A comparison of aural and aural-visual modeling on the development of executive and performance skills of beginning recorder students

The purpose of this study was to compare the effects of aural and aural-visual modeling on the development of executive and performance skills of third-grade beginning recorder students. A secondary goal of my study was to determine whether music aptitude was a factor in students' responses to modeling condition. Two groups of students received instruction on the soprano recorder and heard musical examples modeled by the instructor. Modeling condition and music aptitude served as independent variables. Executive (i.e., posture, hand position, arm position, and finger position), performance (i.e., fingerings, airstream, tonguing, rhythmic stability, and improvisation), and composite recorder skills served as the dependent variables.;Before implementing the treatment phase, students completed Gordon's Intermediate Measures of Music Audiation (IMMA) (1986a), and I randomly assigned pre-existing classes of third graders to either the aural or the aural-visual modeling treatment. In the aural modeling treatment, recorder instruction was conducted from the back of the classroom, where students were able to hear musical examples as they were performed, but were unable to watch as I manipulated the recorder. In the aural-visual modeling condition, recorder instruction was conducted from the front of the room, where students were able to hear musical examples as they were performed as well as see the teacher manipulate the instrument.;At the end of approximately 5 months of treatment, I video recorded participants' executive and performance skills, which were analyzed by two external evaluators and me. Data were then subjected to Analysis of Variance (ANOVA) to compare the effects of modeling condition and aptitude on the executive, performance, and composite recorder skills of students.;There were no statistically significant differences between the executive skills (p = .75), performance skills (p = .46), or composite recorder skills (p = .49) of students in the aural and aural-visual treatments. There were no significant interactions between modeling condition and aptitude level. Music aptitude, however, was found to have a significant effect (p = .001) on the students' performance and composite recorder skills. I concluded that although neither modeling condition was significantly more effective in developing executive and performance skills of third-grade beginning recorder students, an understanding of a student's music aptitude level may prove useful in planning beginning recorder instruction.