Playing on Both Sides of the Djembe: Preservice Music Teacher Development through Facilitating Drumming at a Special Education School

Abstract

Despite a renewed interest in music teacher education practices with real-worldimplications, the heterogeneity of learners is often daunting to early-careereducators. There is a lack of specific and adequate coursework in undergraduatemusic education programs to prepare preservice music teachers (PSMTs) forteaching diverse learner populations, including learners with disabilities. Drawing ona project where PSMTs facilitated drumming sessions at a special education school,this case study explored PSMTs’ experiences of project-based service learning ina special educational setting. Five themes that emerged from the data describingPSMTs’ experiences suggest that such initiatives with learners at a special educationschool can foster student responsiveness and autonomy. The findings describe howintegrating dialectic aspects could nurture the music-teaching skills of a PSMT. Theseaspects are joy and challenges, expectations and reactions, and learning to teachindividually and in a group