North Carolina Music Educator Winter 2023

Evidence-Based
Practice in Music
Education
by Tim Nowak
There has been a lot of public discussion this year about the
implementation of the science of reading instruction in
North Carolina. Not being a literacy specialist, I did a quick
Google search to find out more about this. The results suggested
“science of reading” is a collection of instructional methods
variously described as “scientifically-based,” “proven by research,”
or based on a “body of research evidence.”
My thoughts turned to my public school teaching experience
and faculty meetings about “evidence-based instructional
practices.” Admittedly, this was usually near the bottom of my
priority list. Administrators usually focused on “core” teachers,
saying something like, “This doesn’t really apply to you” when
they addressed us “encore” teachers. This always felt like a slight
to the value of our content areas, but if nodding along meant less
paperwork and more time for rehearsal planning, so be it.
But I always had nagging anxiety when it came to my
professional evaluations. What if my principal took the “evidencebased
instruction” box on the rubric seriously this year? What if,
this time, they expected a real answer from me? In this article,
I provide a starting point for you to navigate these discussions.
First, I give some background on the term “evidence-based
practice” in U.S. education. Then I suggest steps you can take to
engage with music education research in your teaching.
Defining “Evidence-Based”
“Evidence-based practice” gained prominence in U.S.
education with No Child Left Behind’s (NCLB’s) mandate
that federally funded education programs be grounded in
“scientifically based research” (Slavin, 2002). The Every Student
Succeeds Act (ESSA) later updated this language to “evidencebased.”
The U.S. Department of Education has established four
levels of evidence that can be used to justify instructional methods
as “evidence-based” for use in different federally funded programs
(Hale et al., 2017). To help state and local education leaders find
methods – or “interventions” – that meet these different levels of
evidence, the Department of Education publishes databases such
as the What Works Clearinghouse, or WWC (https://ies.ed.gov/
ncee/WWC), which review and evaluate the quality of educational
research.
Crucially, the determining factor for rigor in this system is the
methodological design of the research. The top tier of evidence is
reserved for experimental studies, and the WWC only endorses
research with randomized controlled designs (Simpson, 2019).
This type of study is notoriously difficult to construct in education
research, including music education. My search of the WWC
database for “music” only returned eight studies, six of which were
categorized as “don’t meet standards.”
I mention this not to imply that music education research
is somehow grossly inadequate. Rather, my point is that the
dominant discourse of “evidence-based” practice in U.S. education
is so extraordinarily narrow that it excludes vast amounts of
high quality educational research. The conversation is focused
solely on questions about specific interventions for federally
funded programs investigated through inferential statistics. So,
my administrators weren’t wrong; “evidence-based practice,” as
defined by NCLB and ESSA, didn’t really apply to me after all.
But what if we broadened our conception of evidence-based
practice? Davies (1999), for example, argued that “evidence-based
education means integrating individual teaching and learning
expertise with the best available external evidence from systematic
research” (p. 117). In this sense, evidence-based practice is a
continuous process where teachers integrate what they observe
in their specific instructional context with research – of all
methodological designs – that might inform their work toward
specific goals. Below, I offer some suggestions on how you might
approach this in your own classroom.
Finding and Interpreting Evidence
The first step in engaging in evidence-based practice is
establishing a specific goal or outcome the evidence is meant
to inform. Often left unsaid in discussions about “what works”
in education is what something works for. This is where your
professional knowledge and expertise as a musician and teacher
in your local school take center stage. Is there a musical skill
or concept that your students seem to struggle with, such as
improvisation? Is there a general learning process you want
to know more about, such as motivation? Is there a structural
problem in your program you want to improve, such as ensemble
recruitment and retention?
At this stage, your goal can be a vague idea or open ended
question, such as, “I want my general music students to improvise
more,” “How can I motivate my students to practice more?” or “I
want to improve retention in my band program.”
Once you have your general goal in mind, begin searching for
research that relates to that topic. At this point, you’re probably
thinking, “I don’t have time to read a whole bunch of research
articles,” and you’re right. This is where literature reviews can
help. Literature reviews are systematic analyses of a large body
of research on a specific topic and can give you both a summary
of findings and a sense of the complexity of a topic. Update:
Applications of Research in Music Education frequently publishes
music education literature reviews, and access is free with your
NAfME/NCMEA membership. There are literature reviews
published in Update about all three of the topics I noted above—
improvisation (Chandler, 2018), motivation (West, 2013), and
retention (Hash, 2022).
Once you’ve found a literature review on your topic of interest,
consider the evidence presented and how it might inform your
teaching, starting with specific questions researchers have
pursued. What facets of the topic have researchers addressed,
and how do their questions relate to what you’re interested in
knowing? For example, Chandler (2018) organized his literature
review of improvisation in elementary general music into four
main lines of inquiry:
• the nature of improvisation,
• instructional time dedicated to improvisation,
• development of improvisation skills with age, and
• effects of improvisation on other skill areas.
Seeing the complexity of the field can help you narrow your
interest from a broad idea – I want my students to improvise more
– to a specific question you can pursue to improve your teaching,
such as “what improvisation activities are appropriate for my
fourth and fifth grade students?”
Next, evaluate the findings addressing the specific question(s)
you’re asking: What answers or solutions do the findings suggest?
How many studies have corroborated those findings? Are there
conflicting findings and, if so, how does the reviewer explain
those different results? For example, West (2013) discussed how
inconsistent findings in motivation research could be related
to different theoretical orientations (p. 15). In other words,
how researchers approached the question of motivation shaped
the results of their studies. In this case, it would be important
for you to consider which theory of motivation seems best
supported by the evidence and which theory might best explain
what you’re experiencing in your school. To be clear, this is not
a suggestion that you should simply find research that confirms
your preexisting beliefs; rather, it is a reminder that context
matters, and that you will need to critically evaluate both your
circumstances and the research evidence to find points of
resonance and tension.
At this point, you may be satisfied with the reviewer’s evidence
and suggestions. If you still have questions, you could do what one
of my mentors called “bibliographic archeology.” Find and read
the original studies in the review that were most intriguing and
evaluate their evidence for yourself. Most studies will begin with a
small literature review that summarizes related findings, and you
could find new sources that support – or contradict – the evidence
you had evaluated previously. You could even find and evaluate
those sources, continuing until you’ve compiled enough evidence
to inform your instructional decisions.
Putting Evidence into Action
Once you’re satisfied with the evidence you’ve compiled,
devise a plan for achieving your desired outcome based on the
research and your professional expertise. How might you tailor
the researcher’s recommendations and integrate them into your
program? Be sure to plan an evaluation to see whether your
plan is working. In other words, what evidence will you need to
collect to investigate whether the plan is working? It could be the
same measures that researchers used, or it could be a measure of
your own – higher grades on improvisation assignments, better
engagement with practice logs, or larger enrollment numbers for
the next academic year.
Whatever your measure, schedule a time to go back and
compare your own evidence to that of the researchers: how is what
you’re finding the same or different? Does the research suggest a
possible explanation for what you’re finding? If not, what other
areas of research might help inform your original question? Keep
in mind, research is constantly changing, so this really will be
a continuous process, as Davies (1999) argued, of integrating
individual expertise with external evidence. Luckily, both NAfME
and NCMEA have resources to keep you informed on the latest
research evidence in music teaching and learning, from published
journals to professional conferences and poster sessions. While
the dominant discourse of evidence-based practice may not
be intended for music educators, we can still use evidence to
inform what we do and continually improve the practice of music
teaching and learning.
References
Chandler, M. (2018). Improvisation in elementary general music:
A review of the literature. Update: Applications of Research in Music
Education, 37(1), 42-48. https://doi.org/10.1177/8755123318763002
Davies, P. (1999). What is evidence-based education? British Journal
of Educational Studies, 47(2), 108-121. https://doi.org/10.1111/1467-
8527.00106
Hale, S., Dunn, L., Filby, N, Rice, J., & Van Houten, L. (2017).
Evidence-based improvement: A guide for states to strengthen their
frameworks and supports aligned to the evidence requirements of ESSA.
WestEd.
Hash, P. (2022). Student retention in school bands and orchestras: A
literature review. Update: Applications of Research in Music Education,
40(3), 11-19. https://doi.org/10.1177/87551233211042585
Simpson, A. (2019). The evidential basis of “evidence-based education”:
An introduction to the special issue. Educational Research and Evaluation,
25(1-2), 1-6. https://doi.org/10.1080/13803611.2019.1617979
Slavin, R. E. (2002) Evidence-based education policies: Transforming
educational practice and research. Educational Researcher, 31(7), 15-21.
https://doi.org/10.3102/0013189X031007015
West, C. (2013). Motivating music students: A review of the literature.
Update: Applications of Research in Music Education, 31(2), 11-19.
https://doi.org/10.1177/8755123312473611
14 | NORTH CAROLINA MUSIC EDUCATOR NORTH CAROLINA MUSIC EDUCATOR | 15