Narratives from Preservice Music Teachers: Hearing Their Voices While Singing with the Choir

Abstract

Drawing on Dewey’s (Experience and education. Collier, New York, 1938) concept of experience as education and the literature detailing narrative approaches to investigate teacher thinking and teacher education, this inquiry focuses on participant stories of musical experience as pre-service teachers. Through engaging in collaborative narrative inquiry, seven preservice teachers reflected on the past and continuing role of music in their lives, and documented both individually and as part of a community how this role changed as they engaged in and reflected upon their participation in various musical experiences throughout a year of study. Telling, sharing, and listening to their own stories told in their own voices enabled these beginning teachers to understand what they knew and to make changes for the better in their lives and the lives of those they teach. It enabled them to trace the melody of musical influence through the narratives in their lives—the narratives they experienced as being inextricably intertwined with and within the narratives they have woven with others. In this way, they came to a greater understanding of their own transformation through the presence of music in their personal, professional and spiritual lives. In addition to serving as a means of determining the potential implications for a more holistic approach to preservice teacher education, this inquiry can help to enable preservice educators to identify and explore the experiences, contexts, and communities necessary for engaging preservice teachers in meaningful and joyful music making.