In the Korean music education scene, music teachers at present day are having difficulties in teaching Korean Traditional Music. Naturally, the teaching of Korean Folk Song which comprises the largest portion of Korean Traditional Music education also...
In the Korean music education scene, music teachers at present day are having difficulties in teaching Korean Traditional Music. Naturally, the teaching of Korean Folk Song which comprises the largest portion of Korean Traditional Music education also suffers from the lack of resources and creative methodologies. When faced with the tasks of lesson planning and teaching any subject, teachers frequently consult the Teacher's Guide Book. Therefore, the Teacher's Guide Book must to be a resourceful and effective tool which includes both the conceptional framework, practical teaching methodologies, and other contents to aid the lesson planning of the instructor. This paper examines the contents of the Teacher's Guide Book for 7th grade music curriculum, thereby verifying the validity of Teacher's Guide Book as well as educational effectiveness by using the Teacher's Guide Book.
For the method of this study, from the 9 Teacher's Guide Books, Korean Folk Songs found were selected and divided into their 5 native regions. The subject of this study includes the most represented Korean Folk Songs while the lesson guidelines given by the 7th National Educational Curriculum served as the comparative reference to the Teacher's Guide Books on such Korean Folk Songs for their methods, contents, and consistency.
The overall result points demonstrates the fact that there was a generally strong correlation between the lesson guideline from the 7th National Educational Curriculum and the 9 Teacher's Guide Books, in terms of conceptional framework and teaching instructions. However, there were also some aspects of shortcoming:
First, there were found some insufficient theoretical explanation on the Teacher's Guide Books. While the 7th National Curriculum emphasized upon the components of attune - scale of Korean Folk Music as well as "Si-Gim-Sae". With the exception of Nam-Do Folk Music, there was relative weakness in teaching the regional characteristics of "Si-Gim-Sae". In addition, almost no material touched upon the proper posture, breathing techniques, and announciation when singing Korean Folk Songs.
Second, the Teacher's Guide Books neglected the variations of tempo by only demonstrating the most basic type despite the 7th National Curriculum strongly encourages the teaching of tempo variations.
Third, from some of the Teacher's Guide Books, entirely incorrect information and/or typos were found in their contents, subsequently, mis-leading the students.
Fourth, there seemed to be inconsistency and/or discrepency in terms of the actual music printed among the different Teacher's Guide Books, thereby confusing the students learning the same folk songs.
Fifth, there were found some occasions in which the supplementary materials and the examples used did not correspond accordingly to the learning goal, reducing the affectiveness of teaching.
In sum, even with the educational expertise and government certification, it was found that the contents of the 9 Teacher's Guide Books did have elements of imperfection in their materials to teach the 7th grade students Korean Folk Music. The major types of deficiencies were: 1. Lack of clear academic and theoretical explanation & 2. Entirely incorrect information. It is hoped that by conducting such a study as this, the education for Korean Traditional Music would not only be more and more accurate and effective in the contents but also serve as the useful tip in creating supplementary materials for the upcoming 8th National Curriculum.