After
a 3 year obsession with India, and specifically Mumbai, I have
taken the bold decision that I'm going to make the city my home and
work here for a year. In February I secured myself a job with a
relatively new Indian Music Education company called Furtados School
of Music (FSM). In my role as piano team mentor I oversee the work of
28 teachers in 4 music centres and 10 schools, in a wide variety of
locations across Mumbai, where Furtado's curriculum has been bought
in to provide music education in the classroom.
In
a fairly infantile musical education scene, FSM are unique in their
approach, setting out their intention to give access to music to the
average child in a fun and joy-filled way. Till very recently, music
education was the preserve of the very wealthy and those children who
were the descendants of Indian classical music gurus. Starting out in
one centre in Bandra and quickly expanding into 4, and then realising
the potential to offer a curriculum in schools where there was
previously no music available; FSM have formed an ambitious model
which opens up opportunities for learning to the middle classes.
In
an environment where music education is still relatively new,
teachers with experience and skill and few and far between. Many
teachers are self taught musicians who found they had talent,
musicians without higher education or young people who have been
taught and ruled with an iron fist throughout their learning, so lack
the knowledge of how to motivate, enthuse and inspire the young
learners they find themselves responsible for. In this, the digital
age where everyone has an ipad and laptop and the loom band craze is
as big as it is in the UK, ndian Parents and children expect more
from teachers, and in a system which is dragging itself away from
wrote learning, music education has to conform to those expectations.
With this in mind, FSM have equipped themselves with 2 different
computer software programmes which aim to teach classroom music and
piano skills respectively. Software, whilst effective as a homework
tool, is obviously never as successful at communicating a music
lesson, helping a child or listening to a child, as a real, live,
skilful teacher. As many of the teachers are struggling to grapple
with a learning expectations that are drastically different from
their own experience, software attempts to fill this gap,
unfortunately unsuccessfully in most cases.
Realising
the limitations of the software, FSM have employed me to develop the
skills of their teachers, by providing training, advice, and support.
My aim for this year is to be an inspiring guiding hand to these
teachers who currently lack the imagination to become virtuosic
teachers with high expectations whilst being fun and inspiring to be
with.
I'm
now 3 weeks in and it's been a baptism of fire working 6 days a week
for a total of 48 hours – that's a lot for a laid back Scottish
girl who's used to working as little as 2 days a week at home! Call
me lazy, but I find myself far more efficient when I'm not worked to
the bone! I'm now more used to what I'm going to be doing in my job
and it's clear how the standard of teaching currently is. I conducted
a training session last week, giving the teachers the shock of their
lives when I asked them to role play several different communication
situations they encounter as part of their daily work. They really
enjoyed themselves once they'd got over the shock of the activity!
I'm looking forward to having the opportunity to conduct further
training sessions with all the teachers together. It's also been
really interesting working with the teachers one to one, observing
their work and offering feedback on different aspects of their
approach. Many of them clearly want to improve what they do and
become top class teachers, but they are struggling to be imaginative,
mainly because creativity has not been actively encouraged in their
own education. Thinking outside the box seems to be a real challenge
– there may be quite a lot of hand holding!
It's
currently Ganpati – the festival related to the Hindu elephant God,
Ganesh. Over an 11 day period, people collect their Ganesh, take him
home – either to their actual home or they also take huge Ganesh
idols to constructed temporary temples in the streets and worship him
for a few days until he goes on his pilgrimage to the sea to be
immersed in the monsoon waves, accompanied by a heady mix of banging
drums, dancing and horns! He's then abandoned to swim off into the
ocean. Mumbai looks beautiful just now, it's nearing the end of the
monsoon so everything is lush and green and with the Ganpati lights
strung up along roads, the city is literally sparkling.
I'm
looking forward to moving into my own flat on Saturday and having the
luxury of a bed to sleep in and a kitchen to cook in! It's going to
make life feel more settled, which is definitely a good thing. I'm
also doing some work outside of FSM, doing some recording sessions
for various artists, including singer songwriter Ayush Man Shrestha,
who I've worked with a lot in the past. It's exciting to be playing
professionally but it adds a lot in terms of work load to my week.
I'm hoping to play some more live gigs which is always fun!
Today
was Teachers' Day in India – that basically means that we got
flowers and cake and cards from all the lovely students! More news to
follow soon on the progress of my teachers…! Here's some pics of my travels here, there and everywhere during the week!!
