Nancy Shankman is former Director of Music for the New York City Public Schools, and currently serves as Professor of Music Education at The Steinhardt School of Education at New York University.
In this workshop on music education held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, composer and conductor Thomas Cabaniss and former Director of Music Education for New York City’s Department of Education Nancy Shankman discuss strategies they and others have used to build and strengthen the music curriculum in New York, and explain a blueprint they created and implemented to assess and improve music education in the city’s classrooms. Cabaniss and Shankman introduce their blueprint and its associated curriculum and repertoire, and discuss some of the teaching theories behind their decisions, as well as what they expect students to get out of the experience.
Nancy Shankman from NYU talks about the role of the arts in education and what it takes to be a music teacher. She argues that you can't be a well rounded person unless you have some experience in the arts. Nancy also makes the point that people interested in being a music teacher need to be extremely passionate about music education.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman introduce the challenges and educational priorities behind the blueprint they created for overhauling music education in New York City’s public schools.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman introduce the project blueprint (not a curriculum) they created for guiding the revision of New York’s public school music program, and why the goals for the project were to provide equitable access to music education for all students, and to provide benchmarks to measure grade-by-grade success, rather than to produce a detailed curriculum that determines how teachers approach the material in the classroom. They also introduce some of the details of the blueprint – how to keep teachers in the driver’s seat, how to involve cultural contributors, and their project timelines –and discuss the need for the blueprint to reflect the common repertoire shared between schools, educators, and their partners in the cultural world.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Nancy Shankman and Thomas Cabaniss discusses the importance of composition in music education in general, and in their draft curriculum for New York City schools in specific.
Nancy Shankman from NYU talks about a specific curriculum she developed for music teachers to implement in their classroom. She explains that the curriculum is repertoire based and consists of five strands; music making, literacy in music, making connections, community and cultural resources, and careers in music. Each of these five strands has set benchmarks as teachers progress through the curriculum.
Nancy Shankman (professor at New York University and former music director for New York City Public Schools) shares her thoughts on what needs to be done to keep music education in the United States vital and relevant, and who needs to do the work.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman introduce the project blueprint (not a curriculum) they created for guiding the revision of New York’s public school music program, and why the goals for the project were to provide equitable access to music education for all students, and to provide benchmarks to measure grade-by-grade success, rather than to produce a detailed curriculum that determines how teachers approach the material in the classroom. They also introduce some of the details of the blueprint – how to keep teachers in the driver’s seat, how to involve cultural contributors, and their project timelines –and discuss the need for the blueprint to reflect the common repertoire shared between schools, educators, and their partners in the cultural world.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman take audience questions about managing, funding, and implementing the blueprint they created for the overhaul of the New York City public school music program.
Nancy Shankman from NYU talks about what traits music teachers must have in order to be successful in their careers. She emphasizes that music teachers must be passionate, love children, be well organized and well-prepared, and take the good days with the bad. She stresses that preparation is very important and a music teacher must know the music they are teaching and be sensitive to the needs and learning styles of the class. She also discusses that it is important for music teachers to practice music outside of the school day.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman begin to dig into the nuts and bolts of curriculum development under the project blueprint they developed for the overhaul of the music program in new York City’s public schools. They articulate five strands of inquiry that the curriculum addresses, explain why their guidelines call for collaboration between music and other subjects such as Social Studies, and discuss the primary need to develop students’ musical literacy.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman articulate five strands of inquiry that their curriculum developed for the New York Public Schools addresses, and explain why their guidelines call for collaboration between music and other subjects such as Social Studies, and discuss the primary need to develop students’ musical literacy.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman discuss the challenges that educators face when seeking out and inviting members of the cultural community (artists, musicians, arts administrators) into the classroom.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenter Nancy Shankman introduces the philosophical and pedagogical underpinnings of the repertoire that she and collaborator Thomas Cabaniss included in the draft music curriculum they created for the New York City public schools.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenter Thomas Cabaniss digs into the repertoire that he and collaborator Nancy Shankman included in the draft music curriculum they created for the New York City public schools, and illustrates how the repertoire they chose illustrates the “five strands” teaching philosophy touched upon earlier in the presentation.
In this segment of a music education workshop held in 2008 at Loyola University, New Orleans, presenters Thomas Cabaniss and Nancy Shankman dig into the repertoire that they included in the draft music curriculum they created for the New York City public schools, and use a musical example from the repertoire to explore teaching opportunities and classroom challenges that await music teachers.
Nancy Shankman from NYU talks about how important it is as a teacher to provide their students the opportunity to have interaction with the arts in their community. She discusses the advantages of distance learning and the role New York plays in reaching out to smaller cities nearby to be involved in their educational programs.
Nancy Shankman from NYU discusses the music education program curriculum at NYU. She explains that music education majors take the same musical track as performance majors with courses that include music theory, music history, and performing in ensembles. Also in this segment, Ms. Shankman discusses the hands on courses that she teaches for music education majors.
