Formação Musical: When it is not the assessment that sets the pace - a case study in the Porto region

Abstract

Formação Musical is part of the curriculum of different types of music schools and, historically, one of its purposes has been to promote the proficiency of the musical code. Although Specialized Art Education schools have pedagogical autonomy, this may be guided by national guidelines and didactic reproductions, namely their task directed nature, through the repetition of activities to master this notation and theory, as a continuous test. It is also questioned whether the contents and activities will be shaped to what is easy to classify and what limitations this selection may place on the understanding of the musical artistic phenomenon.

Contact with music schools that are not under governmental supervision – with pedagogical autonomy – allows us to check whether the absence of mandatory tests may lead to an expansion of musical experiences in the classroom. Thus, we sent questionnaires to 'unofficial' music teaching schools and carried out 6 interviews with teachers of unofficial and official music schools, and a higher education institution in the district of Porto. Their contributes provided important guidelines for the development of the theoretical body of Formação Musical Didactics and our proposal of the assessment completeness paradox.