AN EXPLORATORY ANALYSIS INTO THE ROLE OF GESTURE IN INSTRUMENTAL MUSIC TEACHING AND LEARNING

5th Conference of the International Society for Gesture Studies (ISGS). Lund University, Sweden.

24 July, 2012

Lilian Simones

Queen’s University Belfast

Note: video material presented at this conference was excluded from the present slides in order to protect participants’ rights to anonymity

and confidentiality.

STUDY 1

AIMS:

To Test the adequacy of McNeill’s classification of spontaneous co-verbal gestures (1992,2005) and Jensenius et al, 2010 functional classification of musical gestures, in the context of instrumental music education

To identify and describe any particular gestures where these classifications may require adaptation or new categorisation

PARTICIPANTS

TEACHERS STUDENTS

Ethnicity Caucasian Caucasian

Gender

Age 39-55 8-10

Experience 10-30 teaching Grade 1– 5 months of tuition

Education 2 PhD1 Master’s degree

P4-P6 (Northern Ireland)

Accreditation

All specific teaching accreditation

-

PROCEDURE

Teach/learn in one-to-one

environment:

2 contrasting pieces during three consecutive lessons.

6 video recordings per Dyad

(3 piece 1 and 3 piece II)

total18 video recordings

ANALYSISSystematic observation

Elan Software for gestural annotation (developed by Max Planck Institute of Psycholinguistics, Nijmegen, the Netherlands, see Lausberg & Sloetjes 2009)

Teaching behaviours

(adapted from Carlin 1997 and Zhukov, 2004)

DemonstratingModelling

Giving advicePractice

suggestionsAsking questions Giving information

Giving feedbackListening/observing

McNeill 1992, 2005Types: form and

meaning

Deictic Iconic

Metaphoric Beats

Jensenius et al, 2010Musical gestures –

Function

Communicative gestures

Sound producingSound facilitating

Sound accompanying

VerbalNon-

verbalMusical

Cohen’s Kappa of at least .87 (p< .05) was achieved for both teaching behaviours and teachers’ gestures categories.

INTER-ANNOTATOR RELIABILITY(BAKEMAN & GOTTMAN, 1987 )

STUDY 1

RESULTS

MUSICAL GESTURES

CATEGORISATION

MUSICAL BEATS

CONDUCTING STYLE

MIMICS

TOUCH

PLAYING PIANO

GESTURES FOUNDTOTAL: 3 TEACHERS/18 TEACHING SESSIONS: 638 GESTURES

68% SPONTANEOUS CO-VERBAL32% MUSICAL GESTURES

39%

10%7%

5%

12%

3%

14%

6%

4%

Gestures

DeicticMetaphoricIconicMusical BeatsBeatsConducting stylePlaying pianoMimicsTouch

SPONTANEOUS CO-VERBAL GESTURES (MCNEILL, 1992; 2055)

Freq.%

Function and meaning

T. Behaviour association

Modalities

Verbal

NV Mus.

DIECTIC 39% Symbolic association of meaning to musical icons; Synchronisation

All – info and modelling

76% 5% 19%

METAPHORIC 10% Co-verbal Communicative - PMU

Info and modelling 89% 1% 10%

ICONIC 7% Co-verbal Communicative- PMUDescription of musical signs in the air sometimes with diectic assoc. - meaning

Used differently by the three teachers. T1 performed more across teaching behaviours

92% 6% 2%

BEATS 12% Co-verbal Communicative - PMU

Feedback; modelling

86% 0% 14%

MUSICAL GESTURES

Freq.%

Function and meaning Teaching behaviour

Modalities %

Verbal

NV Musical

Playing piano 14 Highly communicative, associated with Verbal and musical modalities

Demo; Info; Modelling78% with Verbal and musical modalities

22

Musical beats 5 EntrainmentSound accompanyingFacilitating SPSynchronisationSetting initial tempo

Info; listening/observing; Modelling

10 14 76

Conducting style

3 CommunicativePreparing to start/endSynchronisationEntrainment

Modelling 5 5 90

Mimics 6 Facilitating/ rectifying sound production gestures/movements – promoting imitative behaviour

Demo; Modelling 36 34 30

Touch 4 CommunicativeWeight/movement of hand/armPhysical postureKinaesthetic sensationPreparing to start/endAssoc. with verbal metaphorical content

Info. T2 also listening/obser. T3 modelling

59 7 34

TYPES OF GESTURES USED PER TEACHER(PERCENTAGE OF GESTURES FREQUENCIES)

Deict

ic

Metap

horic

Iconi

c

Musica

l bea

ts

Beats

Condu

ctin

g st

yle

Play

ing

pian

o

Mimics

Touc

h0

10

20

30

40

50

60

T1T2T3

SPONTANEOUS CO-VERBAL GESTURES VERSUS MUSICAL GESTURES

COMMUNICATION

SYNCHRONY

S. CO-VERBAL Musical gestures

Ubiquitous in human communication (Ekman & Friesen, 1969; McNeill 1992; Goldin- Meadow 2003)

Ubiquitous and Essential in the process of musical communication

S. CO-VERBAL Musical gestures

Synchronous with speech(McNeill 1992, 2005; Goldin- Meadow 2003)

Synchronous to both: the music and the experience of music making.Accompany either: speech, music making at the same time, or only music making

IDIOSYNCRASY

CONTENT

S. CO-VERBAL MUSICAL GESTURES

Idiosyncratic movements of the hands and arms that accompany speech in highly dynamic communicative contexts(McNeill 1992; Ishino & Stam, 2011).

Idiosyncratic use by the three teachers in study, and spontaneously used during the teaching process

S. CO-VERBAL Musical gestures

Verbal content determines in many instances the type of gestureMay represent, complement features in the speech or represent aspects on speaker’s thoughts(Ishino & Stam, 2011).

Musical content guided teachers use of musical gesturesFacilitated attempts to represent the material available in the music score: – make it accessible to students– enabling teachers to project ideas in ways unavailable through speech alone

Spontaneous co-verbal gestures

Spontaneous co-musical gestures

THANK YOU!