teaching – Mastering Librarianship

ETL503 – 4.1 Music Copyright in the Primary School setting

Teachers regularly use music in the school setting, but what are the copyright laws in Australia that must be adhered to? According to Smartcopying, the official guide to copyright for Australian schools and TAFE, music in schools refers to “both musical works and sound recordings” (Smartcopying, Music, 12 August 2021).

In my particular primary school setting, we are blessed to have a specialist music teacher who provides lessons to students each week. Although as part of my TL role I provided the outline for copyright when it was updated this year, all staff were also made aware of these updates too as we were needing to teach remotely. As part of this challenging time of online learning, all staff needed to be aware of the implications of using music in the digital environment, especially when recording themselves or creating videos for their students. In addition, on returning to school, uploading school events such as award presentations were also necessary, as was liturgies and masses (being that we are a Catholic school).

Using music for videos or presentations can be incorporated when it is uploaded to a password-protected intranet or school website. It can also be shared to the school community via email or message through an educational app (such as Compass, but excludes apps such as Snapchat or TikTok). It is pertinent to mention that the school CANNOT upload the content to any social media platforms such as Facebook. Music recording companies may request the event be taken down from the social media platform.

The making and recording of school events is allowable under Australian copyright if it is performed or played and must display ‘This recording has been made under a licence from AMCOS and ARIA for school purposes only’ (Smartcopying, Music, 12 August 2021). For Catholic schools. under section 106 of the Copyright Act, permits schools to play sound recordings in public, such as at school events. In religious services our school often uses music to engage students, when we returned to school during term 4 this year, important celebrations, such as end-of-year mass needed to be live-streamed, to accommodate parents who could not attend the school grounds at the time. Since 30 March 2021, Smartcopying the Religious Education Coordinator needed to be aware of the implications of live-streaming and recording the service when music was involved, since this was a school-based event, and not held in the church, the national schools music licenses were applicable.

Module 4.1b Discussion Forum

It is the 21st Century and never before has our teaching and learning grown and changed at such a rapid rate, encompassed by a digital world. Educators are asked to change the boundaries of teaching and learning to ensure we are building learners for the future, an uncertain one, preparing students for jobs that are yet to exist in this current digital landscape and to become independent and yet collaborative lifelong learners.

Thus, we must ask ourselves, how do we ensure we are not only meeting the needs of our learners and preparing them for their future but also being accountable for this skill acquisition in this exponentially growing and changing information landscape?

As a society, we are data-driven and performance-based testing is a part of this requirement in being accountable. Data identifies needs, gaps, performance, progress and readiness for employment or further education. However, “teaching to a test” should not be the approach either. Prior preparation is an important element in ensuring students go into the test environment with as little stress and anxiety as possible and having the skills to appropriately respond to the style of testing is also beneficial.

These skills need to be explicitly taught, though endless weeks of using past test papers as part of Literacy and Numeracy programming is not ideal. In the end, these tests show a snapshot of the student’s learning at one small point in time and do not reflect them as the complete learner.

Issues with standardised testing can start with some students or parents of students being reluctant to participate in the standardised testing. This weakens the legitimacy of the data gathered and will not be a true reflection of the school as a whole.

What should be the alternatives then?

Should this be up to individual schools?

Is it a true reflection of student learning?

Now much testing is being administered online, are there other skills that are needed?

How do students obtain these skills? Is the test reflective of their skills on the computer or their knowledge as a whole in literacy and numeracy?

I once had a year 5 child finish their NAPLAN practise test exam in about 10 minutes. She just clicked on any answer to get it over and done with, clearly not reading any of the questions and lacking skills in some instances to do so, how effective is the test then, when it is not a true indication of her skills or ability? Data drives everything – how else could we achieve this means to an end?

There is also the ongoing problem with standardised testing not being appropriate to measure such things as creativity, critical thinking, resilience, compassion, generosity, determination, just to name a few. Inquiry-based learning is much better at making students’ thinking valued, visible and actively promoted (Ritchhart, 2015) showing their deeper knowledge. That is assuming that the teacher has the required skills and competency to not only know about this approach but also the knowledge to ensure that they can move from the “sage on the stage” to the “guide on the side”, asking the right questions, reimagining the classroom and ensuring a space for collaborative learning. (Texas Education Agency, 2019). To teach how to think, not what to think.

Therefore, a variety of approaches must be adopted. To be accountable for a student’s academic success teachers are required to plan, develop and assist student learning to encourage deeper thinking through a process of independent and guided learning. Some skills require explicit teaching, but this should only be the foundation for further inquiry learning to ensure students are critical, reflective and evaluative thinkers through a collaborative approach to teaching and learning. Some of these skills may also be taught in the library and therefore the teacher-librarian has a unique role in supporting this critical and creative thinking.

According to the IFLA Library Guidelines (2015, p. 7), “The goal of all school libraries is to develop information literate students who are responsible and ethical participants in society. Information literate students are competent self-directed learners who are aware of their information needs and actively engage in the world of ideas. They display confidence in their ability to solve problems and know how to locate relevant and reliable information. They are able to manage technology tools to access information and to communicate what they have learned…” This definition of the IFLA goal of school libraries puts teacher-librarians in a transformative position to ensure innovation happens and students become an implicit part of their learning journey.

I believe a whole-school approach to constructivist teaching methods is the most effective way to achieve enculturate across the entire school community, with a top-down approach. The support of the Principal and leadership team must come first, to be the driving force behind the efforts. There will always be teachers who prefer to work as individuals and who feel their tried and tested methods and programs “just work” and “get the results”, or they want to only do one part of the new approach because they believe it doesn’t suit all learners. This is not going to achieve the best results and the whole school need to be “sold” on not only the how of inquiry-based learning, but the why. Why should they change what they are doing? Why will it benefit 21st-century learners? Why will it make their teaching more effective? Why will it produce lifelong learners?

I do believe all learners of the 21st Century need to be prepared for this ever-changing information landscape, and as educators, we too need to be lifelong learners to prepare them for critical and creative thinking in this new paradigm.

30+ Important things a test can’t measure – POSTER

References

International Federation of Library Associations and Institutes (IFLA) (2015). IFLA School Library Guidelines. 2nd edition. http://www.ifla.org/files/assets/school-libraries-resource-centers/publications/ifla-school-library-guidelines.pdf

Ritchhart, R. (2015). Creating Cultures of Thinking: The 8 Forces We Must Master to Truly Transform Our Schools. Wiley.

Rippel, M. (2015, April). All About Learning Press. 30+ Important things that tests can’t measure. 532 https://blog.allaboutlearningpress.com/important-things-that-tests-cant-measure/

Texas Education Agency. (2011, September). I Have a Question. Why 21st Century Learning? [Video]. YouTube. https://youtu.be/LoYdJYd8SoU

Tag: teaching

COPYRIGHT and MUSIC in SCHOOLS

Learning and Teaching in the 21st Century