2025 World Music Pedagogy Courses

The World Music Pedagogy course weaves together experiences in music, cultural meaning, and culturally sensitive pedagogical strategies, and provides for active listening episodes leading to participatory, performative, and creative musical experiences—all tailored to fit learners of various ages and experiences. The course emphasizes the teaching of global-local music for intercultural understanding, and attends to culturally relevant pedagogy as it pertains to music education practices. Featured resources in the course are selections from the reserves of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings and the World Music Pedagogy series of books/recording links, all directed to the ways of knowing the world of music, in music, and through music. All are welcome, including music educators, all-subject educators, artist-musicians, applied ethnomusicologists, curricular designers, community organizers, and all who are seeking further insights on musical-cultural diversity, equity, and inclusion.

Click here to learn more about cultural understanding through World Music Pedagogy.

Smithsonian Folkways Certificate Courses in World Music Pedagogy

June 9th–11th - Teaching Music/Teaching Culture (Online)
June 16th–19th - West Virginia University (Onsite)
June 29th–July 3rd - University of St. Thomas (Onsite)
August 18th–22nd - Cape Breton University (Onsite)

World Music Pedagogy: Teaching Music/Teaching Culture

Online Webinar
Dates: June 9th–11th
Location: Online, Delivered by Zoom
Course Directors: Amanda C. Soto and Patricia Shehan Campbell
(PD Hours Available, WMP/SFR Certificate)

Description:
Join ethnomusicologists, educators, traditional artists, and culture-bearers in a webinar course on World Music Pedagogy: Teaching Music/Teaching Culture. In its 18th year, with an experienced faculty of artists, educators, and ethnomusicologists, participants will explore the application of diversity and dignity to teaching music to children and youth in elementary and secondary schools. Course sessions will lead to the development of teaching/learning content and process via World Music Pedagogy, with attention to cultural histories, contexts, and sensibilities. Excursions into a variety of the world’s musical cultures—both local and global—are backed by recommendations for resources (mediated and “human” vis-à-vis culture-bearers), including attention to the resources of Smithsonian Folkways Recordings. Sessions will feature the performance of songs, dance, and instrumental music as taught by artist musicians and seasoned teachers, along with ongoing dialogue on questions of music and race, indigeneity, gender and sexuality, and social activism in the musical education of learners of all ages and experiences.
Enrolled participants receive PD hours and certification by Smithsonian Folkways.
[Note: Because some participants are repeating the course, we’re adding new faculty with new topics while also continuing others.]

Course Faculty:

Loneka Battiste: The Black Aesthetic

Patricia Shehan Campbell: WMP Dimensions, “Ethno-Tenets,” Songways

Juliana Cantarelli Vita: Brazilian Maracatu

Will Coppola: WMP’s Creativity Dimension

John Dankwa: West African Music

Namhee Lim: Korean Music Culture

Constance McKoy: Culturally Responsive Teaching

Jen Mellizo: Smithsonian Folkways Music Pathways

Olcay Muslu: Turkish Folk Music and Dance

Hideaki Onishi and Pamela Costes-Onishi: Filipino Kulintang

John-Carlos Perea: American Indian Powwow Music

Amanda C. Soto: Social Justice; Pedagogy; Technology

Francis Ward: Irish Traditional Music

Please click here for course registration.

For further information click here or email Dr. Amanda C. Soto (asoto@txstate.edu) or Dr. Patricia Shehan Campbell (pcamp@uw.edu).

West Virginia University

Onsite Course
World Music Pedagogy: Celebrating Global and Local Music Culture
Dates: June 16–19 (9:00–4:30)
Location: Morgantown, West Virginia
Course Director: Janet Robbins

Description:
Join music educators, ethnomusicologists, and guest artists for this year’s in-person professional development course celebrating local and global culture. Participants will engage with music in daily workshops featuring music traditions of Appalachia, West Africa, Northeast Brazil, and Trinidad. Principles and practices of World Music Pedagogy (WMP) will be at the center of demonstrations and conversations throughout the course with attention to promoting culturally sensitive, diverse, and inclusive music curricula in K-12, university, and community music settings. Participants will explore Smithsonian Folkways’ rich ethnographic, audio, film, and print archives and draw deeper connections to the vibrant cultures in their classrooms and communities. Applications of WMP for K-12 and university classrooms will be illustrated with examples from Routledge’s new World Music Pedagogy series and highlighted in participants’ projects featuring SFR archival materials and dimensions of World Music Pedagogy.
Smithsonian Folkways Certificate and Professional Development
Upon successful completion of the course, participants will receive documentation of 30 clock hours and a certificate from Smithsonian Folkways for specialized study in world music pedagogy. Teachers needing course credit can register for additional non-degree graduate credit through WVU Online Professional Development.

Faculty/Guest Artists:

Chanler Bailey: Steel drums of Trinidad

Katelyn Best: Ethnomusicology, Cultural Activism

Patricia Shehan Campbell: World Music Pedagogy

Heidi Dunkle: World Music in the Elementary Classroom

Chris Haddox: West Virginia singer-song writer and multi-instrumentalist

Ginny Hawker: Old-time, Gospel, and Bluegrass Traditions

Mary Linscheid: Songwriter, fiddler, and student of Appalachian singing traditions

Jennifer Mellizo: Smithsonian Folkways Music Pathways

Janet Robbins: WMP pedagogy; children's culture

Val Mindel: Old-time Appalachian harmony singing

Katelyn Schramm: World Music in the Choral Classroom

Mike Vercelli: Percussion traditions of Africa and the African diaspora

Juliana Cantarelli Vita: Northeast Brazil; World Music Pedagogy

Learn more here.

For more information, contact Course Coordinator Janet Robbins (Janet.Robbins@mail.wvu.edu).

University of St. Thomas

Onsite Course
Dates: Sunday, June 29th–July 3rd
Location: St. Paul, Minnesota
Course Director: Karen Howard
(Graduate Credits and PD Hours Available, WMP/SFR Certificate)

Description:
A diverse range of media and repertoire are explored in this week-long in-person intensive with the goal of building confidence and skills in diversifying music teaching and learning experiences. Attention will be given to the sociocultural and sociohistorical contexts of the music cultures. This is achieved through the performance of songs, dance, instrumental music, and discussions of constructs related to creating anti-biased environments and dispositions. Participants will be guided through recordings and curricular materials from the Smithsonian Folkways archives and experiences with culture bearers and teaching artists that fit the needs of students in knowing music (and knowing culture through music). Musical experiences will be tailored for use at various levels, including in classes for K–12 setting, community music, and higher education. Enrolled participants will join together to share particular means of teaching diverse musics, and will receive a certificate from the Smithsonian Institution in World Music Pedagogy.
Optional 3 Graduate Credits or PD hours available.

Course Faculty:

Dr. Pat O'Keefe: Brazilian Samba and Batucada

Dr. Patricia Shehan Campbell: World Music Pedagogy

Dr. Karen Howard: Equity in Music Education, Avoiding Cultural Appropriation, Tahitian Music, Wagogo music of Tanzania, and more

Dr. Jen Mellizo: Smithsonian Folkways Music Pathways

Tim O’Keefe: Introduction to Arabic Music

Siama Matazungidi and Dallas Johnson: Music from the Congo

Jasmine Fripp: Hip Hop in Choral Ensembles

Fode Bangoura: Djembe from Guinea

Joko Sutrisno: Javanese Gamelan, Indonesia

Maryan Ali and Becca Buck: Somali Songs and Games

For more information, please contact Dr. Karen Howard at karen.howard@stthomas.edu.

Sound Communities (AC 101 Cape Breton University)

Onsite Course
Dates: August 18th–22nd
Location: Cape Breton University (Centre for Sound Communities)
Course Directors: Marcia Ostashewski and Jody Stark
(Graduate or Undergraduate Credits and PD hours available; WMP/SFR Certificate)

Description:
This course introduces the role of music for teaching and learning through diverse cultural perspectives and in relationship with diverse local culture bearers and communities across Unama'ki (Cape Breton Island) and elsewhere. We critically consider the content and practices of teaching and learning through music in formal and informal settings, and ways that music can support learning in a variety of subject areas (arts practices, language arts, science, history, cultural studies, health, etc). Values and principles of EDIA, Indigenization, Reconciliation, anti-racism and decolonization are foundational to this course as is the Mi’kmaw concept of Etuaptmumk, or “Two-Eyed Seeing” in which personal relationships are foundational and individuals engage and learn from many different perspectives.
Graduate or Undergraduate Credits and PD hours available.

Course Faculty include:

Michel Aucoin: Acadian song and dance of Cheticamp

Patricia Shehan Campbell: World Music Pedagogy

Shirley Christmas: Mi’kmaw Elder, poet and playwright

Afua Cooper: African Canadian historian and dub poet

Lassana Diabaté: Balafon traditions of Kindia

Leah Doucette: Traditional Mi'kmaw dance

Meghan Forsyth: Acadian music

Patrick Howard: Arts Education for health and wellbeing

Ernest Johnson, Mi’kmaw Elder, Traditional practices

Jen Mellizo: Smithsonian Folkways Music Pathways

Michael Morrison: African Nova Scotian Gospel Music

Marcia Ostashewski: Community-engaged music and education for Reconciliation and Decolonization

Starr Paul: Mi’kmaw language learning

Katie Tremblay: Indigenous pedagogies in K–12 instrumental music

Jeff Ward: Mi'kmaw hand drum making

Please click here to view course listing and register.

For more information, please contact the Centre for Sound Communities sound_communities@cbu.ca.