music technology skills support pack 2

Unit Assessment Support

H243 75 Music Technology Skills (National 5)

Package 2: Unit-by-Unit approach

Valid from August 2013

This edition: August 2014 (version 1.2)

The information in this publication may be reproduced to support SQA qualifications. This publication must not be reproduced for commercial or trade purposes. This material is for use by assessors.

Please refer to the note of changes at the end of this document for details of changes from previous version (where applicable).

© Scottish Qualifications Authority 2014

ContentsIntroduction 1

What this pack covers 2

Assessment 3

Evidence 5

Re-assessment arrangements 7

Examples of candidates’ responses 8

Examples of recording documentation 10

Appendix 1: Assessment information for candidates 13

IntroductionThis assessment support is for assessors and is designed to meet the requirements of the Unit Outcomes and Assessment Standards as specified in the ‘What this pack covers’ section. It sets out a possible assessment approach or approaches which are in line with the standards that must be met. It is designed to be as open and flexible as possible.

Where assessments are suggested, these can be used to assess your candidates, adapt for your own assessment programmes or help you develop your own assessments.

Assessors should use their professional judgement, subject knowledge and experience, and understanding of their candidates, to determine the most appropriate ways to generate evidence and the conditions and contexts in which they are used. This pack provides an example of how it can be done.

Evidence can take a number of different forms and may be a combination of practical, written, oral and/or recorded evidence, as appropriate to the assessment activity and the needs of the individual candidate.

Equality and inclusionThis assessment has been designed to ensure that there are no unnecessary barriers to assessment. Assessments have been designed to promote equal opportunities while maintaining the integrity of the qualification.

For guidance on assessment arrangements for disabled candidates and/or those with additional support needs, please follow the link to the Assessment Arrangements web page: www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/14977.html.

Guidance on inclusive approaches to delivery and assessment in this Unit or Units is provided in the Unit Support Notes.

Unit assessment support for National 5 Music Technology Skills (H243 75) — package 2: Unit-by-Unit approach 1

http://www.sqa.org.uk/sqa/14977.html

What this pack coversUnit titleMusic Technology Skills (National 5)

Outcomes and Assessment StandardsThis pack exemplifies one approach to generating evidence for all Outcome and Assessment Standards of this Unit.

Outcome 1

The candidate will:

1 Use hardware and software to capture audio from a range of sources by:

1.1 Selecting and using appropriate audio input devices 1.2 Applying appropriate microphone placement and techniques 1.3 Constructing the signal path for multiple inputs1.4 Setting appropriate input gain and monitoring levels1.5 Overdubbing a track

Outcome 2

The candidate will:

2 Use hardware and software to manipulate audio from a range of sources by:

2.1 Applying creative/corrective equalisation2.2 Applying time domain and other effects 2.3 Applying a range of mixing techniques 2.4 Editing tracks


AssessmentPurposeThe purpose of this assessment is to generate assessment evidence for all of the Outcomes and Assessment Standards for this Unit.

Overview of assessment Assessment should take place when candidates are ready to be assessed. It is the assessor’s responsibility to ensure appropriate learning and teaching, and to provide support for candidates, including opportunities for appropriate consolidation and remediation of learning both before and, if necessary, after any summative assessment.

This pack consists of exemplification material showing possible assessments which could be used to produce evidence that the candidate has achieved the two Unit Outcomes.

The approach used here is one possible model and centres are free to devise alternative approaches and assessments to suit individual local needs, resources and circumstances.

The package consists of a series of short focused exemplar assessment tasks that cover each of the Outcomes and Assessment Standards.

Task Outcome Assessment Standard(s)

brief 1: electric guitar 1 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4brief 2: overdubbing 1 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4, 1.5brief 3: acoustic guitar 1 1.1, 1.2, 1.3, 1.4brief 4: vocal 1/2 1.1, 1.2, 1.4, 2.4brief 5: mix 2 2.1, 2.2, 2.3

The candidate must complete briefs 1 and 2, or 2 and 3 (or similar tasks provided by the assessor) to provide evidence of achieving all the Assessment Standards of Outcome 1 in the contexts of both direct input and recording using a microphone.

The candidate must complete briefs 4 and 5 (or similar tasks provided by the assessor) to provide evidence of achieving all the Assessment Standards of Outcome 2.

Each brief may be adapted to suit the centre’s or candidate’s needs. For example, other direct input sources or acoustic instruments may be substituted into briefs 1 and 2. Note that candidates are expected to have developed skills in the context of a wide range of input sources, but evidence is only required of using one mic and one other source.


These assessment tasks may be given to individual candidates at any point during teaching and learning, when the assessor wishes to confirm that a candidate has achieved a specific standard.

The assessment information for candidates is provided in Appendix 1 and may be detached and given to the candidate.

Assessment conditionsAssessors must exercise their professional responsibility in ensuring that that evidence submitted by a candidate is the candidate’s own work.

Prior to any assessment, candidates should be made aware of the amount, quality and nature of the evidence required to demonstrate that they have met the relevant Assessment Standards. Candidates should know that their work may be assessed, and know the standards against which it will be judged.

Candidates should be given sufficient time to enable them to complete an assessment task.

Although candidates are expected to work independently when undertaking assessment, they must also be supported throughout the process. The requirements of the assessment should be made clear to candidates at the outset. Assessors can clarify with candidates how to approach the assessment and to guide them in producing their response.

Assessors may also prompt candidates where appropriate to clarify that they have met the requirements of the assessment but should not direct them as to any specific response. For example, assessors should not provide specific advice on how to improve responses or provide model answers.

Before being issued with the Unit assessment material, the centre should be confident that candidates are competent in the topic and appropriately prepared, through a range of learning activities set at a similar standard.

Where the assessment task or the preparation for the assessment task involves group activity, centres should ensure that candidates are individually able to provide evidence that they have met the Assessment Standards.


Evidence Evidence to be gatheredAssessors must ensure that the candidate has opportunities to gather evidence for all the Unit Outcomes and Assessment Standards. Evidence must be retained for quality assurance purposes.

Evidence may be generated using the assessment activities suggested in this Unit Assessment Support pack, or by means of other discrete assessment activities, or could naturally occur during learning and teaching.

Assessment evidence can be drawn from a variety of activities and presented in a variety of formats. Assessors should use their professional judgement, subject knowledge and experience, and understanding of their candidates, to determine the most appropriate ways to generate evidence and the conditions and contexts in which they are used.

In the case of assessment by observation or oral questioning, evidence should include assessors’ comments and other relevant evidence that shows clearly the basis on which assessment judgements have been made.

Assessors should keep accurate records of the evidence gathered and the assessment decisions made.

Evidence may be stored in hard copy or electronic format as appropriate. All evidence should be clearly labelled with the candidate’s name, date of completion, and assessor’s comments.

Judging evidenceThe table below describes how the Assessment Standards may be met. Different assessment approaches may be expected to generate different types of evidence, but the same Assessment Standards will apply.

Assessors should ensure that candidates are assessed only on whether they have met the Assessment Standards and not the quality of, for example, their writing, drawing, presentation, planning or ICT skills, unless these are required by the Assessment Standards.


Judging evidence for Music Technology Skills (National 5)

Outcome Assessment Standards Making assessment judgements Appropriate evidence1 The

candidate will use hardware and software to capture audio from a range of sources by:

1.1 selecting and using appropriate audio input devices and sources

uses appropriate microphone techniques for at least three different types of source, using two types of microphone and two polar patterns

applying safe working practices signal path operates successfully making independent decisions

on gain and levels no distortion

Observational evidence (supported by candidate log, screen shots, track sheets, and/or session data files) — all carried out with guidance if required.

Uses one mic, one direct line input and one other source (eg virtual instrument, loop), placement appropriate to source.

1.2 applying appropriate microphone placement and techniques1.3 constructing the signal path for multiple inputs1.4 setting appropriate input gain and monitoring levels1.5 overdubbing a track

2 The candidate will use hardware and software to manipulate audio from a range of sources by:

2.1 applying creative/corrective equalisation

all features applied correctly, working independently

other effects should include at least one other, such as compression, noise gate or modulation

mixing techniques should include volume, panning and one other (eg automation)

Observational evidence (supported by candidate log, screen shots, track sheets, and/or session data files). 2.2 applying time domain and other

effects 2.3 applying a range of mixing techniques 2.4 editing tracks


Re-assessment arrangementsSQA’s guidance on re-assessment is that normally there should be one or, in exceptional circumstances, two re-assessment opportunities. Re-assessment should be carried out under the same conditions as the original assessment.

If a candidate does not fully meet the requirements of an assessment, it is the assessor’s responsibility to decide the nature of the re-assessment that is most appropriate for the candidate on each occasion, within any SQA requirements and also within any specific centre’s policies and guidance. It is essential that any re-assessment makes the same level of demand.

It is the centre’s responsibility to ensure appropriate learning and teaching, and to provide support for candidates, including opportunities for appropriate consolidation and remediation of learning both before and, if necessary, after any summative assessment. In all cases of re-assessment, assessors must take care that reasonable remediation opportunities do not become overly supportive.

For the assessment in this document, the approach to re-assessment should be as follows.

If the candidate’s evidence does not satisfy all of the Outcomes and Assessment Standards, or is incomplete for an individual Outcome, the candidate only needs to be re-assessed on the specific Outcomes or Assessment Standards that have not been met.

Assessors should keep accurate records of all assessment decisions.


Examples of candidates’ responses This section gives some examples of candidates’ responses which would meet the standard of evidence necessary to meet the requirements of the Outcomes and Assessment Standards.

The ‘Judging evidence’ table indicates that observational evidence is acceptable for each Outcome of this Unit, but that, where possible, this should be supported by candidate log, screen shots, track sheets, and/or session data files.

The example below shows an excerpt from a candidate’s log created while working on brief 4, and exemplifies the amount of detail expected at this level. The candidate’s name and the date should always be included on each page of any supporting documentation.


This example below shows an excerpt from a candidate’s blog created while working on brief 5. The candidate has usefully combined screen shots from the software, with some commentary about the task.

The supporting documentation may be produced electronically (as illustrated) or paper-based, and in a variety of formats or layouts. When stored electronically, the audio file(s) created may be hyperlinked to the log file.

Unit assessment support for National 5 Music Technology Skills (H243 75) — package 2: Unit by Unit approach 9

Examples of recording documentationThe documentation that follows can be used to record candidates’ evidence and to reference it against the Outcomes and Assessment Standards. Assessors may use or adapt the suggested templates, or use any other appropriate methods of recording candidates’ achievement and evidence, but it must be clearly referenced against the Outcomes and Assessment Standards of the Unit.

In the case of assessment by observation or oral questioning, evidence should include assessors’ comments and other relevant supporting evidence that shows clearly the basis on which assessment judgements have been made.

It is recommended that all evidence be identified with the candidate’s name and date of production. Since one item of evidence may be used as evidence that several Assessment Standards have been met, each piece of evidence should be identified in such a way that it can be referenced on more than one occasion.

Unit assessment support for National 5 Music Technology Skills (H243 75) — package 2: Unit by Unit approach 10

Candidate assessment record: Music Technology Skills (National 5)

Candidate’s name: __________________________________ Class/group: ______________

Candidate number: __________________________________ Centre: ___________________

In the case of assessment by observation or oral questioning, evidence should include assessors’ comments and other relevant supporting evidence that shows clearly the basis on which assessment judgements have been made.

Outcome 1: Use hardware and software to capture audio from a range of sources by:

Assessment Standard Date achieved Evidence Assessor’s comment Initials

1.1 Selecting and using appropriate audio input devices and sources

1.2 Applying appropriate microphone placement and techniques

1.3 Constructing the signal path for multiple inputs

1.4 Setting appropriate input gain and monitoring levels


1.5 overdubbing a track

Assessor’s signature and date:

Outcome 2: Use hardware and software to manipulate audio from a range of sources by:

Assessment Standard Date achieved Evidence Assessor’s comment Initials

2.1 Applying creative/corrective equalisation

2.2 Applying time domain and other effects

2.3 Applying a range of mixing techniques

2.4 Editing tracks

Assessor’s signature and date:


Appendix 1: Assessment information for candidatesThis assessment applies to the following Unit Outcomes and Assessment Standards:

Outcome 1

The candidate will:

1 Use hardware and software to capture audio from a range of sources by:

1.1 Selecting and using appropriate audio input devices 1.2 Applying appropriate microphone placement and techniques 1.3 Constructing the signal path for multiple inputs1.4 Setting appropriate input gain and monitoring levels1.5 Overdubbing a track

Outcome 2

The candidate will:

2 Use hardware and software to manipulate audio from a range of sources by:

2.1 Applying creative/corrective equalisation2.2 Applying time domain and other effects 2.3 Applying a range of mixing techniques 2.4 Editing tracks

To pass this assessment you will have to show that you have met these Outcomes and Assessment Standards

Your assessor will let you know how the assessment will be carried out and any required conditions for doing it.

Outcome 1You must complete briefs 1 and 2, or 2 and 3 (or similar tasks provided by your assessor) to provide evidence that you have achieved all the Assessment Standards of Outcome 1 in the contexts of both direct input and recording using a microphone.

Outcome 2You must complete briefs 4 and 5 (or similar tasks provided by your assessor) to provide evidence that you have achieved all the Assessment Standards of Outcome 2.


Music Technology Skills (National 5)

Sample Unit Assessment brief 1 — electric guitar taskYour task is to record an electric guitar using an amplifier and two microphones, following the brief below.

Set up a new session or open an existing session within your recording software or hardware.

Add new tracks and a master fader.

Set up two microphone stands in front of the amplifier.

Attach two small diaphragm dynamic mics (SM57s are popular here).

Point one mic towards the middle of the speaker and one towards the outer edge.

Attach cables, following appropriate safety procedures.

Plug the instrument into the amplifier.

Tune the instrument.

Adjust gain as the performer plays to a suitable level for recording.

Wearing headphones, adjust the mic positions as your performer plays. You are looking for the point at which both microphones sound in balance and there are no phase issues. You may wish to solo the centre mic, adjust for best sound, then fine tune the mic at the edge of the speaker.

Adjust the headphone monitoring volume to a level that is appropriate for the performer.

Record the electric guitar.

Update your log.



Sample Unit assessment brief 2 — overdubbing task Your task is record an overdub, following the brief below. You may record any instrument or voice as an overdub.

Open an existing session within your recording software or hardware.

Add a track if required.

Set up a microphone/microphones or setup for a DI overdub.

Attach mics to stands as appropriate.


Tune instruments as necessary.

Adjust gain as the performer plays/sings to a suitable level for recording.

Wearing headphones, adjust the mic positions as your performer plays/sings as appropriate.


Record the overdub.

Update your log.



Sample Unit assessment brief 3 — acoustic guitar taskYour task is to record an acoustic guitar, using a coincident XY stereo micing technique. Follow the brief below.

Open an existing session within your recording software or hardware, or setup a new session if required.

Add two audio tracks.

Set up one mic stand if using a stereo bar. If you don’t have a stereo bar, set up two mic stands.

Attach small diaphragm cardioid condenser mics to the stand(s). (SDCs are good choices but are not the only choices for this application.)

Fix the mics so that the capsules are at a 90 ۠° to one another. This can be arranged with the capsules nearly touching or with the mics one on top of the other.


Tune instrument.

Adjust gain as the performer plays/sings to a suitable level for recording.

Wearing headphones, adjust the mic positions as your performer plays.


Record the instrument.

Update your log.

Note that you can adapt this brief to cover stereo micing of small ensembles. You may also explore other stereo technique such as ORTF.



Sample Unit assessment brief 4 — vocal taskYour task is to record and edit a lead vocal track. Follow the brief below.

Open an existing session within your recording software or hardware, or setup a new session if required.

Add three audio tracks.

Set up one mic stand and attach a large diaphragm cardioid (or multi-pattern) condenser.

Attach a pop shield.

Position the mic so that the capsule is just above the singer’s mouth, angled slightly downwards. This will help minimize the recording of plosives.


Adjust gain as the performer sings to a suitable level for recording.


Record three full passes on different track. Re-record full passes as required until you have at least three full takes.

Comping

Listen to each pass all the way through; you’re looking for the best performance of each section.

Add a new audio track to the session.

Take the best version of each section of the song and drag and drop it to this ‘comp’ track. Try to work methodically and, if possible, use full lines. It’s possible to edit mid line if the performances have been fairly consistent. Do cross fades as necessary.

Listen to the whole take when you finish, to verify that the edits sound natural and are as smooth as possible.

Update your log.



Sample Unit assessment brief 5 — mixYour task is to apply a range of mixing skills to a multi-track session consisting of at least five parts, following the brief below. You must include at least one insert effect and one effects send, and use EQ and dynamics as appropriate.

Open the session and name it as your own, saving into your folder.

Open the mix window.

Listen to the track and roughly balance the parts using the faders, keeping as close to 0 db (but not above) as you can.

Listen again and decide where in the stereo field you want to hear each element, and complete the panning.

Listen again and readjust the balance, using the faders if necessary.

Apply EQ and dynamics processing to the parts that require it.

Rebalance the mix as you work through the parts.

Decide which parts you will use effects on and what types of effects. You must decide which are to be sends and which should be inserts.

Apply your effects, both inserts and sends.

Balance the send effects with the dry tracks within the mix. If it is a mono effect, consider panning.

Listen to the whole mix again and adjust the panning/balance if required.

Apply automation to mix elements as appropriate.

Apply EQ/dynamics/effects to the master fader if required.

Bounce down your work to an audio master.

Update your log.



Task journal/log

Name: Date:

Task:

Add your own notes about the task here.

Attach screenshots to show that you have completed the task.


Administrative information

Published: August 2014 (version 1.2)

History of changes

Unit details

Version Description of change Authorised by

Date

1.1 Removed ‘supported by’ from ‘Judging evidence’ table.

Qualifications Development

Manager

August 2013

1.2 In the ‘Overview of assessment’ section, Assessment Standard coverage for brief 4 has been updated. The layout of the ‘Judging evidence’ tables has also been updated.

Qualifications Manager

August 2014

Security and confidentialityThis document can be used by practitioners in SQA approved centres for the assessment of National Units and not for any other purpose.

This document may only be downloaded from SQA’s designated secure website by authorised personnel.

CopyrightThis document may be reproduced in whole or in part for assessment purposes provided that no profit is derived from reproduction and that, if reproduced in part, the source is acknowledged. If it needs to be reproduced for any purpose other than assessment, it is the centre’s responsibility to obtain copyright clearance.

Re-use for alternative purposes without the necessary copyright clearance may constitute copyright infringement.

© Scottish Qualifications Authority 2014


music technology skills support pack 2

Documents