Fall 2014 Edition
Active and Cooperative Learning in the
College Music Classroom
By Dr. Samantha Ryan Barnsfather, Adjunct Professor, Fine Arts, and
Jessica Van Leer, Adjunct Professor, Fine Arts
Active and cooperative learning occurs when students are engaged in activities
based on course objectives that develop higher-order thinking skills such as
analyzing, creating, evaluating, and synthesizing. This article contains two
narratives on how each instructor used different active learning strategies
within their music appreciation classes. Both instructors studied these
strategies as part of the Certificate of Classroom Teaching and Learning (CCTL)
cohort this past summer.
Jessica Van Leer, Adjunct Professor of Music
In music
appreciation, my
colleagues and I
try to get
students more
interested in
music. We teach
them as much as
we can about
music history
and music styles in a very short
amount of time. One way that I have
engaged students is to include
several active learning strategies that
I learned in the CCTL cohort in my
teaching and lectures. I have
combined two of my favorite
activities, the “Lecture Check” and
the “Reading Quiz”, into my courses.
After I have assigned some reading
and/or after I have lectured for 15 or
20 minutes, I stop the class and ask
them to pull out their phones
(definitely not the norm for a college
class). I use a free polling website
(polleverywhere.com) to ask the
students questions about their
reading, the lecture, or the music
they listened to in class that day. The
students then text their answers to
the poll and we watch the poll
update in real time on the screen. If
the majority of the students answer
the question correctly, we get to
move on. If not, I go back and go over
the material again. I’ve noticed the
students are more attentive during
my lectures and seem to even look