Why should we have our students compose? 

A philosophical basis for the curricular objectives of instrumental music comes from the MENC publication, The Complete String Guide: Standards, Programs, Purchase, and Maintenance: (Klotman et al., 1988)
 

Music education in the public schools exists for the purpose of awakening and refining the aesthetic sensitivities of all children. The instrumental music program should develop skills, understandings, and attitudes that will enable students to enjoy a richer life through listening to or participating in music experiences...
Rehearsal activities in the instrumental music program should provide a conceptual understanding of the basic properties of melody, harmony, rhythm, dynamics, and form to help students become proficient on the instrument. It is the responsibility of administrators and music educators to implement a sequential plan of learning experiences that will meet the needs of all children so they can experience the musical growth needed to provide them with a means of self-expression. (Klotman et al., 1988, p. ix).

For many years, a frequently debated issue in music education is whether it is possible to develop musical understanding and aesthetic growth through an instrumental music curriculum that focuses entirely on the performance of existing repertoire. Over forty years ago McMurray discussed the problems of music teachers’ reliance on performance alone to fulfill the objectives of an education in music:
 

To realize the aims of general education in music, we cannot rely upon instruction in performance skills per se as a means to full understanding of musical content. To teach sensitivity to aesthetic content, we must rely upon other educational experiences than those of performance. Whatever the values of musical performance might be, we must recognize that performance is not a primary  means to the development of aesthetic sensitivity (McMurray, 1958, pp. 46-47).

Within the visual arts, student creation of art through painting, drawing, and sculpting are often seen as being primary developers of artistic understanding, and artistic growth. In the field of music, student creation of new music through improvisation and composition are also viewed as having great potential for developing musical understanding and aesthetic sensitivity. Hickey (1997) writes:

 
Since the introduction of performance music ensembles in public school education, the major focus and goal for participating students has been to develop polished productions of ensemble music...However, when students are actively encouraged to create music, performance students can be stimulated to think in more musical ways and ultimately achieve deeper levels of musical understanding through their ensemble experience (Hickey, 1997, p. 17).

According to scholars in the field of music education, improvisation and composition activities are largely absent from the majority of instrumental music programs. Leonhard (1988) writes:
 

The most damning aspect of music education lies in our consistent avoidance of self-expression through the creation of music by composing and improvisation. At no place in the music curriculum from elementary school through graduate school do students other than composition majors have the opportunity, motivation, or encouragement to use their creative abilities (Leonhard, 1988, p. 189).

One likely reason for the absence of composing activities in instrumental music curricula is the belief that composing is an activity reserved for only extremely talented and musically gifted students. This notion, however, is frequently disputed in the literature. Kaschub (1997) writes:
 

Composition is not an activity reserved only for the most sophisticated and well-trained musicians. Rather, it is a creative engagement that involves imagining sounds, exploring different ways to hear the sounds, revising what you’ve come up with, making musical decisions about those sounds, testing new ideas, discarding extraneous elements, adopting different formats, and polishing the final version. The only requirement is that a person can imagine sound...By mixing [performing], listening, and compositional experiences into the rehearsal setting, students are presented with three ways of knowing the music they are preparing for performance. Not only are these experiences unique, they also provide for a greater understanding of the musical art form (Kaschub, 1997, p. 28, 33).

Lasker (1973) also writes about the potential of every child to compose, and the need for teachers to provide guidance and encouragement:
 

Teaching young people to compose is not as difficult as is commonly believed. Everyone is instinctively creative. In most of us, innate talents lie dormant, often becoming lost through fear, apathy, or lack of guidance. Many young people grow up with the belief that exercising creativity through music is a formidable task to be left to the talented student and the professional living in an ivory tower. Consequently, they develop a defeatist attitude, positive that their creative attempts will fail.  They must be convinced that composing is a natural phenomenon, that they are potential composers because they are human beings, and that their creative efforts can give them great satisfaction. Once their self-confidence is assured, they may reach unforseeable levels of achievement (Lasker, 1973, p. 41).

A reason written music composition activities may be absent from many instrumental music programs is the belief that the musical notation system must be learned thoroughly before students are able to compose. It is likely, however, that students could better understand music notation through a combination of reading and writing activities. Fowler (1988) writes:
 

Certainly students can be asked to spend years learning the symbolic system with no opportunities provided for using these codes for purely personal musical expression. But this need not be the case...In music, the choice of whether the students are invited to invent and to express is a pedagogical decision. Some music teachers are so saturated in the rules of musical notation that they insist the code be mastered before the system is applied expressively. They themselves often believe that they have not yet attained the level that gives them the license to create. They use the system primarily as a means of re-creation, as a way of decoding what others have expressed musically (Fowler, 1988, p. 151).

Some leaders in arts education have warned that a lack of creative musical experiences in the curriculum significantly detracts from the aesthetic value of music education. For example, Eisner (1982) states, "children who are given no opportunity to compose music are unlikely to secure the meanings that the making of music makes possible" (Eisner, 1982, p. 55).

A lack of inclusion of composing activities in curricula may lead to lower levels of musical understanding. Regelski writes, "Not until students have had significant experience attempting to render personal ideas, experiences, and feelings in terms of organized sound structures can a teacher expect them to respect the process of composition and the role of the composer. And without this basis, listening and performing experiences become abstract, irrelevant, and boring." (Regelski, 1986, p. 42).

In addition, a lack of creative activities may be responsible for low student motivation to participate in instrumental music. Leonhard (1988) writes, "The tremendous dropout rate in instrumental music should long since have alerted us to the fact that students are not gaining the musical satisfaction they expect from their experience with music" (Leonhard, 1988, p. 188).

There is a growing body of research-based evidence regarding the value of  composing activities for developing musical understanding and a positive attitude toward participation in school music programs. Wiggins (1989) writes that composing can be a valuable activity for several reasons: "First, children are innately creative; second, composing helps students develop a pride in their own musicality; third, it is a means of teaching and reinforcing musical concepts and a way to address individual abilities and needs; and finally, composition is an excellent tool for evaluation" (Wiggins, 1989, p. 35).

The existing literature in music education may be very persuasive as to why instrumental music teachers should include compositional activities in their classes. An equally important issue for many instrumental music teachers, however, is how to incorporate compositional activities in their classes. Teachers need to know how to structure composition activities so their students can experience success. This is particularly critical at the beginning levels of instruction. Brophy (1996)writes, "...a beginning composer who is not yet familiar with music notation needs to become personally involved in writing music within a context that is creative, comfortable, and developmentally appropriate in order to build his or her understanding of musical signs and symbols" (Brophy, 1996, p. 15).

REFERENCES

Brophy, T. S. (1996). Building music literacy with guided composition. Music Educators Journal, 83(3).

Eisner, E. (1982). Cognition and curriculum. New York: Longman.

Fowler, C. B. (1988). Toward a democratic art: A reconstructionist view of music education. In J. T. Gates (Ed.), Music education in the United States: Contemporary issues (pp. 130-155). Tuscaloosa, AL: The University of Alabama Press.

Hickey, M. (1997). Teaching ensembles to compose and improvise. Music Educators Journal, 83(6).

Kaschub, M. (1997). Composition in the choral rehearsal. Music Educators Journal, 84(1).

Klotman, R., & al., e. (1988). The complete string guide: Standards, programs, purchase, and maintenance. Reston, VA: Music Educators National Conference.

Lasker, H. (1973). Why Can't They Compose? Music Educators Journal, 59(8), 41.

Leonhard, C. (1988). The human values of music education. In J. T. Gates (Ed.), Music education in the United States: Contemporary issues (pp. 185-192). Tuscaloosa, AL: The University of Alabama Press.

McMurray, F. (1958). Pragmatism in music education, Basic concepts in music education, the fifty-seventh yearbook of the National Society for the Study of Education, Part I (pp. 46-47.). Chicago: N.S.S.E.

Regelski, T. A. (1986). A sound approach to sound composition. Music Educators Journal, 72(9).

Wiggins, J. H. (1989). Composition as a teaching tool. Music Educators Journal, (75) 8.