Assessment of Creativity-Based Learning Environment for Major Instrument Courses: A Case Study of Buca Faculty of Education, Department of Music Education

Overview & Synopsis

The development of the creative potential of individuals is considered to be one of the requirements of modern education. As in all areas, the development of students' creative potential is also among the objectives of education programs in music education. The ability of music teachers to achieve this objective and create creative learning environments for their own students' creative potential, is dependent on their training in such a learning environment. In this regard, one aim of this research is to develop a scale which can assess the creativity-based learning environment for Major Instrument courses carried out within faculties of Education, Fine Arts Education, Music Education programs. The second aim is to evaluate using this scale, the creativity-based learning environment for the Major Instrument courses carried out in the Buca Faculty of Education, Department of Music Education. The scale was developed as 5-point Likert scale and was applied to 528 students who were studying in the Faculty of Education, Fine Arts Education, Music Education Department in several universities during the 2012-2013 academic year. The data was analyzed with SPSS 16.0. Additionally, the LISREL 8.8 program was used for confirmatory factor analyses. After items distorting the factor structure were removed, the scale was left with 12 items. The scale's Cronbach Alpha value was determined as 0.928. At the end of the confirmatory factor analysis the level of fit criteria were found to be; x[superscript 2]/sd: 4.0; RMSEA: 0.07; NNFI: 0.98; CFI: 0.98; GFI: 0.94. The data show that the scale in general has an improved fit. The scale was applied to 72 students studying at the Buca Faculty of Education, Fine Arts Education, Music Education Department in the 2014-2015 academic year with the aim of determining the Major Instrument courses' learning environments. The scale's Cronbach Alpha value was determined as 0.948. Responses by students taking Major Instrument courses showed that lessons were carried out in creativity-based (x-bar = 3.95) and positive learning environments (x-bar = 4.25) in which the students' creativity was supported (x-bar = 3.73). With regard to the creativity-based learning environment, Major Instrument Guitar courses presented the highest level (x-bar = 4.55) and Major Instrument Baglama course, the lowest (x-bar = 2.95). [This article was presented at ERPA International Congresses on Education 2015.]