With the availability of Wii Music and Guitar Hero, the question of video games in the classroom has returned. MENC ran a poll two weeks ago to find out what members of the profession think.
The majority of respondents do not use musical video games in their classroom. This is usually due to a lack of funds or time to bring them into the classroom, or because as one respondent said, "They have a limited educational value."
Those who do tend to use them as rewards or reinforcement. One respondent said, "I use Donkey Konga to reward the kids who have the most minutes on their practice chart and as a way to use a 'music' type of game to make band fun. We are a middle school in a block schedule and I have time to use DK. It comes out once a week for 5 minutes in beginning band only." Successful integration of musical video games depends on having a structure. "Have a purpose and assignment associated to the video game," said one respondent.
The consensus is musical video games will become more useful in general music classrooms. They will also continue to be a topic of interest for students and technology-minded directors. The initiative to use video games still overwhelmingly belongs to the director.
Related Resource—"Can music-oriented video games be educational?" by Chad Criswell, April 2009 Teaching Music, vol. 16, no. 6, pp. 24-26.
Related Resource—Wii Music lesson in My Music Class (Member sign-in required).
Related Resource—MENC Teachers Test Nintendo Wii Music In The Classroom.
Discuss this article on the Band Forum.
Coming in two weeks: Stay Tuned!
— Paul Fergus, June 12, 2009, © MENC: The National Association for Music Education (www.menc.org)