The Cats of Music Education Series: Pamela Burnard - Future Maker
Pamela Burnard is a Cat of Music Education. Her journey is important to us for many reasons. Here is a selection:
She is Australian
She embodies passion for music(s) and music(s) education
She is subversive
She is courageously outspoken
She is Professor of Arts, Creativities and Educations, University of Cambridge, UK
She’s Adjunct Professor with the School of Humanities and Communication Arts of Western Sydney University, Australia
Key takeaway - dare to dream Australian subversive classroom music educators!
We’ve been fortunate to be able to spend some time listening to Prof. Burnard riff in real time on a range of classroom music education topics in recent Zoom symposia and conferences and we are so humbled and inspired by her capacity to articulate the most pressing issues in the most accessible manner.
Our featured video is a great example. Professor Burnard breaks down “good” or “effective” music education into three “R’s” and a “C”:
Research Informed
Relevant
Real World
- that puts diverse creativities at the heart
We find we have to stand up to watch videos like these - like Professor Burnard “We do get excited about this”.
The 3RC is at the core of our Gig Based Learning approach to classroom music education. 4 letters for us to keep in front of mind, keeping it simple, as it gives us a road map to direct our research-informed practice. Try putting a question mark after each one and it will transform your classroom: Is our music classroom:
Research Informed?
Relevant?
Real World?
Creative?
See? Changes everything right? What a wonderful challenge to shape our professional lives!
So, once you’ve watched the feature video, be challenged to reflect on your “smuggled in assumptions” about creativity in the video below from the Media Journal in Music Education. That should inspire you to begin reading.
MJiME Video: Researching Musical Creativities in Practice
Book: Musical Creativities in Practice
Book: Bourdieu and the Sociology of Music Education (with Ylva Hofvander Trulsson)
And keep an eye out for:
Burnard, P. (2022 in production) A Posthumanist Theory of Multiple Creativities: Moving Beyond Defining by Pluralising. The Netherlands: Brill-I-Sense Publishers.
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This blog post from the ABC is a great place to see Richard, at large in the community, advocating for a great music education for every child.