Moodle for Music

Moodle for Music

by Don Hinkelman -
Number of replies: 29
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers
Alan Hess asked an interesting question from another thread....

"... I'm also trying to figure out ways of using Moodle for music other than just a few java applets with guitar chord tools, recorder fingering displays or flash videos of performances. Any ideas anyone?"

I use Moodle for music-themed projects in teaching communication skills and foreign languages. I suppose these are more about music appreciation and community-building than actually learning how to make music. Here are some examples:
  1. DJ Project: Students make a CD of their favorite songs and record themselves as a DJ introducing each song. In Moodle they post their DJ text in a forum for teacher/peer commenting and as a powerpoint in the Project Module.
  2. Favorite Artists Project: Students choose their favorite artist, research them on the internet and make a presentation in class with powerpoint. They upload their powerpoint files into the project module for peer assessment.
  3. Music History Class: Another teacher runs a cultural history class on the "Blues". He embeds youtube videos of concerts and samples of music, along with forums, quizzes and other activities.
  4. Blog: I require one blog entry where students write about their favorite groups they listen to. They add a photo and write 20-50 words describing the music and why they like it. I give both an official tag and they make a custom tag.
If I were actually teaching music, I would have students upload short videos of their performances (at home even) into Youtube, then have them embed the video into a forum. Embedding is very easy to teach. Then ask each student to comment on their classmates or members of their group. Remember, every digital camera nowadays has simple but usable video recording capabilities.

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In reply to Don Hinkelman

Re: Moodle for Music

by Alexandre Enkerli -
Oh! Nice topic! Glad the title was changed... wink

And it would be most awesome if Charles Keil's Moodle-based Born to Groove were involved in this discussion. Keil has been trying to get people involved and the Moodle installation is his son's doing.

I've used Moodle in my ethnomusicology course. The music-specificity of my Moodle use at this point wasn't so much to talk about. But I can easily imagine cool things to do with Moodle for music. Or, actually, any other platform for music-related learning, whether it's integrated in Moodle or not.
Some embedded content like MP3s and videos isn't just an issue with music but it clearly an area of great interest for music teaching. Lots of possibilities: podcasting, MIDI files, animations, soundfiles, partitions, loops... Because many of these files are already available and many are available in common formats, it should be easy to embed them, get students to submit them, etc.

But there's clearly more. There's a lot of music collaboration possibilities, out there. Online jams. Sharing samples and loops for GarageBand-like composition. Collaborative editing of MIDI files, partitions, or patches. Informal musicking using easy to understand tools (based, for instance, on Jean Piché's work for the XO). Controlled and educational filesharing. Song rating systems. Creating music videos from student performance. Playlists...
It'd be fun to get students to create and sightsing melodies in teams, or something like it. It's also quite possible that pitch-tracking has come a long enough way that it can be used for sight-singing and such.

One of the most influential models for my thinking about teaching is a Samba school, as described by MIDI studio teacher Jean-Louis Van Veeren. The details are a bit fuzzy but the model was extremely collaborative and quite creative. It involved a lot of experimentation, informal learning, fluid and non-hierarchical teamwork...

Ok... I'm daydreaming again! smile
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In reply to Alexandre Enkerli

Re: Moodle for Music

by David Berry -

The music courses at my school took off, in my opinion, when a forum was opened up. Immediately the students started embedding their own MP3’s and discussing how their compositions could be altered or improved. It became the ultimate form of peer assessment without any teacher involvement and it was wonderful to see how positive the students could be.


After a while I decided to bring all of their compositions together in a course area that all students would have access to. A simple jukebox was then added to make the view look more professional.


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In reply to David Berry

Re: Moodle for Music

by Don Hinkelman -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers
It became the ultimate form of peer assessment without any teacher involvement and it was wonderful to see how positive the students could be.

Wonderful. I keep forgetting how powerful the simple forum can be.

After a while I decided to bring all of their compositions together in a course area that all students would have access to. A simple jukebox was then added to make the view look more professional.

What kind of jukebox software/script was that? Do you have a link? Was it integrated into Moodle? Could it be?


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In reply to Don Hinkelman

Re: Moodle for Music

by David Berry -
The jukebox was just a simple flash application - you can find it here. To embed it in Moodle just add an html block and paste in the appropriate flash code.

The software is opensource and the zip download includes the fla file, so I am sure it could be adapted by some clever person to go into Moodle. I investigated several players before settling on this one so there may be "better" ones somewhere out there.


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In reply to David Berry

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi David,

Just wondering whether you came across any alternative mp3 players to incorporate into Moodle since your last post - I tried downloading this one from sourceforge, but our IT systems detected potential security risks in latest version.

Thanks.

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In reply to Gordon McLeod

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mark Hudson -
Gordon...

A thought about this (mp3 files) too.....

I have just this week set up a Soundcloud account which like Noteflight gives you an embed code. So you upload you mp3 to Soundcloud and paste the embed code onto Moodle.

This then allows listening etc but ALSO.... the ability to add comments. One use I can see for this is to simply tag structural points - exposition, verse, bridge, development etc... but also for feedback on a student's performance. Upload it as an mp3 and tag (or better get them to tag) the places where there are aspects to improve - or to add praise 'cos that's good too!! You have to do this by going to Soundcloud but all you have to do is click on the file and in a few seconds you're there!

The web is fast becoming a VERY music friendly place for teaching & learning.

Mark
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In reply to Mark Hudson

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi Mark,

Sounds interesting - currently we're pilot testing for audio & video of performances using Mahara - with blogs for tutor feedback and student reflection and comments from classmates - but this lacks ability to tag specific structural points (at least without extensive editing beforehand). Think my biggest reservation (paranoia) with publishing to the cloud is over IPR and personal security, but the functionality sounds extremely useful so worth looking at.

So many possibilities ... so few of me!

Thanks, Gordon.

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In reply to Don Hinkelman

Re: Moodle for Music

by John Isner -
Don,
If we make a global change of "music" to "math" in this discussion, it becomes rather absurd. Let's blog about math and then watch a video about famous mathematicians. That might be OK for a class in Math appreciation (is there such a thing yet?) but not math.

Music and math (and other disciplines with their own language and notation) face similar challenges with Moodle, with music possibly at the top of the list in terms of its demands on the LMS. A college-level music course for music majors includes singing, performing, improvising, composing, reading, listening, analyzing, lots of theory, and a growing number of hardware and software tools. How is each of these supported by Moodle? If not directly supported, what's the best way to work around Moodle's limitations?

Here are three relevant discussions in the Math tools forum (which maybe should be called the "math and music forum"):

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In reply to John Isner

Re: Moodle for Music

by Don Hinkelman -
Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Plugin developers
John,

Take a look at David's post and I think you will find an answer there. Moodle can serve as a community for students to share their musical works, comment on them, critique and rate their value, and publicize those works.

Likewise, I use Moodle as a blended learning program, utilizing face-to-face communication as much as online communication. Why would we ever want to teach music 100% online when it can be done much better in a blended approach? Finally, you need a keyboard or an instrument to work with.

This question is not unlike the Lifesaving Association of Australia which has been a big user of Moodle for training lifesavers across that continent for over five years. Moodle does not directly teach lifesaving (no ocean module, no pool module), but serves as one location for building knowledge in a collaborative way. Not absurd in the least. wink

Cheers,
Don
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In reply to John Isner

Re: Moodle for Music

by David Megill -
These are great questions. As a music teacher I've been interested in how to get beyond just talking about music but actually using Moodle to help me teach music theory which requires notation tools, listening tools, dictation tools, etc. I have ported a lot of my external tools to a music assignment type that allows me to have my applet testing system write to the gradebook and I've created a music notepad (applet that allows students to submit notation assignments and allow teacher graphical grading) that is also part of the music assignment type. All the questions and notepads reside in a database that sits below Moodle.

If anyone is interested in looking at (participating in, developing, etc.) some of my Tools embedded in Moodle you can do so at:

http://67.117.214.226/moodle enrollment key= 55555

I've just made these tools available to any who want to share in their development (or use them in a course) so they need some work as usual. If you would like to work in the tools as an instructor let me know and I'll upgrade you.
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In reply to David Megill

Re: Moodle for Music

by João Fernandes -
Hi David
the enrolment key is for which page? does it allow access to guests?
regards
J
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In reply to João Fernandes

Re: Moodle for Music

by David Megill -
The course name is Moodle Music Tools. I'll set it up so guests can join.
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In reply to David Megill

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mary Cooch -
Picture of Documentation writers Picture of Moodle HQ Picture of Particularly helpful Moodlers Picture of Testers Picture of Translators
Thanks for this  - it looks very useful - but in order to view the assignments we have to login; they are not viewable as guests. Was that your intention ?(if so, no problem) If not - are we able to get a login? Thanks
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In reply to João Fernandes

Re: Moodle for Music

by Abby Prestin -
Is the Moodle for Music course site still active? I'm looking into music notation programs for use in Moodle and I think it would be quite helpful to have access to it if that's possible. Thanks very much!
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In reply to Abby Prestin

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi Abby,

I've done some testing with the quiz types added by Eric Brisson which are nice and visual, but have limited functionality as opposed to a tool that would allow user to compose / upload / listen /comment on a notation score, so I'm keen to take this further. I'm currently looking to get Sibelius to integrate with Moodle, but am literally just starting to read up on extension development, so if anyone else out there is further down the line would love to hear about it.

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In reply to Gordon McLeod

Re: Moodle for Music

by Abby Prestin -
Thank you for your reply, Gordon. I'm looking into Sibelius as well. Along with Noteflight, it seems like the most promising option. Good luck to you! smile
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In reply to Abby Prestin

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mark Hudson -

Have you tried using Noteflight?

www.noteflight.com

It's easy to embed scores into Moodle by pasting the sharing HTML code into the HTML editor.

(except on this site where embedding doesn't seem to work!?)

Mark

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In reply to Mark Hudson

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi Marc,

Our academic staff choose Sibelius as our preferred software for notation a number of years ago, and it's installed as standard on our machines. I did have a look at noteflight a few months ago but there wasn't much point progressing it as it's not used within our institution. It's possible the xml export from Sibelius will work pretty much in the same way as noteflight, though I've seen a few posts dating back several years where people were going to try but never came back to say if it worked.

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In reply to Gordon McLeod

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mark Hudson -
Hi Gordon

Fair enough - but Noteflight does give you a free - as in ALL your students get it free too - tool.

I also use Sibelius - for major composition work (controlled conditions A level coursework etc), but I also use Noteflight alongside for setting exercises. The students submit these to me by simply pasting the embed code into the HTML editor of an online assignment I have created - I comment and grade... job done VERY efficiently! No files to open etc - it's just there to hear & see in the browser. This IMHO is definitely worth progressing a bit further. Handling of some pretty advanced stuff - figured bass and extended chord notations is very impressive as well as most basic (traditional) notation needs.

Composition ideas can also be sketched etc in Noteflight... and finished off in Sibelius in class after a MIDI or XML export.

If you do just stick with Sibelius I'm not sure that XML will be of any use in Moodle - how will this 'embed' in a web page. Better option would be to use the Sibelius Scorch plugin?

Mark
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In reply to Mark Hudson

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi Mark,

My understanding was that scorch produces an xml export for Sibelius - that was why I was thinking of that. I'm aware it's been used to put playable Sibelius scores onto WordPress so was planning to investigate how that was achieved. I take the point about ease of using noteflight with moodle - will have a chat with some of our composition staff to see if they might consider it as an option -  suspect people won't be keen on having to learn a whole new software tool, but some staff might already have had some experience with it and be willing to have a go.

Thanks, Gordon.

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In reply to Mark Hudson

Re: Moodle for Music

by Abby Prestin -
Hi Mark -- Yup, I'm looking into Noteflight as one of the most promising options. It seems to be able to meet the needs of the faculty and integrate into Moodle pretty well. Have you used it to give quizzes or exams?
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In reply to Abby Prestin

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mark Hudson -
Hi Abbey

I'm starting to. Mostly it has been to 'collect' work in an online assignment, but should be quite easy to set up in a quiz - i.e. I embed a Noteflight file and ask questions about it. Not sure yet about getting students to submit their own files by embedding in a quiz but definitely something I will be looking into, especially if I can find a neat way of getting the quiz doing the marking for me!

I am also going to investigate costs for a proper integration as this allows for even more streamlined use of templates etc.. will depend on costs!

Mark
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In reply to David Megill

Re: Moodle for Music

by mariano mora -
hello, I'd be interested in your music notation tools, and might be able to lend a hand developing further. How can I have a look at them?
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In reply to David Megill

Re: Moodle for Music

by Gordon McLeod -

Hi David,

I'd be interested in trying out the tool within our Academy, and would be interested in discussing further development once some of my colleagues feedback on what we need to meet staff and student requirements. I tried to access the url provided, but couldn't get to the site (it's been over 18 months so I guess you've changed things since then).

Thanks.

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In reply to Don Hinkelman

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In reply to Deleted user

Re: Moodle for Music

by João Fernandes -
Hi Alan,
maybe you can try PHP Motion for the youtube clone.
Some more ideas for learning music using Moodle or other software to construct and share and discuss in Moodle:

  1. Making music - some software, vst plugins to make music
  2. Camstudio - create video tutorials like in those rock magazines cds. you can synch with finale or music software in general to get a nice tutorial
  3. Finale notepad - a light and free version of finale
  4. Sell a band - about producing yourself and your band
  5. The good old Audacity - for beginners maybe it is the best choice with the simple interface
  6. Ardour - digital audio workstation
  7. Ejamming - to create a distance band
  8. Indaba Music - the same
  9. Band in a box - quite cheap and great software
  10. Improvisor - a free music notation software
  11. Jazz pracite loops - to learn how to make some solos on 2-5-1 progressions for example
with the Moodle filters for multimedia and activities (forums, assignments, quizzes, lessons) I believe you can put this to work in a course, even distance courses. For synchronous communication, maybe dimdim or even skype.
And if you are worried about putting some music originals (partitures or audio) online because of copyright, check the jazz standards, Steve Khan's Korner1, the realbook or the Antonio Carlos Jobim online repository (sometimes down).

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In reply to Deleted user

Re: Moodle for Music

by Mark Burnet -
Wouldn't Teachertube serve that function?

http://www.teachertube.com/search_result.php?search_id=music&x=0&y=0

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In reply to Mark Burnet

Re: Moodle for Music

by aniya lui -

I’d have to buy into with you on this. Which is not something I typically do! I love reading a post that will make people think. Also, thanks for allowing me to speak my mind!

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