Learning Communities in IATL’s Science of Music and Beyond
Summary
Gavin Bell shares insights from developing and teaching on IATL’s Science of Music module. This module explores the connections between music, science and maths from various disciplinary angles such as History, Psychology and Physics. Each week focuses on a different theme ranging from electronic music to acoustics in the environment. It is open to second and third year undergraduates across Warwick. It was created from the Science, Maths and Music grant that Gavin received from IATL as an academic fellowship award in 2015. Gavin discusses how the module aims to utilise key principles from interdisciplinary teaching and learning such as building communities of learning. Students on this module bring their unique expertise not only in their area of discipline, but also in their personal musical background. Gavin also highlights the ways that teaching on an interdisciplinary module has informed his own practice in leading Physics modules within his own department. Ultimately, Gavin shows that the benefits of leading on the Science of Music extend beyond the classroom space into the teaching and learning community at Warwick as a whole.
Interdisciplinarity is...
“Thematic… the idea of interdisciplinary teaching for me is that individuals will learn something new for themselves about [a] theme.”
Students Say
Gavin had “two different students in two different years” who said that they were able to get jobs because they had discussed the skills that they gained working on their Science of Music project. Students said that in these interviews “immediately everyone was engaged” and “could see that [they] had demonstrated the following skills.” Gavin also aims to incorporate student feedback into the development of the module every year. He notes that the module has evolved quite significantly throughout the years on the basis of this feedback to become more streamlined and focused.
Dr Gavin Bell
Professor
Physics
Dr Gavin Bell lectures on Condensed Matter Physics and leads the first year Electronics Workshop in the Physics Department. Gavin’s focus is in material physics and he leads the Surface, Interface and Thin Film group. Among other teaching responsibilities, Gavin runs the Midlands Physics Alliance Graduate School modules on Nano/Surface Science and Hands-on Vacuum Science.
Gavin developed and initially convened IATL’s Science of Music module.
See Gavin’s full bio here.
Highlights
“This is something that I would suggest to people who are thinking about doing interdisciplinary teaching. You've got to know the language and the jargon…and if you have an interdisciplinary group of students, they can help each other with this very effectively.”
“Presentation skills to a diverse audience….this is really something that is very important in real life because….real life problems are not chemistry problems or maths problems.”
“For me, the experience of interdisciplinary teaching is to really shine a light on good pedagogical practice generally.”
Further Resources
Curious to learn more?
- Science of Music - IATL
- Final Project Report from the IATL Science, Maths, and Music Academic Fellowship Award
- Example Science of Music project seeds, including "Alvin Has Left the Room"
- Alvin Has Left the Room Music Piece
“In the project “Alvin Has Left The Room” (21/22 academic year), the students worked on a technique inspired by Alvin Lucier, namely playing back sounds into a room and recording them, playing back that recorded sound and recording it, and so on. This “devolves” the recorded sound (we were using speech, like Lucier) into abstract drones associated with the room shape and size, and the recording equipment. As well as some scientific investigation – they found that male and female voices behaved a bit differently, and even different languages – the group created some music using sounds captured during the project.
You can also contact Gavin: gavin.bell@warwick.ac.uk