centredness and the affordances of the technology to engage and extend student experiences of knowledge and learning.

It was my colleague Andrew Brown that suggested that identified the difference between  Bruner’s (1959) thinking. Bruner recognised that there was too much knowledge changing all the time and that in education we had to  conceptualise and chunk knowledge and revisit these concepts at progressively deeper levels. Now we have too many concepts changing all the time and knowledge production is growing exponentially . What Andrew pointed out was that this approach is epistemological. What we need is an approach that works out what our personal relationship is to knowledge. We need to then compare our ontology with peers and then  develop methodologies for examining the phenomenon like a researcher focusing their question, creating a method and then gathering, coding and categorising data.

In web 2.0 terms this means we can use tools like Wikipedia and Google to gather data about a phenomena and teach students how to focus and bound their enquiry and how to synthesise and determine the quality of data. We can teach them simply how to triangulate multiple data sources and different forms of media and both prepare our investigation, edit and peer review it and then publish it as a contribution to the knowledge in the field. Bruners notion of revisiting concepts at progressively deeper levels is made less tedious by locating it on a blog or a wiki. Finding Knowledge is made less arduous by search engines and producing a clear document with links to evidence is made more robust and accurate by peer editing and sharing. The medium of communication can also extend what we know and how we know it. The production of multi media from podcasts and vodcasts to creative works provides more interesting lenses on phenomenon but also caters to different learning styles.

What generative media can do is to move beyond the mere use of media technologies as an adjunct to text narratives into a way of amplifying embodied understandings of concepts in music and visual representation that are difficult to describe in words.  It also provides a collaborative space where conversations about creative work can take place with immediate audio visual feedback. Further it provides a platform or hub where performances can take place framed by quality media with a broad expressive range. What intrigues me most about this idea is that it affords relationships in ways that emulate those of highly skilled Improvisational musicians between novices or those who do not have access to skill and sometimes even speech.  It is this wordless symbolic interaction between different ages, genders, cultures, abilities, times and spaces that appears to be the most profound affordance of this technology. Inherent in this is also faces with smiles, sustained engagement and and transformative change.

Welcome to new Network Jamming researchers

Network Jamming Research is spreading across the world and this month we welcome German music Educator Dr Michael Ahlers from the University of Padeborn. Michael will be including Jam2jam in his creativity research culminating in data analysis in January 2010. His work with music technology and creativity and the critical review of music technology in school settings is a much needed critical perspective on music technology in education. Jam2jam presents opportunities to respond to critical analysis through the simultaneous  development of software and pedagogy.
Welcome also to our Hong Kong Institute of Education researchers  Professor Samuel Leong and his team of Educational researchers: Barry Lee and Dr Lai Chi Rita Yip who will be undertaking research in Hong Kong Schools and communities. We welcome the opportunity to work in Partnership with the Hong Kong Film Archives. Our generative software Metascore developed by Andrew Sorensen we hope will provide an opportunity for new ways of presenting silent movies. Many thanks to Ms. Kiki Fung and Sam Ho. We look forward to realising these exciting projects.
Jam2jam in Hong Kong
The Network Jamming team would like to sincerely thank the energetic and innovative researchers at the Hong Kong Institute of Education for their fantastic hospitality and enthusiastic support of the project.  We welcome Professor Sam Leong, Dr Lai Chi Rita Yip and Barry Lee From Hong Kong Institute of Education to the Network Jamming team. Thanks also to the dynamic Ms Kiki  Fung from the Hong Kong Film Archives Who made so many great connections with media artists and animatuers in Hong Kong. And the Director of Videotage Hilda Chan for their enthusiasm for jam2jam.

Generative systems as relational bridges.

Paper presented at the Musicology Association of Australia Conference University of Newcastle, Australia.

Steve Dillon

Queensland University of Technology Generative media systems present an opportunity for users to leverage computational systems to make sense of these complex media forms through interactive and collaborative experiences. Generative music and art are a relatively new phenomenon that use procedural invention as a creative technique to produce music and visual media. These kinds of systems present a range of affordances that can facilitate new kinds of relationships with music and media performance and production. Early systems have demonstrated the potential to provide access to collaborative ensemble experiences to users with little formal musical or artistic expertise. This paper examines the relational affordances of these systems evidenced by selected field data drawn from the Network Jamming Project. These generative performance systems enable access to unique ensemble with very little musical knowledge or skill and they further offer the possibility of unique interactive relationships with artists and musical knowledge through collaborative performance. In this presentation we will focus on demonstrating how these simulated experiences might lead to understandings that may be of educational and social benefit. Conference participants will be invited to jam in real time using virtual interfaces and to view video artifacts that demonstrate an interactive relationship with artists.

Introduction

The qualities of music making experiences that connect people with each other and musical practices that connect us with a set of beliefs or a culture and place are well understood if not widely evidenced (see for example: (Bamford 2006; Dewey 1989; Hallam 2001). We have argued elsewhere that these experiences are transformative and promote connection with our sense of self and identity (Dillon 2007). We are intrigued about how Musicological research strategies, and in particular those of ethno-musicology, facilitate a lens on the phenomenon of music as a framing of values in sound and structural beliefs, and how the practice of making music unifies us as human beings in personal, social and cultural ways. Our research focused on music and meaning has led us to examine intrinsic motivation and meaningful engagement; particularly following the psychological research about ‘Flow’ (Czikszentmihalyi 1994) as it is applied to musical experience. Czikszentmihalyi suggests that ‘Music, which is organised auditory information, helps organise the mind that attends to it, and therefore reduces psychic entropy, or the disorder we experience when random information interferes with goals’ (Czikszentmihalyi 1994). This idea recognises the effects of music on individuals and groups and suggests the idea that the symbolic form that we call music can create relational bridges to others and back to ourselves. In the study of meaningful engagement we have suggested that meaning needs to be located in personal, social and cultural experiences. Each of these kinds of relational experiences feeds back into what Martin Buber called the ‘education of character’ (Buber 1969, 1975). Buber’s philosophical discussion of relationships describes the equal and reciprocal relationship of friendship as an ‘I and Thou’. He used the term ‘inclusive relationship’ to describe those where an inherent power differential and moral obligations was involved, like the ones between teacher and pupil and client and therapist. The kinds of relationships between people is predicated, in his view, on access to power and equality, clarity of the mode of communication and personal, and on prior social and cultural knowledge. The qualities of music and music making that affect relationships are often misunderstood or seen as universals. Music can impose power over others as is seen in its use by colonial forces and the application of it by the armed forces and police. Music can discriminate and exclude and identify subcultures such is the case with adolescents and the delineation between Metal and Hip Hop sub cultures (Green 2008) for example. So while music may have the capacity to connect we do need to acknowledge the moral and ethical responsibilities involved in how these qualities are applied. Since the 1980s we have been examining engagement with computer instruments and environments in schools and community settings. We have observed that these kinds of virtual environments provide an almost laboratory like setting for observation and comparison. Amongst the educational affordances of computer systems are that they can document and time stamp all activity, they store and archive outcomes for later retrieval and they can represent data in multi modal ways as audio visual text, number etc. Whilst these data are still only representations of behaviour and artifacts of music making experience they do provide an additional lens on phenomena, over and above naturalistic observation, and permit cross media analysis and perspectives. This has had a significant effect on how we design methodology and how we code and annotate data. It can provide both structured and unstructured data, qualitative data that is captured in audiovisual form and quantitative data that can sometimes be embedded with video captured in parallel with synchronized time code. For the last two years of this Network Jamming study we have used a video analysis software called Transana as a tool for analysis because it enabled coordination between media formats and the ability to annotate them as well as report in documentary video form. This has influenced how we are able to examine music making experience. Whilst there is not space in this workshop to discuss methodology in detail we can say that we have developed the use of audio visual observational tools alongside the hybrid methodology Software Development as Research (SoDaR) approach to foster the simultaneous and iterative development of software alongside pedagogy (Brown 2007). This has highlighted the need to develop media inclusive approaches to methodology. Using these processes the Network Jamming project has collected hundreds of hours of video and audio data in its examination of meaningful engagement and the development of the generative media software jam2jam. This research has been documented across disciplines in interaction design, music education, information systems, community music and even in psychiatry (see for example: Dillon and Jones 2009). In this workshop we will present three purposively selected case study examples that represent particular aspects of relationships. They constitute what we call critical moments in the flow of data that have raised questions about users interactions with creative performance with a computer. The purpose of this is not to claim them as evidence of meaningful engagement in virtual experiences but to consider them as indicators of further research that focuses on relationships and music making and to define an agenda for doing this. Music experiences such as performance, improvisation and ensembles potentially facilitates meaningful engagement for those who have the expressive skills to participate in such activities. We pose the question: What does it mean to give participants with limited prior musical knowledge or skill access to rich musical experiences? We suggest that generative media systems might provide an opportunity to explore this question in educational or community/therapeutic settings. The indication from our work to date is that these experiences seem to offer the opportunity for beneficial relationships and expressive connections.

Method and analytical tools.

The approach to this exploratory study is to purposively select three video examples drawn from the network jamming project files that represent critical moments that indicate aspects of relationships with self, others and community. Expose these videos and the associated contextual data from observations to analysis using the Meaningful Engagement Matrix (See Figure 1) as a means of describing, coding, identifying modes of engagement and locating the meaning of these experiences. Figure 1: The meaningful engagement matrix, used for observing and describing participant experiences. . This matrix and the associated observational descriptions assist us to examine how a participant is responding mode of engagement) and where the meaning is located in terms of their relationships and the effect on meaning which potentially leads to flow. Emerging from this use of generative media systems is an opportunity to observe and  document creative relationships that blur the lines between participants and producers, translate culture fluidly and employ symbolic forms to communicate expressive ideas between people in geographically separated communities. In this presentation we propose to examine video of three critical moments where jam2jam has supported creative engagement and provided access to expressive activity with media performance.

The presentation will use the following three  three vignettes:

1) Dancing Fingers: A 10 year old  elementary/primary school boy is ‘engaged for 45 minutes with this activity. This is about engagement and creativity but focuses upon the visual and choreography of the fingers. Music serves as a framework for time and the activity structures.

Figure 1: Dancing Fingers This example explores the intrinsic nature of technological experiences and the multi media dimensions of this kind of play. It suggests that there is more to the appeal of this activity than music alone whilst music may have been the initial source of engagement it is the creative act of visual choreography and the affordance of immediate feedback that seems intriguing. We note this kind of behaviour with Apple’s photo booth and also with the Andy Warhol exhibits employment of this activity. What emerges is that this may well be about identity and symbolic relationships with self? 2) Social: A group of elementary/primary school girls are engaged with the activity of making music & media in a rap tune about bullying.

Figure 2: Bullying Raps In this 8-week project 12 year old primary school children were able to use jam2jam as a collaborative tool to create a performance about bullying. The task was simply to compose a rap song that drew upon discussions about bullying, their experiences with it and the ways of dealing with it. What emerged from this was a fascination with the collaborative song writing process. The computer and software providing a conduit to improvise with materials easily and construct a narrative that had audio and visual representations of their knowledge of the subject. Both the music and the technology became invisible in the process of forming creative ensemble relationships that resulted in a culturally valued artifact and performance. 3) Cultural: A group of Indigenous Australian Primary/Elementary school students collaboratively remix with digitized images of art work made by Indigenous adults from a remote region and jam along with music to make a new work to share between the locations.

Figure 3: Jamming with culture The outcomes of this project were quite profound and have been detailed in the Australasian Psychiatry Journal (Dillon and Jones 2009). What is most poignant is that art work made by Indigenous people who suffer mental health issues and are using arts-led strategies to assist their therapy provided art work to be digitized for use in jam2jam. This version of the program was then taken to an Urban Indigenous elementary/primary school where young people ‘jammed’ with the materials and made movies which were sent back to the artists located in the Lockhart river region of remote Queensland. What transpired was a consciousness of cultural sharing of work and a relationship based purely on the exchange of symbolic forms and creative activity from participants. The Education of Character: Relationships with self via symbolic interaction. Creating relationships between people that are based upon symbolic interactions are interesting because they concede that a kind of common ground and a system for having a relationship within it exists. Creating and transforming art is the basis of this transaction . Connections between individuals, cultures and community. Just as the practice of performing in a musical ensemble provides a framework for how to behave and relate creatively, Network Jamming systems facilitates these kinds of relationships. Just as music that embodies a particular cultural set of values expressed as a style or genre contains expressive dimensions that both maintain an affinity for the style and allow exploration within it, so does generative processes embed the values in algorithmic processes and allow improvisation within defined parameters. We hypothesise from these kinds of observations and descriptions that each personal, social and cultural engagement with media performance effects some kind of transformation of self and a desire to continue with, or sustain, the activity. Whilst engagement is demonstrated in these cases we are still uncertain of the consequences of these experiences or how best to capitalise on them or indeed how to evaluate their worth. We are aware that the participants are learning something about relationships that may be similar to that experienced in an ensemble but will it last? And how can measure the impact of these experiences so we can support pedagogical or social applications of these accessible creativity support tools. So this is where we are with generative media systems and relationships. We have evidence that the activity is intrinsic, we know it is engaging and meaningful—we can even identify and describe it.  We know that something is being learned and a relationship is being enhanced. But how can we determine its nature and value for the design of these experiences and to benefit human and cultural capital? If as Czikszentmihalyi suggests  our challenge is to be more expressive with creative making  tomorrow  than we are today and to learn how others are expressive, then our goal is to understand better how we make sense of  experience and reapply it to our next experience to remain in flow. Or is it enough to see the smiles on the faces of children, however briefly?

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

The authors of this paper acknowledge the work of Craig Gibbons, Barbara Adkins, Thorin Kerr, John Ong, Andrew Sorensen, and Kathy Hirche, each of whom contributed significantly to the research and development of jam2jam. We also acknowledge support for this project by the Australasian CRC for Interaction Design (ACID) through the Cooperative Research Centre Program of the Australian Government’s Department of Innovation, Industry, Science and Research.

References

Bamford, Anne. 2006. The Wow Factor: Global Research compendium on the impact of the arts in education. New York/ Munchen/Berlin: Waxmann Munster. Brown, Andrew. 2007. Software Development as music Education Research. International Journal of Education & the Arts (6), http://ijea.asu.edu. Brown, Andrew R., Steve Dillon, Thorin Kerr, and Andrew Sorensen. 2009. Evolving Interactions: Agile design for networked media performance. . In OzChi. Melbourne, Australia. Buber, Martin. 1969. Between Man and Man . Trans and Introduction by Ronald Gregor Smith. London: Fontana. ———. 1975. I and Thou. Translated by T. W. a. P. b. R. G. Smith. Second Edition ed. Edinburgh: T & T Clark. Csikszentmihalyi, M. 1994. Flow : The Psychology of Happiness. New York, USA: Random Century Group. Original edition, 1992, Harper and Rowe. Dewey, John. 1989. Art as Experience. (1st Ed.1934), 1980. ed. U.S.A.: Perigree Books. Dillon, Steve. 2007. Maybe we can find some Common Ground: Indigenous Perspectives, a music teachers’ story. . Australian Journal of Indigenous Education 36 Supplement:59-65. ———. 2007. Music, Meaning and Transformation. Edited by E. MacKinlay. 6 vols. Vol. 1, Meaningful music making for life. Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing. Dillon, Steve, and Anita Jones. 2009. Exploring new kinds of Relationships using generative music making software. Australian Psychiatry 17 (Supplement). Green, Lucy. 2008. Music, Informal Learning and the School. London: Ashgate. Hallam, Susan. 2001. The Power of Music. In The strength of music’s influence on our lives., ed S. Hallam. Place Published: The Performing Right Society: MCPS-PRS Alliance. http://www.prs.co.uk/powerfofmusicreport/ (accessed

I have to stomp: an Autoethnography of singing and the body.

Play: Ancestor dreams by Jim Chapman I have to stomp for a couple of minutes before we begin to sing. As an experienced professional singer  it’s difficult to admit but I simply can’t sing this music otherwise.  I glance from side to side at my fellow singers. The women moving with a fluidity and knowledge that their bodies embrace the music and interweave with it and tell them where every utterance is in relation to the position of their bodies in time and space. Memories or rather lack of memory about how I use to virtually ‘white out’ with fear each time I had to dance with someone on National television even miming music and recalling the long tedious hours a choreographer spent with me going over and over each step of our routines flooded back to me. I was useless at moving to music. Terrified I glance at Jim and try to match my feet to his, knowing that the whilst we stomped together I at least could hold a link- a lifeline to the pulse. Also knowing that after the first minute when our parts diverged was when I was most terrified I was going to lose it.  The opening line ‘Amandalla’ is an African word that means power and as I stomped and we sang these words in harmony the strength and power of the music filled me with confidence. The sound we make singing these words is magical- ‘Humankind dreams of peace how long have we been waiting’ On occasions when I felt confident I could see the looks of acknowledgement in the audience. What happened next was always terrifying and exciting. The voices split into a beautiful polyphony that cascaded chotically around the narrative and then dissipate into a complex rhythmically syncopated groove. This marks the beginning of my undoing. The chaos and sense of helplessness of  what followed forced me to question where my feet fell, where I felt my phrase was in time and space- in between my feet of course was what my mind said- that was logical of course, but where in between?  Where I was in relation to the tenors was next where was Jim? Where was my phrase in relation to theirs? Were my feet stomping in time or was my head feeling the phrase. The words of a doctor advising me on a diet come into my head  ‘Steve your body type is dominated by the Pituitary Gland. That means that you don’t really care what state your body is in as long as it carries around your head.’  At this moment those words were pretty accurate. Music had lived in my head for 50 years and successfully so too. My body had never entered into it. No wonder Christie Elizer of Juke magazine called my movements ‘like a randy marionette’. He knew I was disconnected from it- but it was Punk so that only amplified my symbolic portrayal of urban abstraction a quintessentially clumsy male.  By the time we had turned the page the polyphony and poly-rhythmic aspects of the music had me losing the pulse more often than catching it. Intellectually I knew where points in the chaos were available to me to re enter and I even managed to succeed a few times. Doom Doom-doom doom -doom  do-do-do-do    Doom Doom doom doom doom  do-do-do-do. There are moments when the relationship in the chaos of notes synchronise and flow. Where the challenge and the ability to meet the challenge intersect but still others where I am increasingly anxious. Most of all I am alerted to my disconnection from my own body. Alerted to the idea that my successes with my head have reinforced this and made it easy for me to relegate this confronting aspect of my own sense of self as a singer, a musician and as person. After writing this first post I am reminded by Kath (On Facebook) that’s what ‘Ubuntu’ the final words are all about “I am what I am because of who we all are” The feeling of strength when we return to the homophonic ending is powerful.

I have to stomp! I have to stomp! I have to stomp! Background The moment in my musical career that simultaneously touched or challenged me was when I sang with The Esplanados.  I have been a singer for perhaps 45 years. Most of my career as the lead vocalist or soloist. In the Espies however I sing Bass. In this role I seldom sing words and mostly am responsible for the groove and the pitch basis for the harmony. What has been confronting about this is that while my voice is strong and clear in tone and a great part of the sound my skills as a vocal ensemble member had probably ceased as a choir boy some 40 years before. Even in the Opera Chorus and music theatre I seldom had to take the support rather than solo role. Following this my life had always involved solo work. Singing Bass became a real challenge where I found out about my own music learning style predicated upon audio rather than visual processing. When faced with complex syncopation and polyphony I realised the shallow development of my sight reading skills and the tension between them and my experience in sailing across a groove rather than being responsible for it. All this came to a head when confronted with Dr Jim Chapman’s compositions which blended African Polyrhythm and Bach like polyphony in a contemporary syncretic sound.
Afro no-clash: Ancestor Dreams is a complex polyrhythmic and polyphonic piece. The piece formed part of Jim’s PhD composition portfolio. It was also the source of a huge challenge to who I was as a musician. It challenged my sense of competence, sense of confidence in my singing ability and my sense of identity as an academic and a professional musician.
I had to confront the fact that my natural sound and all my experience as a musician seemed meaningless- didn’t seem to be any help at all. I had to change my strategies to cope. I began listening to recordings both of the solo parts and the ensemble performance at every available moment. On plane flights to London, in the car on my iPod I flooded my mind with the aural versions of the piece. I know I am an aural learner and have strong audio imagery for pitch, timbre and rhythm.  I swallowed my pride and began taking private tuition with  Jim and others in the ensemble. I found that my physical relationship to sound was also not good. My solo performance which sailed across the groove had not prepared me to be responsible for it. The very aural imagery skills I have place all my music thinking firmly in my head- NOT in my body. The crucial lesson was to bring the feeling of the sound the location of the pulse to my body. I stomp left- right- left-right.  For hours I tried to locate each phrase in relation to the pulse feeling the spaces between, locating each phrase in relation to the groove and the pulse of each down beat of my feet. I stood alongside my fellow basses and the tenors and tried to feel the relationships between their entries and ours. A completely different way of experiencing music. The complexities of Say Ancestor Dreams was taken to the live stage where  we performed for The opening of the Academic year ecumenical service for QUT, International day of Peace at Brisbane City Hall ( See photo above). We took it to the recording studio where we had to confront the solo voice and ensemble recordings to a timed backtrack.  Each time we did it strengthened my relationship to this new way of performing and singing. I am 56 years old and still not good at this. My body is still disconnected from my head. My flow and successes in life come from the strength of this more abstract thinking. This experiences has been a reminder of this and how the intuitive, tacit feeling and sense of  connection with others in sound is so important to maintain.  In my work around looking at flow and meaning in music I emphasises this idea but never faced it myself until I had this experience. I also realised the importance of relationships in this. Without my fellow singers to support me through this and give me cues and spend time stomping with me endlessly I would never have come through this. Without the public performances and recordings I never would have had the challenge. Without serious reflection on my learning styles and the identification of my deficits I would never achieved even the beginnings of a solution that I now have.  Flow is where the challenge meets your ability and either side of this experience lies atrophy and anxiety!

Engagement: We know they are engaged but…?

Dr Steve Dillon

Generative media systems offer an opportunity to observe meaningful engagement in microcosm.

Emerging from the network jamming project is a means of observing and  documenting different relationships between artists and perceiver that blur the lines between participants and producers, transpose culture fluidly and employ symbolic forms to communicate expressive ideas between people in geographically separated communities. This presentation simply looks at  video of three critical moments where jam2jam has supported creative engagement and provided access to expressive activity with media performance.

The presentation seeks to engage the participants in a discussion around this question through presenting  three vignettes and identifying the modes of creative engagement using the Meaningful Engagement Matrix.

A group of elementary/primary school girls are engaged with the activity of making music & media. Connection with others.

Background

Dictionary definition en·gage·ment

Intrinsic

Locating the kinds of activities that give us flow with music experiences.

Observing and describing meaningful engagement.

Dancing Fingers: A 10 year old  elementary/primary school boy is ‘engaged for 45 minutes with this activity.

Connection to self

An example of creating relationships between people that are transactions based on symbolic representation. Art and transforming art is the basis of this transaction between Lockhart river artists and the ‘jammers’. Connection with culture and community.

We theorise from these kinds of observations and descriptions that each personal, social and cultural experience effects some kind of transformation of self and a desire to continue with or sustain the activity.

Whilst engagement is demonstrated in these cases we are still uncertain of the consequences of these experiences or how best to capitalise on them. We know they are learning something but what are they learning? Will it last? And is it of any use?

So this is where we I am with generative media systems in education.

I know the activity is intrinsic, I know it is engaging, we know it is meaningful- we can even identify and describe it.  I know that something is being learned.

I like many music teachers struggle with whether I achieve a social/feel good outcome or a measurable musical knowledge/curriculum outcomes.

Music = Reasons to be Cheerful- Ian Drury

If as Czikszentmihalyi suggests  our challenge is to be more expressive with music making  tomorrow  than we are today and to learn how others are expressive with music making  then the goal of music education is simply how we make sense of  experience and reapply it to our next experience to remain in flow.

Engagement like freedom is a pathway somewhere not a goal in itself.

Per Skold Animations with jam2jam

Listen to the latest update from the ABC of the Lamentable state of music education in Australian Schools and the two successive governments who have assisted its downward spiral. ABC report with interviews of key music educators and advocates.

Jam2jam on OLPC

ACID network Jamming developers Thorin Kerr and Andrew Brown have successfully prototyped the first OLPC version of jam2jam. Basing the design on jam2jam running on Macintosh computers this version will incorporate the generative and collaborative features of the systems with an emphasis on collaborative performance.

Network Jamming project leader Steve Dillon is particularly excited about the possibilities of jam2jam as a network performance medium in these communities. Jam2jam has been trialled in Indigenous communities in Urban communities and the creative, innovative and unexpected applications that have come from these trials have inspired many of the exciting developments in the software.

Collaborative Music Jamming

The jam2jam activity allows users to make music on the laptop.

Music is generated by jam2jam and by dragging around instrument icons you can change the music as you like.

jam2jam was developed by the Australasian CRC for Interaction Design

See jam2jam.com for an idea of where this is going! The current longer-standing version has been developed for the Mac (with video background, live or stored, photoreel backgrounds, and various export formats).

The jam2jam xo activity for the OLPC computer can be downloaded here.

Improvising over the Internet using Generative Media software.

The Educational Value of Network Jamming

Dr Andrew Brown discusses how to  articulate the educational value of network jamming (defined as improvising over the Internet using generative media software), below is my attempt at such a summary.

The Educational value of Network Jamming

1. Interactive generative systems provide immediate access to engaging artistic experiences, and to the control of musical/visual elements.

2. Networks (or groups) of these systems provide ensemble experiences with the associated collaborative and social challenges and opportunities.

3. The digital nature of network jamming systems enable the use of contemporary artistic genres and audio-visual integration that are relevant to contemporary culture and to student’s lives.

4. The ability to capture (record) performances as sound or video files, supports the documentation, reflection upon, sharing, and evaluation of student activities.

Orff instruments provide 1 & 2 only (and 3 in their day, but not now) and can add 4 with a video camera.

Instrumental and vocal ensembles provide 2, perhaps 3 for Contemporary music programs, but lack 1 - access - by still requiring traditional instrumental skills, and can add 4 using a video camera.

Many music software system (such as Abelton Live) provide 1, 2 & 4 but not necessarily 3, ensemble skills.

Network performance systems (audio over the net) provide 2, 3 & 4, but lack 1 - access - by still requiring traditional instrumental skills.

Steve Dillon’s initial response:

I think that it is helpful that we identify the unique qualities of NJ experiences. I guess what we need to do then is to identify the kind of knowledge or the value of the experiences perhaps using Perkins notion of near and far transfer. We need then to look at sustainability or depth and range of experience. I think we have to look at 1) the skills techniques and processes associated with a generative media performer as a new performance mode. 2) the skills techniques and processes associated with discrete skills like for example collaborative improvisation for musicians that do not have this experience- virtual experiences like a flight simulator an ensemble or creative simulator.  A good discussion to have in relation to the identification of the affordances of NJ software for education. As this will determine what ways we develop the design also.

Re-Focusing on the teachers experience

I have been thinking about the control and sense of esteem awarded to a teacher in a mimetic classroom system using the communication technology of chalk and chalkboard. In 2004 I saw a video of an Eastern European  Math teacher teaching in this way at an East Anglia Research Seminar at Cambridge University in the UK. I was  intrigued by the sense of control and confidence with the technology and teaching system he had. I saw a wonderful kind of relationship with Students based on respect for his knowledge of discipline and perhaps the history of the teaching and learning system. Here was respect and esteem.  I see this same situation with music with the use of Common Practice Notation. There is a symbol of the music teachers understanding of complex systems for organising music, understanding relationships between knowledge concepts and a history of ‘great works’ that were created and represented through this media.

In this blog further down there is a comment about OLPC’s that suggests that educators like Seymour Papert and perhaps to a similar extent Howard Gardner had failed in their attempts to change how children learn. I must admit my own disapointment on visiting Arts Propel at Harvard at the lack of uptake by teachers of these transformative methods. Having recently completed a comparison of quality music teaching practice across 4  countries. I noted also that these kinds of innovative and transformative teachers probably make up about 10% of the teaching population and they are the ones who were at most risk of burnout! Indeed two out of the three in my own Australian Sample have stopped teaching because the system failed to support what they did despite their success. It struck me then that we have spent the best part of  forty years examining the students experience and expecting teachers to change how they teach by imposing curriculum on them. What teachers tend to do when curriculums change is to talk differently about what they do and report using the words of the outcome and assessment statements but NOT change their behaviour. A harsh criticism but an accurate one. So why is it they are reluctant to change? What is the teachers experience of teaching music in an environment where every classroom is multi cultural, multi abilitied, multi motivated, multi functional? How can  a teacher feel the esteem associated with knowledge of their discipline? The relationship with students that shows they have control over the knowledge, techniques and processes, the technology of teaching ( Chalk-CPN- a Computer)?  And what kind of systems do we need to support this kind of interaction?

The affordance or potential for generative media and social network technologies is that they document- time and dates stamp and store, allow interaction and feedback and can record both audio visual and quantitative data about interaction. How can we use these affordances to measure and understand about what students know and can do in a way that harnesses these qualities without damaging the intrinsic engagement of a generative media activity?

The jamj2jam interface is appealing to students because it appears to be a game. It seems less valuable to teachers because it looks like a game. Result will probably be uptake would not happen because the value is not obvious to teachers nor is it something that solves a problem or enhances their esteem as a music educator.

How can we create these kinds of systems and not take away from the intrinsic nature of music activities? Drill and practice software for musicianship potentially gives this authority to music learning experiences but they potentially risk not only turning students off music but also computers.

A hint here comes from the meaningful engagement Matrix. We are able to use generatives systems to demonstrate and document embodied understanding which in the past have been ephemeral or arbritarilly based on criteria. Is this the key to esteeem- provide a way of measuring embodied understanding and progress to higher levels ie directing- appreciating etc.

So What is the teachers experience of generative music making? And how can we create systems that enhance, enable and support their teaching without having to change their behaviour?

Measuring Meaningful Engagement

Jam2jam researcher John Ong has devised a prototype visual representation to map meaningful engagement.

The illustration of this mapping spiral graph  (refer to diagram 1) comprised of 4 layers, each layer  represented the recording of a  video segment that is differentiated by the choice of colour scheme and denoted from the start and end by two shades of colour tones. In other words, when there are  total of four video segments, the green colour scheme represented the first video segment, while the brown colour scheme represented the last video segment utilised to form a case study. The beginning and the ending  of the video segment is denoted by the lighter and darker colour, which in the case of the first video, the lighter green represent the start while the darker green represent the end of the video segment.  The spiral graph is divided into five  quadrangles each representing the modes of creative engagement, ‘Appreciate’, ‘Select’, ‘Direct’, ‘Explore’, ‘Embody’. Each quadrangles are further divided into three segments each presenting the type of creative meaning, ‘Personal’, ‘Social’ and ‘Cultural’. The measurement of time in view of the engagement experience is a linear representation, that may represent the actual or estimated time frame.  Referring to diagram 1, the values ranging from 2 to 18 represented an estimated time of the selected video segments. Subsequently, a red line is used to map out the possible transition of modes detected from a user through the interviews captured in the video segments.

400,000 OLPC’s in remote Aussie Schools.

A version of jam2jam will be on the Australian build

See an update on the 400,000 OLPC machines being distributed in Remote Australian Primary Schools

Reality Check about laptops and learning

The following comes from a response to an article Andrew Brown sent about criticism about OLPC. My response is simply based on observing my daughters experiences with technologies in our lives. It raises some questions about children, teachers and technology use.

Reality check -this from a strident critic of the OLPC project as it now stand, who used to work for it and did see it meeting its rhetoric.

“There are three key problems in one-to-one computer programs:
choosing a suitable device, getting it to children, and using it to create sustainable learning and teaching experiences. They’re listed in order of exponentially increasing difficulty . . . As for the last key problem, transforming laptops into learning is a non-trivial leap of logic, and one that remains inadequately explained. No, we don’t know that it’ll work, especially not without teachers. And that’s okay
— the way to find out whether it works might well be by trying . . .

As far as I know, there is no real study anywhere that demonstrates constructionism works at scale. There is no documented moderate-scale constructionist learning pilot that has been convincingly successful;
when Nicholas points to “decades of work by Seymour Papert, Alan Kay, and Jean Piaget”, he’s talking about theory.”

Source

Ring true more broadly I think, we need to have an answer for the network jamming project so we can succeed where MIT Media Lab failed (a few times if you count Logo as well - to be skeptical for a moment).

Response

Just thinking in a more Heideggerian/Piagetian way about the laptop. When Bridie encounters other technologies in her life where she makes things for example:

Sewing machine

Machine presents itself as being focused on sewing fabric.
Intrinsic pleasure of making something aesthetically pleasing to you and perhaps useful.
Bridie had lessons on how to cut patterns set up the machine and sew total 2 x 6 hours training from a dress designer.
Now she uses the same patterns and makes dresses and tops for her friends within the boundaries of the patterns offered self directed. She also mixes tops and bottoms up to be creative within the pattern book limitations. She has not reached the point of needing or wanting more patterns as the range of basic styles and endless amount of fabric designs are sufficient at this stage. Also she hasn’t a need for more technique just yet either.
Techniques: measuring, cutting out, sewing maintenance, unpicking, different fabric settings and stitches.

Coloured Pencils

Pencils present themselves as a technology with an embedded history of practice in childhood and adulthood.
Not obvious tho’ what they are used for to a Martian maybe???? Or a 2 year old until shown the basic functions and introduced to paper. Some creative children use other surfaces i.e. walls. Intrinsic pleasure of gesture resulting in colour and shape.
Relationship with pencils grows over time between functional representation and aesthetic. At the root is still the intrinsic pleasure of making something that is aesthetic or functional or both.
Some we learn through instruction others through exploring (modes of engagement).
Bridie combines sewing machine ideas with drawing ideas as she has an image of herself as a fashion designer and draws and copies dress designs. Her handwriting reached a functional level but is not as advanced as her free form thinking with pencils. Perhaps teacher/school judgment had an influence there.

Macbook

Presents itself as open but having known desirable functions: iTunes, MSN, iMovie, DVD player, email (only a bit more direct real time communication seems more important). Word processing, drawing programs only to assemble stuff (hand drawing is more immediate and organic), the internet/ firefox browser is the most used function by far. Used for information latest Simpson’s online- immediacy is important. Didn’t get into scratch doesn’t really engage with jam2jam.

So using a limited example of one privileged child
1) Choosing a suitable device.
To an extent she does the choosing and then sustainability of engagement depends on expressive range and success. I think in personal social and cultural ways. It is because she can get off on it solo doing it with friends and share the product with friends. Even though’ I chose the laptop she chooses which functions are important and she will use mainly because of the relational aspects of it.
2) Getting it to children.
Well that was my choice after seeing how bad school choice was I decide to get a playground that suited my daughters personality and needs. We choose computers in institutions without asking children all the time. Bride wanted a macbook and chose a black one. At primary school she was only taught powerpoint because that’s all the teachers knew how to use. She does however use powerpoint quite well and creatively. Maybe that’s an angle we can use in the idea of generative performance. Frightening I know.
So the getting it to children is economic on one hand and about familiarity for teachers on the other. Teachers do teach sewing and drawing because of a history of it. Powerpoint is a slide metaphor that is familiar so behaviour is modified and mediated not changed and expectation is almost assured an outcome except computers lose stuff.
3) Using it as a suitable teaching and learning device
Sewing machine and pencils have this history don’t they? They also have an associated pedagogy of teaching fundamental techniques using defined patterns. Even free drawing or hand sewing. I think this has to do with clarity of outcome, clarity of the activity being engaging and clarity of teaching the technique. Ok we can drop a needle and its difficult to re thread, break a pencil etc so there are established ways of dealing with that.

So how do we observe meaningful engagement.

So really the problems are these:

1. The device itself needs to be appealing and have an obvious use, expressive range and history of metaphor of association.
2. Device has to have ways of fixing it that are established and obvious
3. Teachers need to be secure in knowing it will produce a desired outcome, have simple strategies to fix it if it breaks and be a familiar metaphor so they feel in control of it and the children’s use of it. The power thing is important despite our constructionist ideas about self-motivation. 90% of Teachers don’t know how to let students go, nor do they trust it when they do even if it works with one class. Security of control is everything for them. I don’t think we can change this behaviour!!!!!! How can we work with it without resorting to drill and practice design? I think the secret is about the qualities of computing that enable control and accountability. That’s how the Blackboard people sell their stuff: a) it uses a metaphor that’s recognizable b) it assures control and accountability- pity its crap and doesn’t work. The selling point is fine though how do we do it better?