’cause the keys we went though it really seriously and after that I had an easiness in learning new songs and even now I feel that for me reading at first sight is easier than for others. But what I think he should have showed me, when he gave me a new [musical]
sheet he should have also given me a recording so that I listen to it and realize that in fact I have to make music out of it and that essential is not to play everything without mistake to play everything metronomic and...that’s why I didn’t like it ’cause I when I’ve learned to listen to recordings and to... well initially I was imitating...and to have my own vision then I can say I was not to part with my violin (.) unfortunately this happened pretty late
Iulian’s reflections on his earlier experiences of learning drive him to point out the importance that owning solid basic knowledge of certain key musical aspects (the musical keys having been studied ’seriously’ are conducive of an easiness in leaning new songs) holds for the learner’s sense of who he is as a student musician. Configuring this sense of self takes – yet again – identifying a collective to which claim belonging to (the sense of personal competence is gained by reference to fellow colleagues in studying music at the university). Even more informative in the episode presented in Excerpt VI is the passage in which Iulian explores what should have been done and hasn’t in the teaching and learning located in the early stages of his musical studies. The ’listening of recordings’ is basically presented as a tool-in-use in the repertoire of the more mature learner who placed in the position of reflecting on what learning music was like throughout the stages of he’s development as a musician, clearly locates a break-trough moment in his personal history in the putting into use the tool of listening to recordings. The learning that had occurred once this new instrument for learning (a procedural step in the appropriation of a new musical sheets) was introduced is genuinely presented as expansive, as making (‘I was supposed to make music out of it’)and understanding (‘I also started to have my own vision’) intertwine and afford new horizons of action, previously unavailable – as the learner in this case is fully aware of (‘then I can say I was not to part with my violin’).
Subjected to a cultural historical activity theory analysis, the data presented is indicative of a learning activity that places the learner in a rather empowering place.
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Mihaela Mitescu Lupu/ Procedia – Edu World 2010
Agency and identity are inextricably linked and are visible in language and actions linking the inner (e.g. a change in mind) and outer (a change in practice) of the system of learning.
4. Conclusion
When applying his historical - cultural activity theory to the learning activity, Engeström divides between school-based and professional learning, stating that in “the activity of school-going, certain learning actions are cultivated systematically. But as a whole, school-going is a far cry from learning activity. Pupils remain subjects of separate learning actions, not of a whole system of learning activity. The essential difference is to be found in the object […] the object of learning activity cannot be reduced to text. Such a reduction normally leads to the minimization of the productivity of learning (text as a dead object), and even in the best case to the narrowing down of productivity into intellectualism (production of text only)” (1997).
Looking at how learning is being conceptualized by the music students in their recollections of personal histories of studying to perform a musical instrument, what could be noticed is that although the general structure of the curriculum for music education in Romania is one shaped as contents delivery, performance focused approach to teaching, learning and assessing music and music interpretation, the activity of learning as reflected in student musicians conceptions takes the shape of a system in which located as full participants, students problematize, author, explore and position in active interactions employing in increasingly informed initiatives the available tools (mediating means) expanding over the confines of the actions located in the school-based context. The way is toward an increased sense of one’s own expanding agency and identity as students appropriate the object of the activity – learning to play the musical instrument – and make their mark in shaping the context of their learning by externalizing the results of the actions they took with the tools they engaged with in the course of learning (e.g. Iulian’s increased affection and dedication to studying after deciding what constitutes a good method in his study of violin; Lucian’s decision to ask for a transfer after internalizing multiple public means to assess performance in musical interpretation – opera’s examinations, other student’s performances, etc).
The findings in this study confirm Engeström’s observation that learning is much more likely to emerge in activity-related settings such as: work, research or art creation, schools. This however raises an important question to some systems’ of education (and the Romanian one fully makes to cut to this category) rigidity in maintaining the curriculum for general education as a sum of ‘closed in castles’ - if it is to use Somekh‘s (1994) metaphor to define the teaching and learning confined to disciplines of study with little or no sensitivity to the principle that gaining mastery of the whole work activity means to move from actions to activity; the actions themselves are objectively transformed. “Moreover [...]
the subjects must become aware of the contradictory nature of their present work activity and relate it to a future form of the work activity 'that realizes a broader, more general life relation that includes the given, concrete activity' (Engeström, 1997). In other words, learning is not only determined solely by past collective experiences with tools and actions, but by future object motives related to the present activity too, a feature to which the current structure of the general curriculum in the national system of education is simply resisting to, despite its obvious relevance for the manner in which learners come to understand learning and tend to shape this activity for themselves
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4th International Conference "Education Facing Contemporary World Issues"
Piteşti, Romania, 2010, 2010, October