Teaching the Postsecondary Music Student with Disabilities

'How can I include them?': Teaching pupils with visual impairment in the inclusive music classroom

“…In sum, we agree with Moliner (2020) andwith McCord (2017), that given their readiness to be used with all students, the findings of this exploratory study promote inclusive music education in the form of teaching procedures that guarantee the presence, participation and learning of all the students in ordinary educative backgrounds. The findings reveal the multi-sensory resources of three well-established 20th Century music methods -which can be transferred not only to other active music pedagogies, but to other music learning backgroundsas an alternative to encourage the autonomy of teachers working in mainstream classrooms with students with visual impairments.…”

“…Although we can affirm that Ward's, Dalcroze's and Suzuki's music methods facilitate the inclusion of pupils with visual disabilities, it is essential that in order to be effective the multi-sensory resources are implemented in combination with specific strategies, adaptations and specialized materials. This ensures the participation of these students in mainstream classrooms (in line with Baker & Green, 2016, 2017Chaves, 2013;Pino & Viladot, 2019;Sánchez & Muñoz, 2020). Some of the inclusive teaching resources applied by the experienced teacher were: using the verbal description of movement, providing clear guidelines, keeping a safe space for movement, asking peers to accompany the student, using manipulative materials, providing muscular movement guidance, and the transcription of music notation into other formats.…”

“…Instead, it implies having effective teaching resources and guidelines on how to cope with visual impairment (McDowell, 2010). According to researchers in this field, teaching resources should involve inclusive strategies, specialized materials, and adaptations (Baker & Green, 2016, 2017Chaves, 2013;Pino & Viladot, 2019;Sánchez & Muñoz, 2020). Some authors agree on the importance to develop the braille music-reading (Coates, 2010;Park, 2014;Chaves, 2014;Baker, 2014), and while we are aware that this is a controversial issue that generates a lot of debate in this discipline, it should be noted that music notation is not the only way to learn music.…”

“…Inclusive music education means anticipating the needs of all possible students who might attend the school (McCord, 2017), paying special attention to the procedures of music teaching that guarantees the presence, participation and learning of all the students in mainstream settings (Díaz & Moliner, 2020). Thus, according to Thompson (1999), music educators should become aware of the multiple possibilities they have and must provide a greater number of hands-on activities, multi-sensory experiences, repetition and practice to ensure successful learning for all students.…”

Contesting music education policies through the concept of reasonable accommodation: Teacher autonomy and equity enactment in Finnish music education

“…In the interest of creating policies that support integration, the focus of this trend was to arrange education based on a detailed assessment of students’ needs, instead of specific impairments (Vehmas, 2010). In the field of music education, this shift in thinking is demonstrated in a number of articles in which a dichotomy is presented between ‘abled’ people and students, characterised by terms such as ‘special needs’, ‘special educational needs’ or ‘students/people with disabilities’ (e.g., Adamek, 2001; Adamek & Darrow, 2010; Darrow, 2003; Kivijärvi & Poutiainen, 2020; Lapka, 2006; McCord & Fitzgerald, 2006; McCord, 2017; Melago, 2014; Ockelford, 2012; Rathgeber, 2016; Vanweelden, 2001).…”