Assessing Creativity in Music: International Perspectives and Practices

Abstract

This article presents six case studies from England, Australia, and Hong Kong, which illustrate the different ways creativity in music is defined and assessed by teachers and learners in various educational contexts. It considers the influence of educational policies on the assessment of musical creativity. It also examines the key features of music creativity assessment in order to draw parallels between various contexts. The article concludes with a discussion of the implications for classroom practice.

Peculiarities of Development of Senior Pupils’ Musical Creativity Using Musical Computer Technologies (Mct) in a Music Lesson

“…Participating in creative activity helps not only to internalize knowledge better, but also develops the ability to relate new knowledge to the old, teaches not only to memorize new information, but also to adapt it when raising ideas and creating new products. Therefore, it is very important to present tasks which would be oriented towards presentation of musical creativity, and particularly towards its result (Leong, Burnard, et al, 2012).…”

“…As S. Leong, P. Burnard and others (2012) claim, tasks that are formulated by a teacher during creative activity can be oriented not only towards development of creativity, but also towards the pursuit of pupils' music mastery, towards improvement of their musical skills, towards improvement of quality of music performance. Meanwhile, when assessing the product of musical creativity the following criteria are most often distinguished: novelty, minuteness of solution of the problem, integrity, originality, appropriacy, value (Leong, Burnard, et al, 2012). Some scientists (Murphy, 2002;Leong, Burnard, et al, 2012) claim that when assessing a teacher must be flexible, he/she must be able to evaluate the idea and its realization as a unique and valuable result of musical creativity.…”

“…Meanwhile, when assessing the product of musical creativity the following criteria are most often distinguished: novelty, minuteness of solution of the problem, integrity, originality, appropriacy, value (Leong, Burnard, et al, 2012). Some scientists (Murphy, 2002;Leong, Burnard, et al, 2012) claim that when assessing a teacher must be flexible, he/she must be able to evaluate the idea and its realization as a unique and valuable result of musical creativity. When the criteria of musical creativity are flexible, a teacher encourages pupils to make decisions, to be responsible for their choices, to ask questions courageously and to look for answers themselves.…”

MOKINIŲ MUZIKINĖS KOMPOZICIJOS VERTINIMAS KONKURSŲ VERTINIMO KOMISIJOS NARIŲ PATIRTIes aspektu

“…Siaurąja prasme muzikinė kūryba -naujo muzikinio produkto sukūrimas. Todėl muzikinį kūrybiškumą tyrinėjusių autorių (Hickey, 2002;Hennessey, 2009;Mazzola ir kt., 2011;Leong ir kt., 2012;Odena, 2012a) darbuose pateikiama muzikinio kūrybiškumo, kaip kūrybos rezultato, samprata. Muzikinio kūrybiškumo produktu gali būti: muzikinė kompozicija, improvizacija, muzikos kūrinio interpretacija, muzikos kūrinio aranžuotė (Mazzola ir kt., 2011).…”

“…Muzikos kūrybos produktui vertinti taikomų kriterijų deriniai taip pat skiriasi. Vertinant muzikinę kūrybą siūloma atsižvelgti į keliamos problemos ir jos sprendimo integralumą, naudotų šaltinių adekvatumą (Webster, 1991); problemos sprendimo savitumą, detalumą, integralumą, tinkamumą (Leong ir kt., 2012); produkto naujumą, vertingumą, išbaigtumą (Mishra, Henriksen, 2013); originalumą, panaudotų muzikos elementų įvairovę ir integralumą, kūrinio formos logiškumą (Mazzola ir kt., 2011). Muzikos kūrinių analizės atstovai (Šileika, 2002;Ambrazas, 2010) skiria šiuos muzikos kūrinio analizės vienetus: forma, naudotos muzikos išraiškos priemonės (muzikos kalbos elementai), jų tarpusavio sąveika.…”