A group of Brock Music majors will put their classroom learning into practice this fall as the first students enrolled in the new Music Practicum course.<\/p>\n
The multi-year conjunction course allows students to complete for-credit volunteer placements in either music education, music health\/therapy, music administration or music in the community.<\/p>\n
Music Chair Matthew Royal said the course is unique because it provides real-world learning experiences while also giving students course credit and volunteer hours that are often required for those applying to Faculties of Education down the road.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe idea is to introduce students to real-world settings that might line up with their future career goals and to have them apply the skills and knowledge they\u2019ve learned from their courses in those settings,\u201d he explained.<\/p>\n
It also helps students discover what they are interested in career-wise and how they can achieve their long-term goals, added Koreen McCullough, Experiential Education Co-ordinator, Faculty of Humanities.<\/p>\n
\u201cLearning what you don\u2019t like is just as valuable as learning what you do like,\u201d she said. \u201cStudents are not only getting the valuable placement experience through this course but are also being taught up front to set their own goals. At the end of term, they will have a chance to reflect on challenges and achievements, access resume coaching and really apply what they\u2019ve learned to help achieve their future career goals.\u201d<\/p>\n
Six Music majors signed up to work in schools and community organizations around the Niagara region this year.<\/p>\n
Course Co-ordinator Tim Stacey (BA \u201915) said the students have already shown themselves to be extremely dedicated and enthusiastic.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey\u2019ve worked on these placements over the summer, made connections and did their own research to find them,\u201d said Stacey, who has worked for community choirs as well as the Niagara Symphony and Youth Orchestras since graduating from Brock\u2019s Music program. \u201cThey didn\u2019t get to just pick a selection from a list. They had to find the placement themselves, so it\u2019s evident how engaged they are.\u201d<\/p>\n
Gavino Oresta, a fourth-year Music student, will be completing his placement working with music classes at Saint Michael Catholic High School in Niagara Falls, alongside his former high school music teacher, coincidentally.
\nWith plans to become a music teacher himself, Oresta is looking forward to the challenge of leading his own lessons with the high school students this year.
\n\u201cFor anyone interested in teaching, it\u2019s a great environment,\u201d he said. \u201cIt\u2019s also good to get different perspectives on how teachers go about their lesson structure because every school goes about their music program a bit differently.\u201d<\/p>\n
Learning about different teaching styles was what piqued the interest of second-year student Brielle Kaminsky, who will be working with extracurricular music ensembles, such as the choir, jazz band and string ensemble, at Ridley College in St. Catharines.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m going to be working with students from all over the world in my placement and it\u2019s really cool seeing how different cultures practice music,\u201d she said. \u201cNot only am I learning in the classroom myself, but I also get to go out and teach what I\u2019m learning in the class to students, too.\u201d<\/p>\n
Adds Oresta: \u201cPlus, you\u2019re hanging around in a music class, which is just fun and exciting to me on its own.\u201dFor the first few weeks of the course, students will engage in workshops that will identify their learning outcomes for the term and outline the benefits of experiential learning. They will begin their work placements in late September, with the aim of completing 50 volunteer hours by April.<\/p>\n
The course is open to all Music majors in second year and above and can be taken consecutively year after year. Applications for next year\u2019s practicum course will open in the spring and anyone interested in applying is encouraged to\u00a0 contact <\/span>Matthew Royal<\/span><\/a> or <\/span>Tim Stacey<\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" A group of Brock Music majors will put their classroom learning into practice this fall as the first students enrolled in the new Music Practicum course.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":55,"featured_media":53127,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[37,1,4],"tags":[6965,1153,6969,46,6966,6967,6968],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53126"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/55"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=53126"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53126\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":53128,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/53126\/revisions\/53128"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/53127"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=53126"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=53126"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=53126"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}