What and how? Or why and for whom? A content analysis of middle school general music literature

Abstract

The purpose of this content analysis is to analyze available peer-reviewed middle school general music literature to determine the ways in which middle school general music has been conceived of in extant literature in the United States. The researchers performed a content analysis of peer-reviewed empirical and practitioner articles relating to middle school general music (N = 45), creating a coding scheme of categorical clusters that related to the Association of Middle Level Education’s position paper: This We Believe. Content coding revealed curricular content (78%) and pedagogical practice (42%) as the most common topics. Several topics were underrepresented in the literature including student opinion/voice (11%), inclusive practice (18%), adolescent development (20%), cultural awareness (18%), classroom culture (20%), and teacher preparation and development (16%). These findings may have important implications for preservice music teacher educators preparing teachers for the context of middle school general music, as well as for researchers within this domain.

Keywords

Content analysis general music middle school This We Believe

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