1 What is the Point of Analysing Instrumental Learning and Teaching Practices?

As we have just seen in previous chapters, ways of learning and teaching are determined by how teachers and students conceive of their learning and teaching functions: what do they think learning and teaching is? What are the goals they hope to achieve? What must the student do to learn and how can the teacher help them? What should evaluation consist of? etc. We have also seen that in music classes a considerably large or small gap may exist between what is said and what is done (López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016; Torrado & Pozo, 2006). In actual fact, this is quite common to the way we think in any area. There is always a dissociation between our implicit and our explicit mind (see chapter How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities). It is clear that our most explicit ideas on the environment and how to care for it are not always, on a more implicit level, rendered into sensitive and meticulous actions, in the same way as our explicit attitudes to any discrimination (be it gender, ethnicity or social conditions) are not always congruent with our implicit behaviour or attitudes (Gawronski & Strack, 2004; Gawronski et al., 2017).

This distance between what we think or say (to others, but also to ourselves, our conceptions) and what we really do (what someone would see if they observed what was happening in that class, our practices, in the most objective way possible) is not just a phenomenon of the classroom and still less of instrumental teaching. This disassociation is fairly inherent to the human mind (Pozo, 2014), and therefore particularly important to be aware of if we wish, as appears desirable in our case, to reduce that distance between what is said and what is done (Torrado & Pozo, 2006) to improve musical education and more specifically instrumental learning. Although students, families and other educational agents are exposed to teachers’ beliefs and ideas, they are not exposed to their teaching methods: what they do, the activities they propose. Students are not normally inclined to read curricular programmes, but they go to class and try to respond to the demands made on them there.

As a result, if we wish to understand learning and teaching from research we have to be capable of analysing and deciphering what is happening in the classroom and what practices occur there in the most objective way possible, without of course losing sight of how these practices come into play within the framework of conceptions analysed in previous chapters. Equally, when contemplating educational innovation, for achieving the goals of a new education (see chapter “Learning and Teaching Music in the 21st Century”, also Ballentine, 1984; Elliott, 2007; Hallam, 2010), we should not only change the discourses and theories which to a large extent has been done already (see chapters “Teaching Music: Old Traditions and New Approaches”, “The Psychology of Learning Music” and “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”), we also have to change practices, what is happening on a daily basis in the classrooms.

Finally, as we shall see in the Part Three of the book, these attempts to renew musical education and more specifically instrumental education mainly come about through a new form of conceiving teacher training, where the key issue is to help teachers rethink and restructure their teaching practices (see chapter “Instrumentalist Teacher Training: Fostering the Change Towards Student-Centered Practices in the 21st Century”). They need to start from where they already are, through reflection on their own teaching (Schön, 1987; also Martín & Cervi, 2006), so that new forms of learning and teaching may be fostered, in keeping with the new approach to music education.

2 What Actually Happens in Music Classes?

For the advance of research, innovation and teacher training it is essential to analyse and reflect on learning and teaching practices. These are the three pillars upon which educational change would be upheld. In this chapter we shall demonstrate how this analysis requires probing into practices, but also becoming familiar with the conceptions of teachers and students, in the knowledge that it is only from these conceptions that we may interpret what happens in the classroom. Notwithstanding, and above all, instruments beyond intuition and subjective personal experience are required to help us describe as objectively as possible, and based on shared categories, what is actually happening in a classroom, what actions are being taken, how they are being organised and how they are being experienced by teachers and students. Let us see why this is important.

2.1 From Conceptions to Practices

As stated, this emphasis on the importance of analysing practices does not mean that we do not also need to be familiar with the conceptions. Although there is a distance between what people believe they do and what the “really” do (in music education, for e.g., López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016; Torrado & Pozo, 2006; in other fields, Buehl & Beck, 2014; Clarà & Mauri, 2010; de Aldama & Pozo, 2016; Lim & Chai, 2008; Pozo et al., 2010), it is also true that the conceptions reflected through the conceptual profiles mentioned in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”, are usually a decent predictor of these practices (Pozo, 2017; Pozo et al., 2016).

For a start, we may state that these different conceptual profiles help to identify different learning and teaching styles in practice (in different musical cultures, see Casas-Mas et al., 2015b; in choral rehearsals, Corbalán et al., submitted; in instrumental teaching contexts, López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016). Knowing what a teacher or a student says or how they interpret what happens in a classroom, allows us to infer several essential traits of what that teacher or student does in the classroom. In a similar light, an explicit attitude towards sex discrimination is a pretty good prediction of how that person will behave in these situations, especially when the circumstances of that situation help them to be aware of how they are acting (Girvan et al., 2015).

Repeating what was explained in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”, we may say that there is a critical distance between conceptions and practices which, from a bolder or more promising but as yet not completely empirically validated interpretation, would suggest that the conceptions would act as the zone of proximal development of practice itself (Torrado & Pozo, 2006). In other words, people could explain what they propose or would like to do, but they are not always capable of effectively doing or putting it into practice due to external or internal circumstances or barriers (Ertmer, 1999; also see chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”). This may be due to the experience and strategies they had learned along the way. According to this interpretation, conceptions would always be some steps ahead of action, and would be an essential element in changing these practices through reflection on them, as we shall see in Part Three of this book.

However, if according to this interpretation the conceptions define what teachers and students would be capable of doing if they had the help they required or the right conditions and necessary processes, but they are still not able to do themselves (i.e., their zone of proximal development according to Vygotsky, 1978), the fact is that students and teachers in their daily work in classrooms are exposed mainly to more or less intuitive practices, to effective actions, that one and all programme and execute. However much the teacher verbalises ambitious, even grandiose, objectives to the class regarding the skills the student has to develop (expressiveness, sensitivity, self-governance, etc.), the latter will be more concerned with fulfilling the activities and assessments they are to face the following day (that passage with complex modulations, that rapid succession of arpeggios), that are not always in tune with such ambitious plans. For better or for worse students do not usually read curricular syllabuses or teaching guides. They go to class, they get more or less involved in the activities carried out or proposed there, in what is done there.

Therefore, if we wish to become familiar with and possibly restructure instrumental learning and teaching, we have to analyse the practices that take place in these classrooms, without losing sight of other levels of analysis, whether these be the organisation of this teaching (see chapter “Teaching Music: Old Traditions and New Approaches”) or the conceptions maintained by different educational agents (chapters “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”, “How to Know and Analyse Conceptions on Learning and Teaching” and “The Impact of Teaching Conceptions and Practices in Early Musical Instrument Learning”). One could think that knowing what really happens in the classroom is simple and that both teachers and students could easily explain to us what happens, since they are the ones responsible. However, we must move beyond this intuitive belief that the person who best knows what is happening is the one experiencing it and that it should be enough for teachers and students to explain to us what they have done and what they are doing. The truth is, observation, analysis and comprehension of educational practices is one of the most complex challenges of educational research, both theoretically and methodologically (Barberà, Mauri & Onrubia, 2008; Clarà & Mauri, 2010; Coll & Sánchez, 2008; Lemke, 1990; Sánchez & Rosales, 2005; Sánchez et al., 2008).

2.2 From Intuition to Analysis of Practices

Although intuitively students, but above all teachers, may believe that they really know what is happening during music classes since they are the ones deciding, supervising and assessing the activities, the truth is that in a classroom and even in the context of a traditional instrumental class with one teacher and one student, so many things happen at the same time (actions, gestures, movements, emotions, verbalisations, sounds, silences, etc.) that it is impossible for any teacher or students to capture all of them on the fly.

Anybody who has recorded a class for any reason, be it for research or an innovation or professional development project, knows that analysing what has occurred takes up far more time than the time in class, because so many highly significant things happen and they normally are not initially noticed. The teacher or the student may well be unaware of them happening (that fleeting look of displeasure when the students start their interpretation; the obsessive stare of the student at the sheet music whilst they are playing; the authoritarian gestures which accompany the verbal instructions of the teacher or the smile of satisfaction on seeing how the student regulates their breathing before starting a phrasing; the tremble in the student’s voice when they ask a question or the appreciative look of the teacher when a passage sounds expressive and finely tuned).

An hour’s class is always much richer than any theory or explanation we can give to those who participate in it (this explanation is very important to help understand what has happened, as we have seen), since, as we saw in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”, many of the actions and representations that occur are much more implicit in nature (unconscious) than explicit (conscious) (Pozo et al., 2006). It will therefore be necessary to record or note down that class in some way, observing in detail what happened with some sort of guided analysis system in order to bring to light a good part of these hidden actions, most of which are submerged, occurring in an apparently simple or routine class.

However, it is not just the complexity of what happens in the classroom interactions (or for that matter, any other social context) that makes those who participate in it disregard so much of what happens and only be capable of explaining a minor part of these interactions and their consequences. What one person or another perceives is biased by their own expectations or beliefs, by their conceptions, but also by the focus of attention on learning activities. Attending the same classes, teachers and students normally perceive different things because their expectations and conceptions are different and similarly different students also perceive different things. Only a third person’s outlook can help to reconcile these different interpretations, so that each individual can go further than what at first sight, or intuitively they perceive or feel in that class. In this way, developing instruments for practice analysis, in our case within the framework of instrumental learning and teaching in music, is an essential resource for adopting an experiential focus in innovation and teacher training, a new vision may be formed, or a re-description determined by this system of analysis, from the real experience of the teacher and student. This has been supported by watching videos by the people taking part (see chapter “Instrumentalist Teacher Training: Fostering the Change Towards Student-Centered Practices in the 21st Century” in this respect), because the researcher also has his or her own bias. A global view of the different empirical investigations of several proposals for analysis of learning and teaching practices will now be made.

3 Proposals for the Analysis of Learning and Teaching Practices

3.1 Analysis Models and Dimensions of Interactions in the Classroom

Over the last few decades much research has been conducted on learning and teaching practices in classrooms (Barberà et al., 2008; Clarà & Mauri, 2010; Coll & Sánchez, 2008; Lemke, 1990; Sánchez & Rosales, 2005; Sánchez et al., 2008). Among the different types of focus and methodologies analysed, definitely one of the most influential approaches in this new research agenda has been the study of the classroom as a space for interaction determined by the way in which educational agents speak, determined by an analysis of discourse, i.e., of what is spoken there. From a socio-cultural viewpoint, Mercer (1995; Edwards & Mercer, 1987) proposed a model of analysis of the interaction sequences, in an attempt to reveal the mechanisms of educational influence that teachers use for joint construction of knowledge with their students (Coll et al., 1992), and the different types of conversation that take place between the students themselves (discussion, accumulation, exploration) that make it possible for increasingly complex levels of collaboration and construction to occur (Engel & Onrubia, 2013; see also chapter “From Individual Learning to Cooperative Learning”).

Other different but complementary approaches have emphasized the content of interactions between teacher and students and on how the discourse in the classrooms is managed by the teacher, to encourage a more complex appropriation of educational contents. Thus, Cazden (1988) for example proposed analysing talking in classrooms in terms of a series of communicative strategies or dialogues, among which the IRE sequences would stand out, so-called because they would begin with (I) (“interrogar” which in Spanish means to question), a question formed by the teacher which would give place to (R), one or several responses by the students and finally (E) to be evaluated or reconsidered by the teacher. These interactive sequences would give rise to different variations (e.g., Coll et al., 1992; Edwards & Mercer, 1987; Lemke, 1990; Sánchez & Rosales, 2005; Sánchez et al., 2008), from those where the teacher could take on a more directive role in each of their phases to those others in which final evaluation of the process would remain open and which the students themselves would have to close.

However, this analysis of the structure of participation in a class (in terms of IRE, IRF, symmetrical patterns, etc.), according to Sánchez et al. (2008) would reveal how a class is executed, but it would be necessary to complete this with another two dimensions of practice, what is done, i.e., the content of the representations and processes carried out and who does it, depending on the level of participation of the students and the type of hot and cold assistance received from the teacher. Other studies have also stressed what is done, but not necessarily what is said, emphasizing other dimensions of learning and teaching practices like, for example, the explicitly or implicitly cognitive processes managed by the teachers and students, the cognitive demand of activities, the level of the meta-cognitive management the students require of them, the memory or recovery strategies used, their level of involvement or motivation, etc. (Hora & Ferrare, 2014; Hora et al., 2013). Other forms of analysis have also incorporated other non verbal actions present in learning and teaching practices. But which also play a role in the construction of knowledge in the classrooms, such as gestures, actions, private singing with different types of internalisation and bodily representations (Casas-Mas et al., 2015a, 2019; Goldin-Meadow, 2003; Neill, 2017).

As shown therefore, classroom occurrences may be analysed from many dimensions or planes and are always richer or more complex than the models and methodologies that attempt to analyse them. However, if none of the approaches we adopt can capture the entire wealth of interactions taking place in the classroom, a more complete vision would require a multidimensional analysis that takes into account the different components outlined. etc. (Hora & Ferrare, 2014). To do so, we would start from the analysis proposed in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”, based on three essential components of all learning: results, processes and conditions (Pozo, 2008). As we shall see later on, each of these essential components or dimensions is again divided into different categories or sub dimensions, the interaction of which provides us with a joint pattern of educational actions and intentions taking place in the classroom at any given moment and which may be adapted to different contexts and contents of learning and, in our case, specifically in instrumental learning.

3.2 Instrumental Learning and Teaching: Didactic Interactions, Based on Visible Actions

Research has introduced different forms of analysing instrumental practice and teacher-student interaction in this field. Compared with other educational scenarios, there are two traits which generally characterise instrumental music classes, that make them particularly apt from a theoretical and methodological viewpoint for these analyses. For one part, their generally dyadic nature (one teacher and one student), compared to most educational scenarios where a teacher works with a class of 25–30 students, makes analysis of interactions and identification of voices in the classroom much easier. Although incipient workgroups have been attempted (see chapter “From Individual Learning to Cooperative Learning”), for the most part classes are still individual, making analysis easier but possibly impoverishing learning. On the other hand, if we compare this to a language or mathematics class, a great part of what happens in the instrumental music class is observable: the movements and actions of the teacher and student can be discerned. This includes where they focus their attention, what they do with their body, with the instrument, even listening to the sound their actions produce and feeling the expressive direction of their interpretation and how they manage their emotions. However, when the student is thinking about how to resolve a problem or how to form a phrase, it is much more difficult to infer their cognitive, embodied and emotional activity. Naturally, as we will see, similar situations also exist in music to those we have just described and there is a cognitive activity which is not directly observable that needs to be inferred but when they become obvious most, actions are easier to reconstruct and analyse.

Notwithstanding, not many structured systems of analysis for practice exist within the context of instrumental learning. In their time both Hallam (1997) and Jørgensen (1997), proposed theoretical models to analyse instrumental and vocal practice. Thus, for example, Jørgensen (1997) considered that the primary component of this model were the conditions which restricted or enabled learning opportunities: personal, instrumental and environmental factors. The second component was made up of factors which the learner can determine in every given situation, such as the goals of learning, strategies, content, time and means. The final element refers to the level of achievement in instrumental execution. Jørgensen’s proposal (1997) is suggested as both a model of analysis and also as a tool for teaching students to practise and to help them develop their own learning strategies (Marín et al., 2012).

Several later studies dealt with the content of interactions between teachers and students regarding a specific teaching-learning process. These studies have a factor in common which is having been made through the analysis of class video recordings. Several subjects were analysed, including the analysis of verbal interaction understood as a means of constructing shared musical meanings (Viladot et al., 2010); the different patterns of group configuration produced in a group instrumental class (Baño, 2018; see also chapter “From Individual Learning to Cooperative Learning”); the particular attention paid to instrumental technique by instrument teachers (López-Íñiguez & Pozo, submitted); the intensity of interaction between instrumental music students and teachers (Heikinheimo, 2009); support from the teacher to encourage self-regulation of students during practice (Pike, 2017) and the critical analysis of restructuring pedagogic and reflexive processes with music students at different levels (Carey et al., 2017; Coutts, 2018).

Other authors such as Chaffin and Imreh (2001) analyse the structure of the instrumental learning sessions, fragmenting every session into two typical activities which are called run-throughs—playing top-down—, and works—working passages in depth. For her part, Zhukov (2004) speaks of a typical structure comprising three parts, clearly organised in time: warming up (tuning up, sound exercises, getting the fingers going, etc.), the main body of the class (technical work and repertoire) and closure (when homework is assigned and the time the student must dedicate to each activity they have to do at home). Other elements analysed and which are entwined in the previous structures are the waiting or “dead” times, which have been called digressions and which will be described in more detail later, due to their importance in interaction and learning (see chapter “The Choir Conductor: Interpreter or Maestro?”; also Casas-Mas et al., 2015a; Corbalán et al., submitted; López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016, submitted).

4 A System for the Analysis of Instrumental Learning and Teaching Practices (SAPEA)

In consideration of this background, the system of analysis presented below (SAPEA, for its initials in Spanish),Footnote 1 tries to unite several characteristics (GIACM, 2011). Initially, as with several of the models cited, it is a system which is based on a theoretical model, in this case the model presented in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”, from recent developments in the psychology of learning. However, unlike those proposals, it has been empirically validated, applying it to different scenarios of instrumental learning both in contexts of conservatories (López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016, submitted; Marín, 2013), and in other contexts of informal and non formal learning contexts (Casas-Mas et al., 2019; Pozo, 2014). It has also been used to analyse contexts of vocal learning (Corbalán et al., submitted) and even in group learning in formal and informal contexts (Baño, 2018). These applications, the results of which some are included in several chapters in Part Two of this book and supported in the SAPEA, have led to a fine-tuning and completion of the initial proposal (GIACM, 2011) into a system which adapts to each new setting of musical learning. This system of analysis has also been adapted to other contexts of teaching which are removed from music (de Aldama et al., 2017).

Together with the above, SAPEA proposes a multidimensional analysis by integrating different components (results, processes and conditions), but also different levels of practice analysis, which include not just verbal interaction (what is said in class, who says it and how it is said), but also the instrumental actions: what is done with the instrument, and also with the body. It is therefore a system which differentiates between different types of activities, leading to the breakdown of what happens in the classroom into different units of analysis. As a result, following analysis, the identification of several components or types of actions simultaneously leads to a global or holistic vision of each episode or sequence of actions that take place in the classroom.

4.1 Units of Analysis of Instrumental Practice

Our proposal adopts the musical unit (piece of music, song, composition) being practised as its more basic level of analysis. Since several musical units are usually worked upon in one session (in a fragmentary or complete manner), analysis can also be arranged around a time unit (the teaching/learning session), whether this be a class, a rehearsal, etc. The musical units may differ from one another depending on their nature and musical content, at least in technical exercises, compositions, improvisations, creations, etc. In any event, the development of musical units occurs in one or several time units or practice sessions, wherein different typical activities may be identified, according to Sánchez et al. (2008), on the understanding that these are the different parts into which a session is organised or structured in time. Depending on the meaning or function of these activities for musical execution or interpretation they would be:

  • Warm-up/tuning up (preparation prior to the musical execution or interpretation).

  • Musical production (or actual interpretation).

  • Symbolic production: oral, gestural or written (referring to the musical production itself or to the warming up and preceding, interrupting or accompanying this production or after it has finalized).

  • Other activities without musical content (digressions, pauses, etc. For example, a student saying to the teacher in the middle of any classroom activity: “teacher, did you know that today is my grandmother’s birthday? And yesterday my parents bought me a 400€ bike”).

These four main activities may also be divided into several subtypes. Thus, musical productions may be based on the actual instrument itself or on additional musical resources (humming, singing, clapping, etc.). Similarly, the symbolic productions with musical content may consist of oral or gestural communications or in writing. Finally, several of these activities may be combined with one another, creating mixed productions. Table 1 details all the possible activities that can be observed from these criteria:

Table 1 Typical activities involved in the teaching and learning of instrumental music activities. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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Once these typical activities have been defined in an instrumental class or rehearsal, each activity could be segmented into different practice episodes. In our case, the Instrumental Episodes could be typically differentiated (when one or several of the educational agents, students or teachers are interpreting music, practising with the corresponding instrument) and the Discursive Episode (when one or several of the same agents talk or explain their representation on these instrumental actions). A Discursive Episode would normally be the result of communicative imbalance (a problem or a challenge) between what is expected to happen and what actually does, usually in the form of managing an error, a difficulty or a new challenge in student learning (or perhaps suggesting or reaching out to a new goal, maybe a Standard Activity). Therefore a Standard Activity would be broken down into a Sequence of Episodes (instrumental and discursive).

Each Session would therefore be broken down into different Episodes which could be analysed as units in themselves (either just the instrumental or discursive ones or both). An Interpretative Episode would be identified from the moment the musical production began until it was interrupted. Similarly the Discursive Episode begins when the interpretation is interrupted and ends when it restarts (or when another Standard Activity starts). The discursive Episodes may in turn be broken down into each of the cycles shaping this verbal interaction, in keeping with the model proposed by Sánchez et al. (2008). At this level of analysis a more micro description would be made of the interaction sequences.

4.2 Dimensions and Components of the Analysis System

As stated, we understand that analysis of practice must be multidimensional in its nature, so that different components may be identified and their relationships may also be described or interpreted. From the distinction established by Sánchez et al. (2008) between what is done, how it is done and who does it, SAPEA assumes, from Pozo (2008), that in all instructional activity or practice there are at least three components connected to these three questions which we must respond to: results, processes and conditions (see chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”).

In our case then, the how it is done would be broken down into two components: the interactions and aids that are measured in learning and the cognitive and metacognitive processes which the student puts into effect. Moreover, unlike the proposal by Sánchez et al. (2008) one of our hypotheses would be the close interdependence between these three components since they would form an integrated system but with different degrees of coherence (Pozo, 2008; Pozo et al., 2006). Similarly to the studies by Sánchez et al. (2008), the distinction between these three analysis components would enable their relationships to be empirically contrasted, although in our case we would foresee interdependence between these components. For each of these dimensions it is necessary to also develop specific analysis categories or dimensions, and the most precise as possible indicators for each of them, which are presented below.Footnote 2

4.3 The Results of Learning

An initial classification of these results would begin with the distinction between symbolic, procedural and attitudinal learning, established in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”. These three types of results could be observed both in verbal and instrumental episodes. Equally, the same episode could work on different results in a related or simply juxtapositioned manner.

4.3.1 Symbolic Learning (Verbal)

This would correspond to the mastery of languages and codes of musical representation, particularly to sheet music, differentiating between several levels of processing (Bautista & Pérez-Echeverría, 2008; Casas & Pozo, 2008; Marín et al., 2012; Marín et al., 2013a) from the differentiation established by Postigo and Pozo (1998) between the explicit, implicit and conceptual processing of external representations (see also Pérez-Echeverría et al., 2010; Martí & Pozo, 2010; Pérez-Echeverría & Scheuer, 2009). In the case of musical notation learning, these three levels of increasingly complex processing, as explained in detail in chapter “Reading Music: The Use of Scores in Music Learning and Teaching”, would be:

  1. (1)

    Notational (corresponding to the explicit marks or notations in the musical score, such as notes, rhythms, fingering, etc.). For example, in a classroom of any string instrument a teacher could say “in this bit of the song there are little clues for you, numbers” [referring to the fingering].

  2. (2)

    Syntactic (corresponding to the implicit information in the musical score), which would be divided into two (see Table 2):

    1. (a)

      The actual syntax (harmony, melody, scales, arpeggios, etc) so that in a string instrument class the following dialogue could occur:

      • Teacher: What chord do we play this melody in? [Pointing to the musical score]

      • Student: Well on the bear string and, no, wait, yes, on the mummy string [talks whilst playing the complete passage with pizzicatos]

    2. (b)

      The analytical-structural (which involves a structure analysis or more overall organisational guidelines in the musical score). In this sublevel, we may find ourselves, for example, in a rehearsal of brass instruments with the following situation:

      • Trumpeter: OK, I’m lost.

      • Trombonist: In the four bars that you do on your own, what do you do? I mean, do you go in on a cadence?

  3. (3)

    Referential (corresponding to the conceptual relationship of the composition with its production and interpretation context, considering expressive, communicative, historic elements, etc.). A situation at this level could be that of a musician in a rehearsal saying:

    OK, in the first chord, ¿What note shall we use? An E natural, isn’t it? A D sharp? so it is A major, let’s see if we can tune it in.

As demonstrated in previous studies (among others Bautista et al., 2009; Casas-Mas et al., 2015a; Marín et al., 2012; Pérez-Echeverría, 2017), the more complex levels (syntactic and referential) are usually associated with conceptions of more complex musical learning, at least interpretative if not constructive whilst the teachers and students most oriented towards reproductive learning, close to direct conceptions and practices, tend to reduce the processing of the musical score to decoding of their more explicit notational components (see chapters “Reading Music: The Use of Scores in Music Learning and Teaching”, “The Impact of Teaching Conceptions and Practices in Early Musical Instrument Learning” and “Learning Outside the Music Classroom: From Informal to Formal Learning as Musical Learning Cultures”).

Similarly, within symbolic result learning, identification could be made of those components related to the literal content learning of a piece. In the case of direct or more traditional practices resources requiring memorizing would be used, compared with more comprehensive or significant learning which is characteristic of constructive teaching. This would require linking parts of the same content to one another and then these in turn to other works or musical material external to the piece being learned. Again, literal learning tends to be more associated with direct or reproductive conceptions whilst a learning aimed at comprehension is characteristic of more constructive focuses (Bautista et al., 2009; Casas-Mas et al., 2015b; Marín et al., 2013a).

Table 2 Categories of analysis of symbolic learning in SAPEA, based on the levels of comprehension of musical scores (see chapter “Reading Music: The Use of Scores in Music Learning and Teaching”). López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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4.3.2 Procedural Learning

This concerns knowing how to do it, not knowing what to say. Differentiation may firstly be made between motor or psychomotor procedures aimed at learning instrumental technique and body control. As a result, cognitive actions and procedures (e.g., Lehmann et al., 2007; Williamon, 2004) related to mental processes could effectively be made and these would in turn regulate actions such as the production of sound, expressiveness or memory.

In the first psychomotor case, a choir director could say to the choir singers “Listen to the piece whilst you move freely around the room, paying special attention to the changes in intensity and the variations of the melody”. Also, the following situation could occur in any instrumental classroom:

  • Teacher: Now, do you see this secret mark there? That little bird? I told you at the beginning of summer that the little bird is a natural harmonic that you can find here [pointing to the fingerboard]. Now you can do it like this [with one finger specifically], and now the other [finger] pressing close to this other one [whilst they place the fingers of the student in the right place]. This other one is a bit more complicated, let’s see how you do it.

  • Teacher: Now we let our wings [arms] rest.

  • Student: [humming and moving their body in a relaxed way]

Regarding the cognitive procedures relating to the expressive aspect, in a brass rehearsal this could be practised in the following way:

  • Trumpeter: We should sound stronger in bar 33.

  • Horn: But afterwards there is a very tragic strong note.

  • Trumpeter: Yes, but that moment is sweet and intense.

We could also find teachers and learners of instruments commenting on issues such as:

  • Teacher: “I’m going to lend you 20 records so that you really get into the Baroque style”.

  • Student: “I used to play like this [plays it], but the teacher wants it to sound like this [plays it differently], like dancing”.

Memory resources could be reflected in a dialogue like the following:

  • Teacher: Memorise the piece for the exam.

  • Student: The best way to learn a piece by heart is dividing it first into sections and practicing them separately.

  • Teacher: Can you play the piece without the musical score?

  • Student: Yes, I already know it [plays the whole piece by heart]

In both cases, in keeping with the distinction established in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”, we would be able to distinguish between more technical procedures, aimed at automated reproduction of action sequences that would be more common in direct didactic approaches and the more strategic ones either related to the use of techniques with specific expressive goals with metacognitive management of the actual learning processes (review of this subject in Bathgate et al., 2012; Concina, 2019), that usually appear in the framework of interpretative practices (under the teacher’s supervision) or constructive practices (when it is the student who manages these procedures) (Table 3).

Table 3 Procedural learning analysis categories in SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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4.3.3 Attitudinal Learning

This refers to learning to know how to be and how to feel. The frequency and repetition of behaviour patterns in our daily lives lead to a series of attitudes which in turn build up values towards what surrounds us. This social learning allows us to develop an identity, which becomes our social calling card that changes throughout our development depending on how our beliefs evolve. Attitudes and values towards music and its learning are promoted by learning and teaching. The foremost among these is the training of an approach to the so-called “stage presence”. Learning this stage profile implies attention to aesthetic ideas and skills for performance as well as the implicit or explicit development of an attitude towards the audience, which is by no means always successful.

This critical learning may overshadow a large quantity of potential skills and important aesthetic ideas. In music education and research institutions there has been an upsurge in recent years for the gradual and deliberate incorporation of preparation for public performance. For example, an awareness has been made of the beliefs, sequences of actions, verbalisations and self-instructions in anticipation of performance (e.g., González et al., 2018; or also see, for example, the research projects on improvement of interpretation in the Centre for Performance Science in the United KingdomFootnote 3; or the online teaching initiativeFootnote 4 of teachers from Finland, United Kingdom, Holland and Australia where they offer free resources in this respect for students of musical instruments in higher education). From our theoretical focus and our research, we know that children exposed to the more traditional teaching models appear not to pay much attention to this aspect, whilst those who belong to constructive models do usually indicate that preparation for facing an audience and the communication of expressive ideas to the listener is important (see the card activity with children in chapter “The Impact of Teaching Conceptions and Practices in Early Musical Instrument Learning”) (Table 4).

Table 4 Attitudinal learning analysis category in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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4.4 The Learning Processes

This dimension refers to the management of the different processes that help to produce learning and that contribute to the different types of learning, either more repetitive or more significant. It therefore refers to procedures which seek the mobilisation of certain processes. Thus, for example, the demands of the teacher at a given time may encourage a student to learn repetitively and aim at syntactic comprehension from a musical score or at other levels. There’s a difference between asking a student to have learnt the scale of F major and bringing it to class to asking them to recognize it or how it is used as a harmonic transition in any movement of a sonata.

As studies prior to those of our group have shown (e.g., Bautista et al., 2010; Casas-Mas et al., 2015a; López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2014; Marín et al., 2013b; Torrado & Pozo, 2008), teachers and students with closer conceptions to a constructivist focus tend to attach greater importance to cognitive and metacognitive processes gained from learning, whilst those which adopt closer models to a traditional focus (associative or reproductive) focus mainly on results.

However, with greater or lesser frequency, many references to processes the student should activate in order to achieve fixed learning goals (see chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”) are produced in all class interactions. Thus, reference may be made to the mediation of more cognitive (Table 5) or motivational and emotional type processes (Table 6).

Table 5 Categories of cognitive process analysis in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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Table 6 Categories of emotional process analysis in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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Regarding cognitive processes, as analysed in chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”, references are usually made regarding how to manage information recovery, to the actual processes of learning that should be used (either repetitive or comprehension directed), to how to manage attention, the use of different types of mental representations (auditory, visual, corporal, etc.) and to the actual metacognitive management of these processes to achieve the foreseeable goals, in terms of planning (see definitions and examples in Table 5). The frequency with which reference is made to these different processes, and to the nature of the same, is usually indicative of different conceptions and practices of learning and teaching (Baño, 2018; Casas-Mas et al., 2015a; Corbalán et al., submitted; López-Íñiguez & Pozo, 2016, submitted; see also chapters “The Impact of Teaching Conceptions and Practices in Early Musical Instrument Learning”, “Instrument Mastery Through Expression: The Learning of Instrumental Technique”, “Learning Music by Composing: Redescribing Expressive Goals on Writing Them”, “The Choir Conductor: Interpreter or Maestro?” and “Learning Outside the Music Classroom: From Informal to Formal Learning as Musical Learning Cultures” of the book for further examples). Thus, as we have seen, from a more direct focus (in keeping with the taxonomy established in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”), identified with a type of ingenuous conductism (Pozo et al., 2006) less reference is generally made to mediator cognitive processes and when they appear, they refer mainly to associative forms of learning (literal recovery, repetitive learning based on blind practice and revision). However, with the interpretative focus greater reference is made to cognitive processes, even of higher complexity, which are not only aimed at associative learning but at some forms of constructive learning. Notwithstanding, the regulation of these processes—who mentions them and who manages them—is up to the teacher alone. Finally, from a constructive practice, greater emphasis is placed on the student to manage and regulate their cognitive processes, which are also mainly aimed at more complex forms of learning (recovery with transference, comprehension, planning, use of many different representational formats, etc.; see references and previously mentioned chapters).

Motivational and emotional processes (see Table 6) follow a similar pattern. They are closely linked to the evaluation and interpretation of right and wrong acts. In this case, however, there is a clear presence of references to motivation and attributions, even in the direct conception, although they are usually clearly directed at extrinsic motivation (maintaining efforts through rewards and punishments, see chapter “The Psychology of Learning Music”) and to attributions which are more generally negative than positive. Given the importance of error correction in this direct or traditional conception (see chapters “Teaching Music: Old Traditions and New Approaches” and “The Psychology of Learning Music”) it is highly frequent that this practice involves attributions and evaluations that focus more on errors and on negative aspects, which usually generate greater emotional tension in students (Austin & Vispoel, 1988; Hallam, 2009). These theories also make attributions to student conditions or traits, which are difficult for the student to change or control, such as talent. In contrast the adoption of an interpretative focus is the sign of an attempt to promote a good classroom environment, with more positive evaluations, focused often on explaining the reasons for error, not just correcting them. Finally, from a constructive stance more actions and verbalisations are made which are aimed at promoting intrinsic motivation and carrying out attributions to factors which can be controlled by the student, helping them take over control of their own learning and getting as close as possible to their own goals.

4.5 Teaching Conditions

In this analysis, the conditions refer to the type of teaching–learning activities that take place and to the participation of the different agents (teachers and students) in these activities—in short, who intervenes in these activities and how they do so. It is a question of identifying the different actions carried out by music teachers to manage their students’ learning and the way in which they interact with them, giving rise to different participation structures. Depending on the interaction between all these conditions and the objectives involved, learning may be more associative or more interactive. For example, the first action in Table 7, informing, may be a condition for associative learning if it is carried out in an isolated or predominant manner and it is hoped that this is enough for the student to learn. However, if apart from informing, they also ask questions, argue, propose, etc. we may understand this would be a condition for significant or constructive learning. Although a great part of learning in instrumental music is supported in dyadic interactions, it is of particular interest to also analyse cooperative learning spaces (e.g., Baño, 2018; Gaunt & Westerlund, 2013; Vidal et al., 2010; see chapter “From Individual Learning to Cooperative Learning”), where several interpreters interact, by themselves or under the supervision of a teacher. From the different works which identify typical teaching activities (e.g., Coll & Solé, 1990; de la Cruz et al., 2006; Viladot et al., 2010), we would distinguish between the following types of actions:

Table 7 Categories for analysis of the conditions in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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But apart from observing the actions taken and their sequencing we are also interested in identifying the agents which fulfil them and the function they adopt in these didactic sequences. In this sense, Sánchez et al. (2008), who take as the unit of analysis the cycle from which episodes are composed, identify the three components of the already mentioned proposal by Cazden (1988): a teacher asks something which the student should know (I = enquiry), a student responds (R = response) and the same teacher evaluates what has occurred (E = evaluation). As we saw previously, this structure is known as IRE (for its initials in Spanish) There are also more open patterns of activity such as IRF (F = feedback), or more symmetrical where both the student and the teacher could begin the cycle, respond or evaluate. From these patterns, as shown in Table 8, we have been able to identify in each of the episodes observed, three types of cycles, which would correspond to those of response or evaluation mentioned, but also a type of open cycle which would not necessarily have any type of closure or feedback, and which could be made by the teacher or the student, as appears below:

Table 8 Types of cycles in instrumental teaching and learning practice in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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In the SAPEA this type of help and the way in which these practices are structured would be linked to the previously mentioned implicit theories (see chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”). In turn, these cycles would correspond to different teaching practices in the following manner:

  • Direct teaching practices: the teacher says what they have to do, assesses or offers a (closed) response to the suggested need or problem [this would correspond to something such as an (I)RE) in Sánchez et al. (2008) terminology, where RE are made by the teacher]. In this pattern the predominant actions would be transferring knowledge, giving instructions, ordering, moulding, correcting.

  • Interpretative teaching practices: the teacher provides aid, suggestions, proposals but closes the cycle with an evaluation or a response (an IRE). In this pattern together with some of the previous categories, the predominance of actions such as explaining or suggesting would be characteristic.

  • Constructive teaching practices: rather than providing responses the teacher guides and helps the student to find their own responses and self assessment or leaves the cycle open. He or she questions more than responds (this would be closer to the IRF or to open participation structures or where the closure, when there is IRE, is made by the Student). Here the pattern should be different with a predominance of categories such as suggesting or asking by the teacher, even with the additional presence of explaining, but it is especially the student participations which should increase, with them discussing, doubting and correcting their own actions.

We divided interaction into different sections depending on who the participants are (see Table 9). Firstly, we identified the predominant interactions in musical instrument teaching, with dyadic classroom formats (1–1), i.e., teacher-student. In this interaction we distinguished different nuances in the importance of participation and management of processes, results and learning conditions establishing as predominant the structures of Teacher (P), Teacher-Student (Pa) and Teacher-Student (PA) described below (the structure of just predominant A is much less frequent in the case of formal music teaching, but we have included it to be able to identify exceptional cases).

Table 9 Types of interaction identified in the different episodes in the SAPEA. López-Íñiguez and Pozo (2016) (Reprinted with permission from Elsevier)
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5 Analysis of Practice as Resource for Changing Musical Education

The system of practice analysis we have just described seeks to be an exhaustive tool for the observation of most activities taking place in instrumental music classes. We believe it would be impossible for observation to be totally objective. The eyes with which we observe, and the tools we use are influenced by what captures the attention most or what we concentrate on most at each moment in time. In the SAPEA construction we have tried to contemplate the majority of situations which could occur in the instrumental teaching class as well as the relationships of these situations which are more or less directly observable with the processes and type of learning produced.

Our aim was not just to describe what happens in the classes, but mostly to better understand what happens in them, providing a theoretical meaning to what is observed. To this end, Table 10 is an attempt to present a summary of the characteristic traits of the musical learning and teaching practices in accordance with each of the conceptions described in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”.

Table 10 Characteristic traits of the practices of teaching and learning according to different conceptions (The continuous arrows indicate that this characteristic is maintained in the following conception; discontinuous arrows mean that although it may still appear, it is undertaken with less frequency and relevancy)
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It is important when interpreting the content of this summary table to bear in mind that the actions of a teacher and a student are not always aligned within the same conception or theory. This was already made clear in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities” relating to conceptions and is all the more so when real practices in the class are involved. Instead they respond to summaries or profiles which, in keeping with the principle of hierarchical integration mentioned in chapter “How Teachers and Students Envisage Music Education: Towards Changing Mentalities”, embody several of these conceptions to a variable degree (Pozo, 2017; Pozo et al., 2016). Also, as reflected in Table 10, some of these traits have a continuity from a simpler conception to another more complex one (from left to right in the Table 10), which is reflected with continuous or discontinuous arrows. The same trait may appear in different conceptions with a similar frequency (continuous arrow) but also stay the same whilst considerably reducing their frequency or relevance (discontinuous arrow). In fact, as shown in chapter “How to Know and Analyse Conceptions on Learning and Teaching”, the change of some theories or conceptions to others, in keeping with the principles which govern conceptual change (Pozo, 2014; Scheuer et al., 2006), are initially supported by a hierarchical integration, according to which new conceptions accept some of the traits of the previous theories, but redescribe them or reconstruct them, in this case in new practice structures.

Another major trait of the SAPEA which the Table 10 attempts to reflect is that one has to consider not just what is done but also who does it. It is not the same for processes to be managed by the teacher, or the student or that their management is combined. These different forms of managing activities are contained in the last row of the table.

In any event, Table 10 should be regarded as an ideal or prototypical characterisation of actions which both the teacher and the student undertake in an instrumental music class, according to the three positions previously mentioned (direct interpretative and constructive). However, as pointed out several pages ago, at the beginning of this chapter, practice is always richer than any model attempting to contain it (including of course the SAPEA, however exhaustive it purports to be), and the use of this system for analyzing specific practices usually leads to more complex, varied and infinitely richer patterns than those reflected in it.

In addition to this attempt at thoroughness and the provision of theoretical meaning to teacher and student practices for a better understanding of them, we have tried to make SAPEA a versatile tool that can adapt to different circumstances. We believe it is therefore a living and alterable tool which must adapt to the objectives and people using it but also to the characteristics of the instrument that is being learned or the circumstances and conditions of the classroom and the students. As may be seen in the following chapters, it is not the same to observe the dyadic interaction in a beginner’s cello class (see chapter “The Impact of Teaching Conceptions and Practices in Early Musical Instrument Learning”), as that of a choral class where there is a teacher-conductor and several students (see chapter “The Choir Conductor: Interpreter or Maestro?”) or the analysis of informal learning spaces (see chapter “Learning Outside the Music Classroom: From Informal to Formal Learning as Musical Learning Cultures”). The works upon which these chapters (and many other chapters in Part Two of the book) have been based are supported by the SAPEA, but the categories used in each case may vary in keeping with the actual conditions and the direct observation objectives.

SAPEA therefore seeks to offer a structure which will be used differently, depending on characteristics and objectives and where categories used may be selected and new categories may be introduced. However, this versatility means that the tool may also be used with different objectives. As shown in the following chapters, it is a valid tool for research on learning and teaching of instrumental and vocal music. Furthermore, with this common but versatile structure we are able to compare results which in other situations using different tools would be impossible without falling into an inferential, and at times not well justified practice. We believe this tool may also be useful in innovation spaces, in educational change where a teacher analyses his or her own practices to improve them. So too in teacher training spaces. Practices are undoubtedly essential tools during initial teacher training or continuous professional training and they should include knowing what to say and knowing what to do (Martín & Cervi, 2006). The same occurs with the observation of practices undertaken by others. However, as underlined in chapter “Instrumentalist Teacher Training: Fostering the Change Towards Student-Centered Practices in the 21st Century”, these practices serve for very little if they are not combined with reflexive processes that foster comprehension of what is happening at each moment. It is SAPEA’s aim to accomplish this reflection.