The present chapter will describe the study design, evaluation instruments,
the research population, data collection, and the data analysis procedures
for all three portions of this study: (1) attitudes regarding the effectiveness
of multimedia presentation tools within a music fundamentals course for
non-music majors, (2) the cognitive gains on certain topics in the
music fundamentals course with regard to the incorporation of both commercially
produced and concept-specific produced software by the author, and (3)
the affective response of students to certain music selections via the
Digital Affective Response Technology (DART) software program.
The data collected for all three areas of this study were from students
enrolled in a Fundamentals of Music course at the University of Minnesota
in the Fall Quarter (n=110) (hereafter referred to as Treatment A) and
Winter Quarters (n=105) (hereafter referred to as Treatment B) of 1997-1998.
The course was a four-credit class which met for three fifty-minute sessions
(full class) and one fifty-minute recitation (one-fourth of the class)
each week. This course was designed to be offered to undergraduate
non-music majors. The pretest/posttest results were based on Treatment
A (n=92) and Treatment B (n=81) due to students missing either the pretest
or posttest administered on the first and penultimate days of class.
The lecture portion of the classes was held in one of the school of music’s lecture auditoriums. The recitation for Treatment A met in music classrooms, and Treatment B met in a computer/keyboard lab. The lecture auditorium had a seating capacity for approximately 125 students and was a room designed for acoustic and aesthetic excellence. The room was equipped with a fine music audio system and a visual projection system (ceiling suspended) with a 8’ x 10’ projection screen. The room was also designed for multiple lighting situations which were incorporated for various classroom situations and was a tiered-seating design. The room was equipped with a Macintosh 8600/250 connected to the video and audio systems. The room also had a grand piano available to the instructor.
The recitation facilities were varied for the two treatments.
Students in Treatment A met in music classrooms with approximately twenty-five
students per recitation. The classrooms were equipped with staffed-chalkboards,
a sound system, chair/desk seating, a piano, and overhead projection equipment.
Students in Treatment B used a small lab outfitted with twenty Macintosh
computer stations (PowerPC 7100’s) and Casio synthesizer keyboards.
Each computer station was loaded with the three software programs used
in this study: Practica Musica, Key Signatures and DART . The room
was also outfitted with a teacher station equipped with a projection system
(both overhead projection panel system and Simal-Link System which projects
the teacher’s computer screen to each of the student’s individual computer
screens). Because there were more students in each recitation than
available computer/keyboard stations, students would on occasion share
workstations. This should not have compromised the study, as the
lab was used primarily for demonstration on the use of software, whereupon
the student would independently practice various concepts with the software
during open lab hours as assigned homework.
Study Design- Classroom Presentation Software
The first portion of this study investigated the attitudes of the students regarding the effectiveness of multimedia presentation tools incorporated into each class. At the penultimate class of both Treatment A and B, an attitude survey was administered to each of the students (appendix D, Treatment A, and appendix E, Treatment B).
Seven questions were presented. The first five were related to the student’s perception of various elements of the multimedia tool used in the class. The last two questions were related to the student’s self-perception of musical experience in both high school and in general.
Each of the first five question used a Likert-scale with the following
responses: (a) not helpful, (b) no difference,
(c) somewhat helpful, (d) helpful, (e) very
helpful.
The second portion of this study focused upon the difference in achievement which may be attributed to the use of commercially produced and concept-specific produced software by the author. The study design consisted of two sections of a music fundamentals course. The course was taught by the same instructor with the same general course goals for undergraduate non-music major students. Treatment A was instructed without the use of outside-of-class computer aided learning software, and Treatment B was instructed with two programs used outside of the class via independent practice by each student. A pretest and posttest (Appendix F) were administered to both sections on the first and penultimate days of class. The data was collected and analyzed (Chapter Four).
The testing instrument consisted of thirty-eight multiple choice questions generally divided into two main sections: written recognition (questions 1-32) and aural recognition (questions 33-38). There were seven subcategories: (1) note identification (ten questions), (2) written meter recognition (four questions), (3) written interval recognition (six questions), (4) written key signature recognition (seven questions), (5) written triad recognition (five questions), (6) aural rhythm recognition (two questions), and (7) aural triad recognition (four questions). A pilot testing instrument was designed and administered the previous quarter (Spring 1997) in a Fundamentals of Music course taught by a different instructor.
The testing instrument also consisted of a CD which was used in the test. The CD gave the instructions for the exam and also included aural examples which were used for the second section of the test (aural recognition). The attached CD includes the audio portion of the test.
The final segment of the testing instrument (aural triad recognition)
was not included as part of the learning goals for either Group A or Group
B, but rather, were intended as “peripheral learning” indicators for this
specific task. The questions were placed on the testing instrument
to investigate the potential growth of related learning tasks not necessarily
coved within a classroom setting.
Commercially Produced Music Software-Practica Musica
The software program, Practica Musica, was incorporated into the Treatment B group. In conjunction with homework requirements from the textbook Music First, by Gary White, activities related to the current concepts were assigned to be completed by the student outside-of-class as a homework assignment. Two computer labs (the lab used in recitation and another computer lab with approximately sixty computer stations) were made available to the students. At least one lab was always available to the students seven-days-a-week and was open until 10 p.m. nightly. The students were given the instructions to do the activities at whatever rate was comfortable, but there were deadlines for the completion of each activity. The student would then print a progress report indicating the “mastery” of that activity level. The progress reports were included as fifteen percent of the student’s final grade for the course. The activity was demonstrated to the students in the recitation meeting so that there would be no problems with the operation of the program. Students were also encouraged to meet with the instructor or teaching assistant if they needed assistance with operating the program.
The pretest/posttest was the tool administered to both Treatment A and B. The test, had six sections which could gauge the potential cognitive gains from the the Treatment A group (no outside-of-class software incorporation) to the Treatment B group (outside-of-class software incorporation). The six sections of the test focused on: (1) written note identification, (2) written meter recognition, (3) written interval recognition, (4) written triad recognition, (5) aural rhythm recognition, and (6) aural triad recognition. The final area (aural triad recognition) was the only area where specific homework assignments were not assigned to the student.
The students participating in Group B were given an additional attitude questionnaire to help assess the student’s attitude with regard to the use and perceived effectiveness of the software program.
The data collected from both Group A and Group B were analyzed with
a two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) test. The total scores, as well
as each of the subsections were tested for significance of different scores
in relation to treatment and gender.
Faculty Produced Music Software-Key Signatures
The Key Signatures program was written by this author especially for the incorporation into this course. The task was selected to test the use of a concept-specific designed software package by the instructor of a given course.
In conjunction with the homework assignments from the Music First textbook, the student was assigned to practice with the Key Signatures software program. Students were instructed to open the Key Signatures program in the lab setting and to sign-in and complete as many of the key signatures as they could within a three minute segment. They were instructed to print a progress report and turn it into the instructor. This information assessed the proficiency by the student with regard to both accuracy and speed. This was a helpful tool for the teacher to help gauge whether to review or to proceed with confidence. The other progress reports were a part of the homework assignment for the student.
One portion of the pretest/posttest was designed to test the knowledge of the students with regard to major key signature recognition. The pretest was administered to both the Treatment A and B students on the first and penultimate days of class. Results were compiled and will be discussed in Chapter Four.
The data collected from both Group A and Group B were analyzed with
a two-way analysis of variance (ANOVA) test. The total scores, as well
as each of the subsections, were tested for significance of different scores
in relation to treatment and gender.
Study Design- Digital Affective Response Technology (DART)
The third portion of this study focused upon the affective response of students to certain music selections via the Digital Affective Response Technology (DART) software program.
In the second week of classes, the Treatment B students were instructed how to use the DART program in the recitation lab. Each student was issued an identical music CD and instructed to listen to the given selections in the order indicated (Appendix G). Students were instructed to judge the music at every moment, using criteria with each student deciding what was “good” and/or “bad”. The students also indicated whether they had heard that selection before (Appendix G). The total number who participated in this portion of the study was n=83.
There were nine music selections, in 60 second segments, which the students listened to: (1) Duke Ellington’s: “Cotton Tail”, (2) Charlie Parker’s: “Bird Feathers”, (3) Dave Brubeck’s: “Blue Rondo a la Turk”, (4) Dizzy Gillespie’s: “Bebop”, (5) Dave Brubeck’s: “Take Five”, (6) Thelonius Monk’s: “Straight, No Chaser”, and (7) Don Ellis’: “Bulgarian Buldge”. Later in the quarter (sixth week of class) students listened to two more selections: (8) segment of Edgar Varèse: “Poème électronique”, and (9) George Crumb’s: “Lost Bells”, from “Black Angels”.
The first seven selections were chosen for six reasons: (1) to maintain general style and genre, (2) to maintain general instrumentation, (3) to maintain general tempo, (4) to demonstrate contrasting meters, (5) to demonstrate contrasting melodic contours (conjunct and disjunct), (6) to demonstrate contrasting melodic rhythmic construction (complex and simple) and (little syncopation to much syncopation).
After the first series of data was collected, a general trend was perceived: all of the compositions had the same general trend (a gradual increase of rating from the beginning to the end). In order to conclude that this was not a trend due to the testing instrument, two more selections were added (numbers eight and nine) with a hypothesis that there would be a negative listening rating.
The second-by-second rating data was collected from each student’s computer and imported into the database program Excel with an analysis tools add-in. Data from each selection were collected and analyzed. The data were analyzed with the following questions in mind: (1) what was the student’s preference for the composition with regard to meter differentials? (2) what was the student’s preference for the composition with regard to melodic contours? (conjunct and disjunct), (3) what was the student’s preference for the composition with regard to melodic rhythmic construction?, (4) what was the period of time that it takes for a student to make a decision about the composition (positive and/or negative)? (5) were any of the above questions effected due to the gender of the student?
The following chapter will discuss the findings of the three areas of study: (1) attitudes regarding the effectiveness of multimedia presentation tools within a music fundamentals course for non-music majors, (2) the cognitive gains on certain topics in the music fundamentals course with regard to the incorporation of both commercially produced and concept-specific produced software by the author, and (3) the affective response of students to certain music selections via the DART software program.