The Voices Foundation

Voices Foundation professional development course

The Voices Foundation was established in 1993 by Suzi Digby (Lady Eatwell) OBE, inspired by her Churchill Fellowship travels to Hungary; during her time there, she observed the country’s holistic approach to music education for primary-age children, and resolved to devise a relevant methodology which was suitable for use within the framework of the English education system. I had also visited Hungary on a Churchill Fellowship and found that Suzi and I agreed on certain key issues regarding music education in England.

When it was set up, The Voices Foundation immediately carried out a survey of music education in English primary schools. Soon afterwards, we had hoped that the National Curriculum would put music firmly on the educational map. It made music a legal requirement, but it has turned out to be rather like the papal request for the church to return to plainchant and polyphony – it was understood and not wilfully disobeyed, but it could not be met efficiently. In other words, the National Curriculum requirement has not been met efficiently because funding has not been provided to equip teachers for teaching music in class, within the school curriculum.

Consequently, we do not have teachers trained to do it. Where it exists, ‘music education’ in our schools is generally more concerned with random music-making (often using only instruments) than with music education. The large majority of our primary schools still do not meet statutory requirements – partly because the teachers do not know how to do it and partly because curriculum music has never been adequately funded – despite the fact that it is a legal requirement. Initial teacher training in music has been scarce for many years, in consequence failing miserably to meet the needs of schools.

The challenge

In 2008, in our maintained primary sector in England, 17,205 schools had 198,200 teachers serving 4,087,890 primary children. Schools today also have a significant proportion of children for whom English is not their mother-tongue.

The challenge of this is quite bewildering. We have a National Curriculum in England which requires that all children have access to music education. We certainly need more specialist music teachers, but it is clear that hell will freeze before this becomes a reality for our 17,205 primary schools.

Possible ways forward

There are only two ways to change this situation:

• improve the initial training of teachers;
• develop a national plan of carefully structured and supported in-service training for our existing primary class teachers.

We should not overlook the fact that primary schools have a formidable force of experienced class teachers, many of whom are excellent practitioners, who know their children, but are frightened of teaching music. Music learning is hierarchical, like mathematics and (also like mathematics) has much to do with patterning. Music also has interesting learning parallels with language; both are acquired through the ears and make fundamental use of the voice. Teachers who lack basic music skills can hardly be expected to teach basic music skills. But there is much to be gained from remembering that schools are learning institutions in which the best teachers are willing to be learners as well.

In the primary sector, music specialist teachers should receive formalised training:

• to provide support for primary class teachers up to, and including, classes of 8/9 year olds;
• where continuity has been achieved, to take on the responsibility for teaching music to children aged 9 onwards;
• to ensure that those teachers who carry a responsibility for music within their primary school are equipped to lead a sustainable music curriculum programme.

It is also our view that secondary teachers should not undertake this role, but should be encouraged to attend primary music training sessions so that they become aware of the implications for transfer from age 11 and guidance to ensure continuity of learning from primary to secondary. The secondary sector would then need to re-write its schemes of work for music and our current examinations in music at age 16 would become more relevant and could set higher expectations than they do now.

Certain principles

To make a start on tackling these problems, and by using an in-service training approach, we have based our work on certain principles, by recognising that:

• music learning is hierarchical. Therefore, it is necessary to build from the earliest years, working in small steps based upon a sequence of music skills and concepts. A carefully structured programme ensures that the child progressively acquires music experience, musical understanding and personal confidence – the key components of musicianship;
• musicianship needs to be the core of all music education – the source from which pathways to successful and ongoing music involvement are created;
• music education is not necessarily an automatic consequence of music-making;
• use of the singing voice is essential to musical development and understanding.

We have been able to build a structured aural and vocal approach for use in class, which includes the use of instruments, and which also supports the National Music Curriculum requirements in England. The approach takes into account the needs of primary teachers who have not taught music before as well as the needs of those with more experience.

The Voices Foundation also takes the view that, as teachers, we need to acknowledge:

• that there are two traditions in music: the aural and the written. Most music in the world is in the aural, unwritten, folk, spontaneous tradition. The written, interpretive, classical tradition, although smaller, is of equal importance. A music education programme must include both;
• that music has two performing media: the singing voice and instruments. The significant difference between the two is that when the child uses their singing voice, it is the child who makes the sound; when using an instrument, however, the child makes no sound at all but manipulates an object to make the sound. For music education this is an important distinction. At each stage of learning, the teacher needs to have the capability to decide which of these two performing media is the more effective for the children’s learning;
• the value of ‘internalising’ or ‘inner hearing’, which is to do with singing music in one’s head. For the children it is what we call ‘using the thinking voice’. It becomes the way in which each child ‘thinks’ music. This key factor is closely allied with the singing voice and the development of memory. Improvising is the means by which the child reinforces a new skill or concept and makes it their own. These two pedagogical tools are the least recognised, least used and least understood. Yet they are the tools we need most to support good teaching and learning in the music curriculum.

The present position

Our team of highly trained advisory teachers who go into schools to provide training, mentoring and support for every class teacher over the course of an entire academic year, has swelled from a mere handful at the start of the millennium to 35. They are based all over England. This has allowed us to reach out to an increasing number of schools across the country.

Since we were founded in 1993, using the in-service training approach, we estimate that we have made an impact on the lives and learning of around 300,000 children across the county; and over 9,000 teachers have received training in our methodology, either through our one-year in-school programme or on shorter, intensive courses held offsite.

National recognition of our work has grown over the years, too. The DCSF supported our development through project funding in a cluster of 15 schools in the mid-noughties, and more recently funded us to run a three-year Early Years training pilot programme modelled on its approach in primary schools. We were further acknowledged as a prominent force in the field of music education when Sing Up appointed us as one of its flagship organisations in 2008, providing funding to lead training projects for teachers in four regions around England.

However, there is still a long way to go – and we continue to learn.

Michael Stocks, Director of Curriculum & Training, The Voices Foundation

The Voices Foundation
34 Grosvenor Gardens
London SW1W 0DH

020 7730 6677

www.voices.org.uk

We are delighted that both Michael Stocks and Suzi Digby from the Voices Foundation will be working with participants in a highly interactive session at our seminar Changing Lives Through Music on Saturday 27 February at Kings Place. Michael will also be talking about the pedagogical approach of the Foundation at the seminar. To book your place, please call Fiona MacLeod on 020 7079 1204, or download a booking form from our website (ism.org)