Music 1 Assessments/Exams (1 Viewer)

[starbaaa]

I was just wondering what other schools do in the way of assessments for music (whats in exams etc). I'm primarily interested in music 1, because thats what I do.

I just recently did my half-yearly exam, which was actually three exams. The first one was a musicology paper, which consisted of three sections. Section 1 had some excerpts of scores, and asked ridiculously easy questions on them (eg. what does tr mean? What bar does it appear in?). Section 2 was an essay which basically asked us to write down everything we knew about either jazz or popular music. Section 3 was composition. We had to do two compositions. The first one gave us a 12-bar blues song and asked us to write parts for two more pitched instruments. The second one gave us 2 bars of a pop song (for vocals, lead guitar, rhythm guitar, bass guitar and drums) and asked us to write another 6 bars. And that was the 2 hour musicology/composition paper.

We also had an aural exam, which was just the 2002 HSC music 1 aural paper. Pretty typical I suppose.

And we had a performance exam. For this we were required to perform 2 pieces. The first one was a set piece, which we had to perform individually with two teachers (not music teachers. they just play music) accompanying us. We had never played with these people before the exam. We walked into the exam room, got one practice run, then we did it again and were assessed. I thought that was slightly ridiculous. The second piece was free choice.

My music teachers are clueless. I'm not very impressed with their teaching methods, and I was just wondering if I should be unimpressed with their assessment methods. So how does this exam sound in relation to everyone elses? What do other schools set as music 1 assessments?

 

[JoeysBoy]

I was just wondering what other schools do in the way of assessments for music (whats in exams etc). I'm primarily interested in music 1, because thats what I do.

I just recently did my half-yearly exam, which was actually three exams. The first one was a musicology paper, which consisted of three sections. Section 1 had some excerpts of scores, and asked ridiculously easy questions on them (eg. what does tr mean? What bar does it appear in?). Section 2 was an essay which basically asked us to write down everything we knew about either jazz or popular music. Section 3 was composition. We had to do two compositions. The first one gave us a 12-bar blues song and asked us to write parts for two more pitched instruments. The second one gave us 2 bars of a pop song (for vocals, lead guitar, rhythm guitar, bass guitar and drums) and asked us to write another 6 bars. And that was the 2 hour musicology/composition paper.

We also had an aural exam, which was just the 2002 HSC music 1 aural paper. Pretty typical I suppose.

And we had a performance exam. For this we were required to perform 2 pieces. The first one was a set piece, which we had to perform individually with two teachers (not music teachers. they just play music) accompanying us. We had never played with these people before the exam. We walked into the exam room, got one practice run, then we did it again and were assessed. I thought that was slightly ridiculous. The second piece was free choice.

My music teachers are clueless. I'm not very impressed with their teaching methods, and I was just wondering if I should be unimpressed with their assessment methods. So how does this exam sound in relation to everyone elses? What do other schools set as music 1 assessments?

Your teacher's methods ARE strange... I gotta hand it too you! The fact that you had only played the piece once with an accompaniest once is a little shocking, tho we don't normally get accompaniests anyway... its just too hard to organise and isn't really worth it cuz its not hsc assessable (yet)

And the fact that u got a Aural 2002 HSC paper is even more shocking! Isn't there some random law that says u can't do that?

And you had to do two compo's? We only had to do one, but it had to go for between 4 and 5 mins... the standard for hsc composition task.

In music 1, we can't be assessed on our ability to read/write a score! My teacher actually told me that! (I was a little disapointed cuz i find it really easy to notate songs n stuff) We only had to read and answer questions relating to a score in year 10, which isn't part of the hsc music 1 course at all...

Are you sure your school is following board of studies music 1 sylabus?

 

[starbaaa]

I am nowhere near sure that my school is following the BOS music 1 syllabus. I'm sure theres some things wrong. I'm not even sure that they're using common sense. I mean, how can we be expected to perform with accompanists we've never practised with? Thats just... stupid. And... we can't be assessed on our ability to read/write a score? Thats very interesting. Oh, and as for our compos... I don't know if you can really call them compositions... its not like we'd ever submit something like that to the board (we had to do them IN the exam by the way. I find it hard to do something thats contrasting or very interesting without sitting in front of my piano)... they went for, like, 12 bars! hmmm...

 

[lil dotti]

Hey, I'm doing Music 1 as well and I'm the only one in my grade who does it.
My half yearly was an aural exam it was 2 questions. 2 different excerpts. The first question was comment on the pitch material and one other element. The other question was comment on the use of repetition and contrast.
I'm doing 4 performances in total and my teacher only does performance assessments at the end of the year so she can hear us when we're really good, which I think is a bit dodgy.
Anyway, let me know what you think.

 

[franski]

we just do aural practice in class, and our exams (eg 1/2 yearly) are just past aural papers, or aural papers made up by our teacher. we also do class and personal composition tasks - our band slash class (5 people) is called "music 1" (haha, how original...) and we have perform these compositions for marking at performance nights open to the public, or at lunchtime barbeques during school. we are also having progress reports on composition logbooks and performance tasks during the year. thats all. lol. xxx

 

[babywhitto]

For our exam we just have a performance of 2 pieces (one of the subject we just did) and then an aural exam paper from a few years back or whatever.

During the term we have mini-performances, a composition due, and a speech on the topic we did (e.g. musicals) and we do prac aural papers and yeah thats it basically.