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The National Standards for Music Education:

1. Singing, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music.
2. Performing on instruments, alone and with others, a varied repertoire of music.
3. Improvising melodies, variations, and accompaniments.
4. Composing and arranging music within specified guidelines.
5. Reading and notating music.
6. Listening to, analyzing, and describing music.
7. Evaluating music and music performances.
8. Understanding relationships between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts.
9. Understanding music in relation to history and culture.

How they were Developed

The National Association for Music Educators (MENC.org) has an in depth history on the web. The impetus is from a Council for Basic Education report, commissioned by the National Endowment for the Arts which compared art education in four different countries: Japan, England, Germany, and the United States. The three essential questions they asked were:

1. Are there national standards? Japan=yes, England=yes, Germany=no, and US=in development

2. Are there sequential arts curriculea nationally? Japan=yes, England=yes, Germany=no, US=no

3. Is there national assessment of student knowledge skills? Japan=no, England=mandated, but not in place, Germany=College prep only, US=in development

After this report was issued, the National Committee for Standards in the Arts (in 1994) approved the arts standards. Those standards were then presented to U.S. Secretary of Education Richard Riley on March 11, 1994 at the National Press Club in Washington, D.C.

Why rewrite the standards?

If you take a look at the national standards they cover what musicians should know but they neglect some of the details. First, I combined those standards that I felt belonged together or shared similar skills. Then I tried to identify the various skills that are required for each standard. Once those were in place I tried to identify those particular skills that are required in each musical endeavor.

The next step(s)

Vision. The MENC has done a good job in developing a scope and sequence for the primary, secondary, and tertiary grades. As music educators, we need to develop that sequence or vision of what music in the schools should look like. We should also be concerned with "how good is good enough" and what rubrics could be used to grade various areas of music content. Finally, we should consider the idea of a "Musical Portfolio" and how that could represent a students growth in music.

 

Proposed Standards: