Account of Placement- When I was doing my work experience I kept a diary of where I was and the tasks that I was doing on each day. Because I was doing a 2-week placement but both weeks were on the same timetable I have only include one of the weeks.
Monday 24th October – I started at a Secondary school in Alster. We were only there for an hour and were supposed to have 2 pupils but one didn’t turn up and another was on work experience so we didn’t have anyone to teach. It gave me a good chance for Ted Hanman to tell me what we would be doing for the 2 weeks and for him to find out what standard of brass playing I was so that he could decide how I could help him. After that we had 3 primary schools for the rest of the day. There were lots of pupils who came in groups of about 2-3 for their lessons. For the first couple of days I was just watching and playing along with the pupils. All of the pupils were working from the same book so I had a chance to compare the standard of he pupils. There were 2 students who were at the end of book one so they had earned their certificate. They were presented it at their lesson in the second week.
Tuesday 25th October – I was at 3 different schools today. They were all primary schools. At the first school we had 10 pupils who were all beginners. The school hadn’t had brass lessons in the previous year so all the pupils had only started this year. This meant that I could help teach the basics to them such as how to hold the instrument and how to make a noise in it. At the other 2 schools there was more of a mixture in standard in the pupils. I again helped play the pieces with the pupils so that they knew how it was supposed to sound. There were another 20-25 pupils at the 2 schools.
Wednesday 26th October – On Wednesday Ted Hanman takes a jazz band and an Orchestra at a Secondary School in Stratford. This meant that we worked the hours 9am-8pm when on the other days in the week we worked 9am-3pm. We had 3 schools to teach in before the jazz band and Orchestra and the pupils who were in the first schools were mainly beginners, but last school was a Secondary school so the pupils were older. This was interesting because I was helping teach pupils who are my standard and better. This was more difficult for me because I didn’t know of any advice that I could give, but I also found it good to play along with them. Next we were at the jazz band and then Orchestra. Although I was playing in both of these I was watching Ted Hanman and I found it interesting to see how he chanced his style of teaching to conduct groups of people rather than just ones and twos.
Thursday 27th October – We were at one secondary school and four primary schools today. First we went to 2 primary schools, which were like a lot like the other primary schools that we had been at earlier in the week. Then we went to a secondary school in Leamington. We had 6 different pupils all who had individual lessons. They were at different standards so I was sometimes playing with them and sometimes just watching and listening. Finally I went to a primary school where there were only 2 groups. There was one boy who was of a good standard and another group of 20 pupils who were all beginners. This was a difficult group to teach because of the number of pupils in the group. We couldn’t go any quicker than the slowest member of the group so even if most of the people understood and only one or two didn’t we couldn’t go on.
Friday 28th October – On Friday we were at the same school all day. It was another school in Alcester. Many of the pupils were of a very good standard, a lot better than me. This meant that I couldn’t do a lot to help teach the pupil but I could play along with them. There was one group of two pupils where one was practicing a piece of music that he was going to perform. While Ted Hanman was listening to him I got to teach the other pupil for ½ an hour. He wasn’t a beginner but I was a better player than him so I gave him a few tips in how to improve his playing and just played through some music with him.
Evaluation – Each activity that I did had an aim. When I was listening to how he was teaching each pupil I got to understand how to notice the things they were doing wrong. There are only a small amount of common mistakes that people make so after a small amount of time I could hear and see these mistakes in each person. This was important when I was left to teach people on my own when Ted Hanman was teaching someone else. I also learned the differences between teaching an individual pupil and teaching a group. I think that these things helped Ted Hanman, the pupil and me. I learned about how to teach and the types of work that a peripatetic teacher would do. There were some problems as we were going along. There was many times when I was unsure what to do but I felt I couldn’t ask Ted Hanman because he was teaching a pupil. There were also more practical problems with the size of the rooms we were in, the size of the groups and with pupils being ill or not turning up for their lesson. I think that the pupils would be helped by me playing along with them and showing them how the music went. Ted Hanman also said that he enjoyed and was helped by telling me some of his teaching ideas and his reasons for doing them and also for asking for my opinion on them so overall a lot was achieved by this work experience. If I had to do this work Experience again I would have arranged what I had to do in advance better. When I turned up each day I always brought my cornet with me but I often didn’t use it. My own organisation would have made the tasks easier but I didn’t feel affected the work experience much. Overall I felt that my work experience went well. I felt it helped me to understand the job of a peripatetic brass teacher. It also helped me to learn what it was like to be in a work environment instead of a school environment and finally I also enjoyed being on work experience with Warwickshire County Music Services for two weeks.
