03-09 Diving Deep into Culture Learning: Folklife Education in K-12 Music Classrooms

Chair: Linda Deafenbaugh;

Sponsored by the Folklore and Education Section.

As music educators who include folk arts education in our music programs, we discuss how the folklife education approach improves music education practice and enhances student learning. Even as the sole point in the school for student engagement with folklife education, using this approach in our music rooms deepens student learning about culture - their own and other’s. After examining many options for using folklife education in music classrooms, we dive deeper to focus on how to: build multi-grade folk arts spiraling curriculum, work with community experts and their music traditions, and construct performances that share students’ learning with audiences.