11/06/06 Another Look at “Ice-T’s Rap School”: Evaluating Student Work
I’m watching “Ice-T’s Rap School” on VH1 again. This time, the episode is putting its emphasis on the business/entrepreneurship aspects of being a hip-hop artist: show promoting, making business decisions, deciding what kind of music/rhymes are appropriate for a show, and also the social pressures that come with being an artist. Ice-T is confronting the students and trying to reinforce that he thinks that the quality of the music should reinforce how much effort the students put into their work.
I see Ice-T’s response as a real-world example of the need to look at student work from an objective point of view. In other words, if student work is at the center of the conversation, rather than the relationship the teacher has with the student or the context of the work (i.e. previous work the student has done), one can really pay attention to what the student is learning.
Harvard Project Zero researcher and Arts In Education program director Steve Seidel has done a lot of work in the area of how to evaluate student work, and in fact, we take a similar approach when evaluating MIE student portfolios. Seidel runs an occasional conference at the Harvard Graduate School of Education known as ROUNDS, in which educators and researchers of different backgrounds come together to discuss student work and learn various conference protocols (the most “successful” of which is known as the Collaborative Assessment Conference) that Project Zero has developed to help facilitate reflective discussion.
Although Ice-T’s approach to evaluating his student’s work seems to be pretty effective, what I have noticed is that the show doesn’t really give the viewer much idea about what other students think about their peers performances or lyric writing. Because of the age of the students (middle school?), and the nature of the project (fairly informal), I suppose it might be awkward to show students engaging in lengthy reflective practices — though in the reality-cutaway sequences, we do see snippets of students reflecting on their work. We also see students practicing for their performances and engaging in both group and individual work. In a way, each episode ends up working as a mini-portfolio of Ice-T’s residency. [Note: Could this be a model for documenting internships? Perhaps... ] Anyways, this makes me wonder how a tool like Seidel’s Collaborative Assessment Conference could be used to help faciliate student reflection, and what effects it would have on student learning.
Finally, and on a separate note, I find myself raising the following questions (now that I’ve seen a couple episodes of the program):
Although ‘entertainment’ is probably what the main focus of Ice-T’s show is, I would urge other MIE advocates to look closely at the world that surrounds them, and see how they might find other environments or situations that could fit within the context of our world: though the field of music-in-education may seem specialized upon first glance, programs like “Ice-T’s Rap School” help to show how ubiquitous, and closely-connected, the world of interdisciplinary music education really is.
-Randy
February 22nd, 2007 at 8:12 pm
I have seen this show once but I don’t remember too much. I do remember a lot of sixth graders being really excited about it. I am interested in how popular culture can be a way in to music education. I have used rap lyrics many times to teach poetry and also to teach performance techniques. The students often enjoy the lessons but I have always had trouble connecting it to music as a larger field. Once I start talking about the similarities between rap and more traditional music or between rap and shakespeare, I lose them. I have no doubt that popular culture is a good technique to get students’ attention, but I am wondering how we can then bring it back and give students a deeper understanding of music and the performing arts as larger fields with great histories. Any ideas?
February 23rd, 2007 at 10:19 am
Aliza, thanks for the response.
Part of my interest in the VH1 show is that I, too, have used rap and hip-hop as an entry point for students, when I was teaching a class that helped high schoolers to acquire fundamental music literacy skills (i.e., reading & writing music notation, sight singing, composing, and improvising). The students I was working with were vocalists at Boston Arts Academy. I taught two sections of 8-10 students each, twice a week.
I suppose it depends what particular similarities one chooses to show between ‘old’ art forms (i.e., Bach) and ‘new’ (i.e., hip-hop beats) ones, and at what point those similarities are introduced. In my experiences, I chose to start with the older forms first, to get students grounded in the material. I remember having the most success when I chose a specific correlation I wanted to make, and focused on that correlation only. Then, after learning a few sessions, I would bring in an example from a ‘new’ art, and without explaning my rationale for choosing something out of the norm, examine it just like we had worked with the older specimens. Eventually, students in class would start to remark about how they never envisioned those connections. I used this as my basic formula.
For example, one set of lessons focused on showing how basic rules of counterpoint from Bach’s era still apply to writing vocal harmonies (i.e., background vocals) for hip-hop tunes. In this case, I’d bring them a few Bach chorale first; we’d sing through them, learn each part, and find out what the harmonies were doing. We would experiment with changing the voicings, and hearing how they would sound – and also make things easier or more awkward for the singers. Once we became familiar with how the chorales work, I brought in an excerpt from a Boyz II Men song – but I formatted it the same way that the chorales had been, and temporarily removed the lyrics. Of course, they could tell immediately that ‘something’ about this ‘chorale’ was different (i.e., harmonies more jazzy), but we plowed through it, learning the parts and harmonies like before. Afterwards, I asked the class if anyone knew where our newest assignment had come from (no hints). One student remarked, “Well when we analyzed it, it was like definitely Bach, but when we sing it, it sounds like Boyz II Men or something.” I agreed. The student then said, “So does that mean, if we know Bach, we can know Boyz II Men?”
One time, when I came to class, a student was sitting at the piano and plunking out some chords and trying to vocalize them. When I asked him what he was doing, he said he was trying to figure out what notes he could sing with what chord — he went to a concert and heard a singer improvising, and wanted to know how he could do the same. I used this as an opportunity to tie in what we’d been learning in class with what my students’ interests were. For this case, I brought in some Monteverdi madrigals with figured bass, and melismatic sections. We learned what the figured bass notation meant and how the melismas related to the harmonies. Subsequently, we imagined what the figured bass parts might look like if they were written out, and I brought in some guest performers to read and improvise continuo as if they were in a Baroque ensemble. We practiced singing the madrigal with our live continuo players, and each student got a chance to improvise some melismas. In another session, I asked the student who had initially expressed interest in improvising to bring in a pop song he was learning. I transcribed the harmonies and basic beat, and wrote them out as like the madrigals had been: three part vocal harmonies with bass line and figured bass. Except, in this case, the ‘figured bass’ were chord changes ala jazz lead sheets. In class, we first explored the connections between figured bass and lead sheet chord changes. Then we took the step of singing the chords – and finding what passing tones can create tension, and how to resolve tension back to chord tones. We also used the chord changes to imagine chord voicings, ala Bach chorales, and finally, looked at how different chord voicings could influence the ways that singers improvise over them. For this unit, I brought in a jazz combo with singer (piano, bass, drums, voice) to sing through various jazz progressions and improvise over them.
Anyways, I chose those two anecodotes to share, but I have a few more that maybe I’ll write about another time. Thanks for commenting!
February 25th, 2007 at 12:55 pm
Here’s something that sounds familiar to me:
“I see Ice-T’s response as a real-world example of the need to look at student work from an objective point of view. In other words, if student work is at the center of the conversation, rather than the relationship the teacher has with the student or the context of the work (i.e. previous work the student has done), one can really pay attention to what the student is learning.”
Most of the work we’re doing in assessment data analysis is “looking at student work,” that is, determining for ourselves what is exemplary, what is competent, and what needs improvement, and double checking those against a rubric. There are significant drawbacks to this method, like missing multiple teachable moments, but at least you can know what you want from your students and give them direction towards success.
February 26th, 2007 at 12:45 am
“…the episode is putting its emphasis on the business/entrepreneurship aspects of being a hip-hop artist: show promoting, making business decisions, deciding what kind of music/rhymes are appropriate for a show, and also the social pressures that come with being an artist.†This quote sheds light on the enormous power of the media in getting the audience to think about issues in a certain way or context. For example, learning how to make smart decisions, combat social pressures, and determining levels of appropriateness in various situations are all so-called life skills that undoubtedly must be learned in some fashion or another. When they are learned in the context of the show, the audience is provided with a context in which they may better be able to understand such skills.