Browsing by Author "Haliseva, Ville"

Purpose. Singing was prohibited in some Finnish schools during 2020–2021 as an act to reduce the spread of covid-19. The purpose of this thesis is to explore how teachers experienced this singing prohibition and how it affected their teaching. The aim was to describe what music education in schools looked like when singing was absent. Previous studies indicate that singing is an effective tool for creating feelings of belonging and for processing one’s feelings. In addition, singing has traditionally been very important in the Finnish schools. The thesis also describes the importance of singing in today’s school music pedagogy by exploring a period when singing was prohibited. Methods. The study was conducted with qualitative methods and a phenomenographic framework. Data was gathered during the spring of 2022 through individual interviews with class teachers and music teachers (N = 7). The interviews were thematical and semi structured. A phenomenographic method was used for data analysis. Results and conclusions. Teachers found that singing is an adequate tool for practicing social and emotional skills, for identity development, and for mediating a cultural inheritance. Singing was considered a given part of different celebrations in school. Singing also seemed to be an important starting point for teachers when working with new material in music classes. The singing prohibition aggravated educational planning and was also viewed as an illogical decision for school context. The content of music classes consisted mainly of playing instruments during the singing prohibition, while celebrations did not take place at all. It also proved to be challenging for many teachers to get students excited about singing again once the singing prohibition was terminated. A continuity of singing would be needed, especially in the teenage years, since the individual’s relationship to singing seems to suffer from a longer break.