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Critical pedagogy for music education: cultivating teachers’ critical consciousness through critically reflective inquiry

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Critical pedagogy for music education: cultivating teachers’ critical consciousness through critically reflective inquiry

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Content Critical Pedagogy for Music Education:
Cultivating Teachers’ Critical Consciousness Through Critically Reflective Inquiry
Jeffrey Lara-Ledón
Rossier School of Education
University of Southern California
A dissertation submitted to the faculty
in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of
Doctor of Education
May 2024

© Copyright by Jeffrey Lara-Ledón 2024
All Rights Reserved

The Committee for Jeffrey Lara-Ledón certifies the approval of this Dissertation
Julie Michele Slayton
Mary Stevens
Artineh Samkian, Committee Chair
Rossier School of Education
University of Southern California
2024

iv
Abstract
This action research study examines enacted andragogical and leadership moves aligned with critical
pedagogy in music education that sought to elicit a developing critical consciousness in my teacher
colleague, the main participant for this study. I facilitated critically reflective inquiry that spanned 12
weeks and leveraged critical discourse around instructional practices, race, positionality, and critical
reflection to answer the following research question: How do I engage with a music teacher colleague,
in my district, in critical discourse about our instructional practices to lead to critical consciousness? This
study used a conceptual framework grounded in transformational learning theory and critical pedagogy
which informed the development and implementation of weekly 1–1 sessions between my participant
and me to engage in such discourse. The findings of this study argue how facilitating critical discourse
through the use of probing questions, modeling, exploring our positionality, and employing the adaptive
leadership move of regulating distress helped elicit a developing critical consciousness on the part of my
participant. Since this action research study involved a focus on the self as a researcher throughout its
design, I also describe missed opportunities and moments of growth in my leadership while engaging
with my participant.

v
Dedication
To my partner, Cameron, thank you for being my rock throughout this entire process. I could not have
achieved this without your love, support, patience, and dedication to me and our three “fur babies.”

vi
Acknowledgments
I want to thank my dissertation chair, Dr. Artineh Samkian. Artineh, thank you for your guidance
throughout this entire Leading Instructional Change journey. The ways in which you have listened to my
questions, taken the time to shine a light on alternate perspectives, become a critical peer, and
supported my growth have all challenged me to think about my practice and become a better
researcher and educator. I cannot thank you enough for believing in me and leading me towards
success. I would also like to thank Dr. Julie Slayton for consistently making me intentionally question my
experiences and choices and reminding us of the possibilities that exist if we all just “jump off the
ladder!” I also want to thank Dr. Mary Stevens for being the main reason I chose to stay in the Leading
Instructional Change concentration. Being in your class the first semester of this program was truly
meant to be and it inspired me to learn more about what this whole LIC thing was about. Thank you!
To my friends and colleagues in this cohort at USC, thank you for the great memories! I am so
glad our paths crossed and we were able to embark on this journey together. Fight on! To my
participant, thank you for letting me work with you and helping me grow as a leader. To my brother and
sisters, I love you and I hope to bring you nothing but inspiration. To my mom, I love you! To my friends,
thank you for being patient with me when I canceled plans, and for always rooting for my journey. To
my family, I love you all!
Para mis amigos, familiares, y nuestro pueblo Mexicano, recuerden que el éxito es posible en
esta vida aunque otros nos duden. Juntos podemos sobrevivir y dominar las injusticias de este mundo.
¡Viva!

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Table of Contents
Abstract....................................................................................................................................................... iv
Dedication .................................................................................................................................................... v
Acknowledgments....................................................................................................................................... vi
List of Tables................................................................................................................................................ ix
List of Figures ............................................................................................................................................... x
Context and Background .................................................................................................................8
My Role as a Social Justice Scholar Practitioner.................................................................8
Music Education in American Public Education .................................................................9
Historically Entrenched Inequity ......................................................................................13
Context.............................................................................................................................18
Role...................................................................................................................................23
Conceptual Framework .................................................................................................................26
Critically Reflective Inquiry...............................................................................................29
Adaptive and Andragogical Moves...................................................................................37
Critical Pedagogy ..............................................................................................................45
Actions..............................................................................................................................51
Research Methods.........................................................................................................................58
Participant and Setting.....................................................................................................58
Data Collection .................................................................................................................61
Data Analysis....................................................................................................................67
Limitations and Delimitations ..........................................................................................69
Credibility and Trustworthiness .......................................................................................70
Ethics................................................................................................................................72
Findings .........................................................................................................................................75

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Facilitating Critical Discourse............................................................................................76
Adaptive Leadership: Regulating Distress as a Facilitator..............................................112
Missed Opportunities.....................................................................................................126
Conclusion ......................................................................................................................134
Afterword ....................................................................................................................................135
Understanding Where I Am Now ...................................................................................135
Moving Forward With “The Work”.................................................................................139
References................................................................................................................................................143

ix
List of Tables
Table 1: Planned Actions Page 54

x
List of Figures
Figure 1: Conceptual Framework Page 27

1
Critical Pedagogy for Choral Music Education:
Cultivating Teachers’ Critical Consciousness Through Critically Reflective Inquiry
I proudly call Southern California my home. I was born in Los Angeles and grew up in and around
the San Gabriel Valley in communities with significant Latinx populations. I am shaped by Californian art,
culture, people, and delicious food. Between kindergarten and fourth grade, my family moved around at
least once a year causing me to transfer to different schools each time. My public education reached
stability starting in fifth grade in the small city of Montebello, California. I reached this feeling of stability
once I was no longer living with my parents and was put into adoptive care with my aunt. During this
time, I was given a chance to explore who and what I wanted to be while navigating internal conflicts
with my own intersecting identities.
As a first-generation Mexican-American, growing up in my aunt’s first and second generation
Mexican-American household played a special role in what cultural values, beliefs, and morals were
instilled in me. Our Spanish language, Mexican and American traditions, customs, and food recipes
shaped how I began making sense of the world. These traditional aspects and cultural views play
themselves out in how I think, navigate being bilingual, inform what I like and dislike, and shape my life.
As a teenager who was also discovering their gay identity, differences between my family’s traditional
values and my identity caused me to feel isolated at times. My family was openly vocal about their
homophobia which made it difficult to trust and build a support system around me. I started feeling
disconnected from the family I lived with and developed strong feelings for a way out of our home. I was
learning how to appreciate and embody parts of my Mexican heritage but was also struggling internally
on how to grow and break cultural norms.
I always had an unexplained, strong desire to do well in school, get into college, and begin to
support myself. My family was encouraging of this idea although they could not always help me in my
educational journey. I was seen as someone who had superseded my family’s education and was

2
bringing new knowledge into the household. Whenever I encountered difficult homework, or projects, I
usually had to seek assistance elsewhere, mainly from other friends or teachers. Montebello’s local
public transportation played an important part of my daily school routine which helped instill what
many would call “street smarts” or the ability to navigate urban life vigilantly. I relied on public
transportation for school, and it played a role in my ability to engage in social time with friends.
In high school, I became involved in the choral music program as an extracurricular activity. I had
never experienced choral music before or had any understanding of what it entailed. As a MexicanAmerican, the music genres presented by our favorite singers, played at festive events, and favorited by
my family were not represented in the revered, ideal choral-esque, Western music styles. I enjoyed my
time in the choral program developing music literacy skills, learning about my voice, and performing on
stage. By my junior year of high school, I wanted to choose between being a music teacher or becoming
a lawyer. Being a music teacher was my number one choice and as a promise to myself, I believed that if
music schools did not accept me then I would be destined to become a lawyer. I began researching local
universities, learned about different music programs, and planned out how to apply so my dream of
being a music teacher would come true. Making such a big decision, in my junior year of high school,
brought me one step closer to creating my own, independent life.
The positive memories I formed in high school choir drove a newfound passion not just for
music, but for education. I wanted to become a teacher solely for the purpose of providing future
students with the same comfort and safety I felt in the choral music classroom. I had not yet realized the
disparities that existed in education between various racial populations. My high school was largely
made up of a Latinx student population, with a mostly White followed by Latinx faculty, and at the time I
had no consciousness about the White ideals and values that exist in our education system (Patel, 2016;
Spring, 2016). I was not aware of who I was or what my positionality (Douglas & Nganga, 2013) in this
world meant, and the opportunity gaps that exist not only in education (Ladson-Billings, 2006), but in

3
the way our country has been developed via that education system (Oakes et al., 2018; Tuck &
Gaztambide-Fernández, 2013). At the time, I was focused on securing a career that would get me away
from my current home life and would simultaneously allow me to leave a positive mark in the lives of
future students.
After graduating high school, I auditioned for and chose to attend California State University,
Fullerton (CSUF), which was mostly known for being a smaller, commuter type college campus in
Fullerton, California. CSUF became my number one choice because of the proximity to my hometown,
the cost-effectiveness of the university at the time, and the positive reviews I had discovered about their
music and teacher education programs. At CSUF, it was the first time that I truly felt, and noticed, what
it meant to be a part of a marginalized community. In our music department I noticed how most, if not
all, of the faculty were White, and how my peers were also mostly White. I recall wanting to learn how
to “fit in” while I attended school. I stopped speaking as much Spanish, especially since I ended up
moving out and was not using it with anyone at home anymore. I dove into internalizing the Western
music literature I was asked to learn and prepare in my music education classes. I let professors’
remarks and comments drive my work and began to align with their beliefs and practices to assimilate
(Solórzano & Yosso, 2002) into this new community. Today I can look back and see that the music
language, techniques, and instructional practices were very much aligned with that of White Supremacy
culture (Jones & Okun, 2001). Still, I never acknowledged or questioned how I, as a Mexican-American,
gay, male, was succumbing to ideals pushed by White professors—particularly two White, cisgendered
male, heterosexual and gay professors who are, to this day, held in high esteem in the regional, choral
world.
I graduated with my Bachelor of Arts in Music Education and began my teacher credentialing
program at CSUF. As a teacher candidate, I was placed at a high school in a very affluent, mostly White,
Latinx, and Asian community near the edge of the Los Angeles/San Bernardino County borders. I was

4
paired with a mentor who was the textbook definition of a successful White, cisgendered male,
heterosexual teacher whose work as a high school choral director was revered. I wanted to learn as
much as I could about his techniques, teaching styles, and success as a choral music teacher. I knew I
wanted to run my programs the same way he did, because his classroom structure fit the mold of what I
understood was an exemplary choral classroom environment based on my music education training. He
taught traditional choral music from the European renaissance era to modern day American pop. His
music selections were in English, French, German, and Italian which in my college experiences served as
the top four languages used in choral music. His award-winning choral groups had the opportunity to
perform and travel across the country promoting all the Western, Eurocentric choral qualities of musical
tone, balance, and grandeur. Most importantly, his classes were overflowing with students which
signaled to me that his teachings and musical programming were popular. As a pre-service teacher, I still
had not realized how problematic the nature of the White supremacist ideologies (Picower, 2009) in
education were. I only had the understanding that this classroom environment was what I needed to
prove my viability in building a successful choral program to secure future job opportunities.
After receiving my teaching credential and being offered my first high school teaching job, I
finally reached the goal of entering my own music classroom and finding the stability I craved. I felt on
top of the world. As a Mexican-American who came from a low-income background, a broken family,
and an unstable home life, I believed I had found my place in life and could finally begin my journey as a
music educator. Unknowingly, I was operating under the training of an education system that thrives on
dominant ideologies (Brookfield, 2017) and the propelling of majoritarian stories (Solórzano & Yosso,
2002). In other words, it was less my own journey, and one I was told was the “right” one.
My first teaching site, as a newly credentialed teacher, was an extremely affluent, mostly White,
community near the coast of Orange County, California I will refer to the school site as Beach High
School (BHS). At Beach High School I began building up the choral program, based on the ideals that

5
were instilled via my college education and student teaching experiences. Soon my students began
demonstrating success in their music experiences through performances, trips, and award recognitions.
In my third year of teaching, we had a school-wide racial incident which provided me with a disorienting
dilemma (Mezirow, 1991). In short, a Latinx parent formed a small group of former students who raised
awareness on issues of unequal opportunities for Latinx students in our district. I was invited by my
administrators to join a small task force discussion with this parent, her supporters, and a few other
teachers. I suspect it was because of my Latinx identity. While addressing issues related to embracing
our expanding, diverse population, the parent said to me, “Must be nice to be afforded special privileges
as a light-colored Latino.” While I had started to become more aware of the marginalization of Black,
Indigenous, and People of Color in our world from experiences in college and in starting my master’s
program at CSUF, this was the first time I became conscious of disparities based on skin color within the
Latinx community. Colorism was just something that never crossed my mind causing me to feel dumb
and naive. This experience allowed me to see that I could both be marginalized and marginalizing as
someone with a relative privileged status in the Latinx community who was protecting White ideals in
this White dominated educational environment where Latinx students existed and needed to be valued.
During this time, I was finishing my Master of Science in Secondary Education from CSUF, and
my teaching focus involved providing my students with expanded exposure to diverse choral music. For
the choral students at BHS that included performing music from different cultures while learning about
their historical context through discussions on proper cultural performance practices. A second
disorienting dilemma came when my students worked with a music clinician who provided comments
and feedback on their performance. They were working on a piece written in Tamil being performed in a
Southern Indian style. During the experience, the clinician turned to us and asked, “What is wrong with a
mostly all-White choir singing an Indian piece?” I believe the clinician, a White woman, had an
awareness of assumptions that could be made towards my mostly White students about cultural

6
appropriation. Knowing what I know today, I would say this experience involved an interaction where
my hegemonic assumptions were questioned, and my emotions drove a defensive reaction. I explained
our intentional research on performing this piece without appropriation and allowed my students to
discuss and defend our performance process. Seeing my students converse about cultural issues, while I
remained mostly silent, made me question if I was failing my students by not being equipped with the
knowledge to build their sociopolitical awareness as I sought to uplift and expose them to diverse music.
Memories and feelings from experiences like these sat with me when I applied for the doctoral program
at the University of Southern California.
When I started the doctoral program, I had been teaching at BHS for 5 years. I learned how the
American education system stripped marginalized communities of their cultures and forced complicity in
the larger White supremacist system (Oakes et al., 2018; Patel, 2016; Spring, 2016; Tuck & GaztambideFernández, 2013). I began reflecting on my teaching philosophy and how educational experiences had
molded me into someone who maintained the status quo and perpetuated inequities. My reflection
highlighted how I moved from being a teacher who provided a comfortable, safe environment where
students could gain musical knowledge to one who was driven by moving students towards “successful”
performance expectations by valuing certain music literature over others, leaning on largely Western
choral music ideals, and punishing myself in the process whenever I did not meet those expectations. I
acknowledged how the system made me, shaped me, and controlled my complicity in perpetuating
Whiteness through assimilation as explained by Solórzano and Yosso (2002), “according to cultural
deficit storytelling, a successful student of color is an assimilated student of color” (p. 31).
In my journey to free myself from the limitations of how this system has shaped me, I looked
forward to becoming a critically conscious educator (Douglas & Nganga, 2013; Ladson-Billings, 1995;
Milner, 2003); an educator who, through choral music, created learning opportunities for students that
raised their critical consciousness (Abrahams, 2017; Hill, 2021) towards dismantling the status quo while

7
improving academic opportunities for future generations. As Milner (2003) referenced, “we (as people
with multiple roles and positions) cannot work for freedom on behalf of others until we are free
ourselves” (p. 194). I had finally built up the courage to understand who I was as a person, as an
educator, and as a leader. Although I was still building skills and knowledge, my goal was to become a
critical educator who understood the world around us and found passion in leading critical music
education for all students.
Getting to this point was fueled by recognizing when disorientation (Wergin, 2020) occurred and
making sense of those disorienting experiences through new mental models (Senge, 2006). Brookfield
(2017) stated that hegemonic assumptions “are assumptions that we think are in our own best interests
but that actually work against us in the long term” (p. 17). These assumptions shape us and how we
view the world, but I now push myself to question such assumptions and how they previously formed.
With my love of music education, I seek to provide students with learning experiences that value their
identities and contributions to the world, along with disrupting the status quo as a critical instructional
leader. To do this, I contend we must change the adults who ultimately teach these students.
As a leader of instructional change, I want the music of students in classrooms all across the
country to be valued; I want to provide music teachers with opportunities to build capacity in critical
pedagogy (Douglas & Nganga, 2013; Milner, 2003); and for teachers to have the courage to value music
that is not from the same 500-year-old stockpile of mostly Western European musicology. Milner (2003)
defined critical pedagogy as “a form of instruction, which rejects oppression, combats injustice, gives
voice to marginalized people, fights the maintaining of the status quo; and critical pedagogy encourages
instruction that promotes radical action in the classroom and beyond” (p. 199). Additionally, critical
pedagogy is an “approach to education that involves liberation,” and “values learning experiences as an
avenue for bringing forth social change by engaging in criticisms of capitalism, inequity, injustice, and
other social ills that plague institutions and the larger society” (Douglas & Nganga, 2013, p. 62). As will

8
be further defined and discussed, critical pedagogy does not have a specific method, tool, or recipe to
follow and is highly contextual.
As I interrogated the experiences that shaped who I was as a person (and educator) complicit
with White supremacy, I wondered where and when this work should begin. Given how long it took me
to realize the narrow music education I received and perpetuated, what was my role as an educational
leader to help support my colleagues in arriving at this awareness, if they have not already done so?
Realistically, educators still operate within an educational system that inhibits space in creating small
interactions that move others towards criticality (Brookfield, 2017; Douglas & Nganga, 2013; Elmore,
2002; Ladson-Billings, 1995; Larrivee, 2008; Milner, 2003). However, I believed that work in my local
context could help move music teachers towards this awareness. In building critically reflective inquiry
(Belenky & Stanton, 2000; Brookfield, 2010; Brown, 2004; Horn & Little, 2009; Howard, 2003; Larrivee,
2008; Rodgers, 2002), and through modeling (Loughran & Berry, 2005) the questioning of my current
pedagogy, I will further explain how these concepts shaped my action plan by facilitating critical
discourse (Mezirow, 1991, 2000, 2003) on critical pedagogy with a music teacher colleague to
interrogate our current instructional practices.
Context and Background
In this section, I will cover how I viewed my role as a social justice scholar practitioner engaging
in this action research study to address an historically entrenched inequity present in my context as a
music educator. Additionally, I will provide information on the background of music education in the
American public education system, the context where this study took place, and my role throughout this
action research.
My Role as a Social Justice Scholar Practitioner
Social justice movements focus on ensuring the fair share of society’s wealth and benefits
among its members (Jorgensen, 2015). Proponents of social justice highlight that all citizens are entitled

9
to educational, cultural, political, and legal benefits in a democratic society. In turn, this justice applies
not only to the collective well-being of the community but also that of an individual. Jorgensen (2015)
explained that “social justice is transformational in seeking to right past wrongs and creating or restoring
a more humane and civil society” (p. 15).
Music education is a largely contentious space where educators continuously engage in matters
of social justice while navigating the pressures of multiple agendas and complex tensions (McCarthy,
2015). To advocate for social justice, and do it well, researchers first must analyze educational history to
uncover entrenched roots of injustice and highlight patterns of oppression in our society. McCarthy
(2015) noted that in doing such an analysis “it is important to critique past events and actions in the
context of what constituted public good at that time,” and cautioned against, “interpreting human
motivation and actions in the name of labeling actions and events to fit contemporary discourse in social
justice” (p. 30). My own research alone cannot undo the entrenched structures that produce and
promote oppressions and systemic injustices. However, exposing these roots can reveal how efforts that
addressed injustices were framed at different points in history, which efforts and movements worked,
and which failed and why. Therefore, as I discuss the historically entrenched inequity in music education
history, I want to acknowledge my commitment to being a social justice scholar practitioner as I engaged
in this action research study.
Music Education in American Public Education
Cogs in the American educational system (educators, leaders, politicians, etc.) have consciously
enacted and perpetuated systems of oppression since the early days of European settlement (Spring,
2016). Driven by the belief that White Europeans had to “civilize” the world’s people, deculturalization,
or the act of replacing one culture and language with that of the “superior” race, has characterized
curricula in American schools for generations. This act of cultural genocide, where education destroys a
culture of the dominated group, pre-dates the founding of our country and shapes choices made in

10
classrooms, politics, and government. The founding fathers of the United States frowned on a
multicultural society shaping our country and advocated for a unified American culture where
nationalistic attitudes dominated hegemonic structures such as the American English language
advocated by Noah Webster (Oakes et al., 2018; Spring, 2016).
To make sense of the world, humans learning in the American education system are taught that
through science and reason they can “discover, organize, and control for their own benefit and
enlightenment the mysteries of the universe and human existence” (Oakes et al., 2018, p. 78). However,
Oakes et al. (2018), discussed how this science and reason is derived from the essentialist view of
promoting White supremacy as the dominant ideology. To provide a space where these goals would be
achieved, the common school was created in America where students were sorted and segregated into
classes and grade levels. Here, curricula that promoted deculturalization efforts began paving the future
of elementary and secondary schools. Oakes et al., (2018) also explained that common schools appealed
to American society because they were seen as beneficial to all citizens looking for a path to the
American dream whilst creating productive workers and “good citizens” (p. 83) and would work to
create common experiences for all citizens that would eliminate inequity between socioeconomic
classes (McCarthy, 2015)—a type of social justice.
However, this perpetuated White narrative where race is excluded is one that we often see in
education politics and the history of the United States. Racial issues have been apparent since the early
days of education in this country as seen in the allocation of resources and opportunities where the
dominant group receives far more than the marginalized groups (Givens & Ison, 2023). Native and Black
identities have historically been excluded from the conceptualized narrative depicting the creation of
the American public school system and highlights how our inequitable system of education historically
limits access based on race, gender, and class. Givens and Ison (2023) explained the importance of
acknowledging the racial triad of White, Native, and Black identities in the formation of our educational

11
system and how a focus on merging various White cultural groups into one “White American” national
identity promoted the exclusion and domination of non-White ethnic groups (p. 345). Understanding
this racial context is necessary to uncover the implications that race and power hold in the development
of the educational institutions in which we operate today.
Music entered the common school system as a subject that had “physical, intellectual, and
moral benefits” (McCarthy, 2015, p. 34). McCarthy (2015) further discussed how the act of singing, such
as in a choir, was seen as something in which citizens could participate together in a civilized act that
would elevate the tastes of working-class people. Essentially, it was believed, providing music education
for everyone would in turn develop better American citizens. As the culture of the dominant group
becomes the norm and is projected as humanity’s ideal way of living, a narrative of Salvationism is often
perpetuated (de Oliveira, 2012). This ideal is important for the oppressor as a new culture is cultivated
and cultural minorities are stripped of their identities. Bringing music to the American common school
meant that certain music, particularly that which was popular amongst the poor, or marginalized
groups, would be excluded, or eliminated, from the curriculum (Jorgensen, 2015; McCarthy, 2015).
As this nationalist view continued to shape educational decisions, in the mid 19th century Lowell
Mason advocated for the inclusion of music education in the American public school system (McCarthy,
2015). Mason’s experiment offered free vocal music instruction and its success led to the creation of
school music programs across the country and offers us documented experiences of music programs in
White schools.1 His work was appealing because it brought people of various cultural backgrounds
together to engage in a singular act that would promote cultural assimilation through singing and
playing instruments; thereby putting music education under the nationalistic goal of preparing
1 Music in schools of Black and other marginalized communities from that time period have not yet been
placed prominently in music education history (McCarthy, 2015), providing a potential for future music
education research to transform its canons.

12
culturalized citizens in a democracy, but most importantly in developing White American nationality. As
McCarthy (2015) pointed out, music teachers’ focus during the late 19th and early 20th centuries was to
achieve cultural homogeneity through singing patriotic songs and the folk songs of Western European
countries. The individual identities of students in these communities were not considered in teachers’
curricular choices. Viewing this movement under the context of social justice is important as it helps us
analyze how “supporters of local musical traditions in the service of nationalistic movements may also
resist efforts to introduce students to the musics of other cultures” (Jorgensen, 2015, p. 11).
Instilling musical ideals under the guise of building a new American nationality guided music
teachers in their encouragement of cultural assimilation and majoritarian ideals (Solórzano & Yosso,
2002). As we uncover, and make sense of, how music education came to be in its early days, we must
ask the following questions: Whose folk music was being represented? How was this music appropriated
to be used in schools? How were those songs curated for building a national identity? Whose histories
were being represented?
In the 20th century, the divisions between music for the common school and popular music
limited the ways students developed skills that could be transferred into cultural musical practices. The
1960s and 1970s brought with them societal and educational change with a push to expand music
education to include music of diverse peoples and cultures during an era of “multiculturalism”
(McCarthy, 2015). While multiculturalism might promote the inclusion of music from other cultures in
the curriculum, again, we must ask the following questions as stated earlier: Whose music is being
represented? How is this music appropriated to be used in schools? How were these songs curated for
building a national identity? Ultimately the question of “who gets to decide which [music] is
represented?” was answered by Jorgensen (2015) as she stated, “what is considered to be ‘right’
conduct is framed by those with the power to create and enforce the rules that define it” (p. 8).

13
Music education has publicly been linked to student achievement in recent years particularly to
highlight the importance of its role in the education system as part of the discourse over budget cuts to
the arts in primary and secondary education (Southgate & Roscigno, 2009). Connections between music
and cognitive benefits in academic subjects such as math and science have been leveraged to promote
its inclusion. With such claims being defended about music education, it is important to also
acknowledge the ways in which American music education, and its proponents, fall into the trap of
perpetuating the status quo and inequitable practices.
Historically Entrenched Inequity
The historical development of music education in the American public school system is narrated
and represented by the interests, values, morals, and beliefs of White settlers who subscribed to White
supremacy. These narratives perpetuate deculturalization efforts by instilling a “White savior complex”
(Liera, 2019) in music education while advocating a unified national identity for the common good even
though it causes harm for marginalized groups (Givens & Ison, 2023). If music teachers operate under an
appropriated, dominant narrative, then students are exposed to a music education that perpetuates
White hegemony and promotes deculturalization in American society as music from other cultures is
viewed as irrelevant, or lesser than, in the music curriculum. This lends itself to the creation of deficit
ideology of other ethnic groups when music from other cultures is excluded from the curriculum
(Bradley, 2015). Music education history highlights this claim as it reveals a dominant narrative in the
development of American public school music programs while the narratives of marginalized peoples
are not yet told, or are constructed with narrow ideological foundations (McCarthy, 2015).
Music classes at secondary levels usually have higher numbers of White students than other
ethnic groups (Southgate & Roscigno, 2009). In line with the promotion of a “White American” national
identity (Givens & Ison, 2023), deculturalization efforts in music education perpetuate acts of ignorance
in White people by subscribing to strategies that categorize and alienate anybody who is perceived as

14
“different” (Bradley, 2015). Bradley (2015) discussed this in relation to pre-service music candidates who
reacted defensively at the mention of including music from another culture. Reactions included
complaints about not knowing anything about other musics (an effect of Western practices being the
sole and standard curriculum), and resistance to erasing the Western canon from the curriculum (a
defensive reaction that reveals unacknowledged racism). As teachers refuse to venture beyond what
they already know they continue to be afforded the “luxury of ignorance” as they perpetuate White
supremacy under the guise of not “having to know anything about those people who are not like them”
(Bradley, 2015, p. 195). If White music students never experience music outside of the Western canon,
then the lived realities of students of color or other culturally diverse groups are ignored and a negative
view on music from other cultures is perpetuated, thus reinforcing deculturalization.
Differential learning opportunities for students are fueled when teachers are rewarded for
maintaining a White supremacist, Eurocentric, music program where deculturalization efforts stay in a
curricular loop as students’ own identities and experiences (including music from other cultures) are
devalued (Abrahams, 2017; Perkins, 2019). These unexamined instructional choices contribute to
deculturalization by cultivating and uplifting the “White American” identity (Givens & Ison, 2023). As a
result, students from diverse populations lose opportunities to benefit from music’s cognitive
advantages and are harmed when socioeconomic challenges (Southgate & Roscigno, 2009) or feelings of
alienation in previous music experiences (Bradley, 2015; Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2015) fuel losing interest
in and access to music education.
For example, Kelly-Mchale and Abril (2015) discussed how the nature of high school music
ensembles in schools often showcase this historical inequity with Latinx students. They argued that
multicultural repertoire selected as relevant to Latinx culture is often written and inspired by Latin
American folk music to fit dominant musical practices and is disconnected from actual musical traditions
of these cultures. Viewing music from other cultures through a Western European lens then contributes

15
to feelings of musical isolation in students and sustains dominant ideologies even when a marginalized
community, in this case Latinx students, is the majority at a school site (Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2015).
Additionally, maintaining dominant practices of ensemble structure, style, and repertoire along with the
competitive nature of ensembles, time commitments after school, and financial obligations affect Latinx
student participation in music programs. Maintaining an agenda of cultural Whiteness in music
classrooms creates situations where music programs often fail, are funded poorly, and promote deficit
mindsets when students from diverse cultures do not succumb to dominant music ideologies.2 KellyMchale and Abril (2015) showcased this while analyzing a study of band programs in the same school
district where schools with higher numbers of Latinx and Black students had lower financial resources,
inadequate facilities, and lack of parent involvement compared to schools with fewer Latinx and Black
students.
Differential opportunities such as these are perpetuated by deficit mindset and create additional
deficit mindsets in teaching students from different backgrounds because entrenched beliefs (like music
practices) in our system work against the acquisition of new knowledge (Elmore, 2002) such as building
critical capacity, or consciousness. In this mindset, teachers and students maintain limited experiences
with diversity and manifest negative attitudes and beliefs towards people whose backgrounds (and
music) differ from their own or what they have been taught to accept as their own (Shaw, 2015),
perpetuating White supremacy. White students are taught to uplift and celebrate their own cultural
identity while simultaneously being harmed as humans who are stripped of their capacity to embrace
diversity. While the data behind music genre selection and its implications on student achievement is
2 Kelly-Mchale and Abril (2015) noted that a gap in high school music participation for Latinx students is not fully
explained in current research literature. Some potential reasons include limited access to electives, lack of district
support, family socioeconomic status, but most relevant to this study, “the perception that school-based music
programs lack relevance and importance in [students’] lives due to the nature and structure of large performing
ensembles” (p. 157).

16
limited (Southgate & Roscigno, 2009), we do know that music selected for a curriculum has implications
for the retention of students from culturally diverse groups (Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2005). As expressed
by Southgate and Roscigno (2009), if higher student achievement is linked to involvement in music
classes, then students from diverse groups who do not feel represented and decline participation in
music are eliminated from taking advantage of such artistic knowledge and cognitive benefits. This
further harms culturally diverse students by segregating them into the contexts of society that our
education system was designed to perpetuate and promotes the elimination and domination of diverse
identities (Givens & Ison, 2023).
Community perception and teachers’ individual deficit views of culturally diverse populations
shape how students who do not fit the Western canon are treated in the music classroom (Bradley,
2015; Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2015). As music education programs stay focused on multiculturalism, this
promotes a color-blind mantra of music being a universal language that “treats everyone equally”
(Bradley, 2015). However, as Bradley (2015) emphasized, this color-blind approach, which ignores race
and ethnicity, allows teachers to view all children as White and prevents understanding other cultural
backgrounds as global music is “Whitewashed” with dominant practices, aiding deculturalization. An
example of this is evident when teachers only teach multicultural music that can be musically notated
and refuse to acknowledge folk music that is traditionally learned aurally, or when multicultural pieces
are used in a tokenizing fashion as novelty pieces and limited to specific concert genres throughout the
school year.
Music teachers operate under the notion that personal choices in school music programs allow
the representation of cultures from all students (Bradley, 2015; Jorgensen, 2015; McCarthy, 2015).
However, Oakes et al., (2018) warned that “what has typically passed for a pluralistic or multicultural
curriculum is little more than a ‘heroes-and-holidays’ approach to teaching about diversity” (p. 96). Even
in using a multiculturalism lens, educators perpetuate the same salvationist and nationalistic views in

17
music education as teachers are the sole decision-makers of what type of music is performed. This
selective decision is often informed by teachers’ own values and beliefs in what defines a “good” music
curriculum. When music from other cultures is brought into the classroom, teachers take on a White
savior complex by becoming gatekeepers who have allowed the representation of that culture in the
classroom. Resisting and disrupting this complex system requires engaging in music education critically
as students discover how music of their own cultures, and others, fit into the diverse identity of the
United States and break down deficit ideologies.
What can we do? Researchers (Abrahams, 2017; Bradley, 2015; Douglas & Nganga, 2013; Hess,
2017; Hill, 2021; Jorgensen, 2015; Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2015; Milner, 2003; McCarthy, 2015; Oakes et
al., 2018), and educators, have advocated for the inclusion of critical approaches in education and music
education. Offering a critical approach develops students’ knowledge of our nation’s diversity and
provides critical content opportunities while maintaining students’ own heritages and languages (Oakes
et al., 2018). Most importantly with a critical approach, students become adults who learn to challenge
social and economic injustices that are perpetuated and derived from our adherence to Eurocentric
perspectives, traditions, and cultural practices in the creation of our Anglo-American identity (Spring,
2016). In this context, teachers play a central role in helping “the oppressed become vigilant towards
the eradication of the powers that dictate future oppression,” (Milner, 2003, p. 200) as White, Native,
Black and other culturally diverse students embrace diversity as part of the norm.
How do we approach such a task? To undertake this work, I operate under the awareness that
we become informed learners, researchers, and educators who can engage in critical pedagogical
choices that curate knowledge through socialization (Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano, 2017;
Fairweather & Rhoads, 1996), and bringing others towards critical consciousness (Abrahams, 2017; Hess,
2017; Hill, 2021) where they can recognize the hierarchies and structural inequities that exist in our
realities, without ignoring the “canon” (Hess, 2017). By understanding what has caused the historically

18
entrenched inequities present not just in music education, but in the American education system, we
can enact an adaptive change (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016) that is guided by all members of
society and not just the dominant group. Such a change would require us to unlearn entrenched beliefs
about our practice that stand in the way of developing new critical approaches (Elmore, 2002). Music
teachers, and other educators, need leaders who engage with adaptive leadership to “build a culture
that values diverse views and relies less on central planning and the genius of the few at the top, where
the odds of adaptive success go down” (Heifetz et al., 2009, p. 16) to tackle this challenge. Together, we
can build the skills necessary to infiltrate our current system and position ourselves in roles where we
successfully engage in critical and adaptive educational change with others.
Context
Beach High School was a comprehensive, 4-year public high school serving Grades 9–12, where
students had access to eight periods a semester and year-long classes that met every other day for 90-
minutes. BHS is part of a school district that served at least 15,000 students over approximately 30
schools employing about 900 teachers and over 1,000 other staff. Total revenue for the district sat
around approximately $360,000,000 from federal, local, and state funds while spending a per student
amount of about $18,000. Situated between two cities, the district served City 1, which had a population
of about 80,000 people (largely White, followed by Latinx, less than 10% Asian, and less that 5% other)
with a median household income of around $140,000. The second city, City 2, had a population over
110,000 people (Over 50% White, followed by Latinx, Asian, and less than 1% other) with a median
household income of around $96,000.
BHS was the largest of the four public high schools in this district with an enrollment of over
2300+ students in 2021–2022. BHS described the student body as “quite diverse,” and was composed of
largely White, followed by Latinx, with less than 7% Asian, Black, and/or other; however, from the data
provided it was not clear how expansive the definition of “diversity” was to this site. In 2021–2022 there

19
were over 100 certificated faculty employed at BHS (no demographic information was provided for
faculty in the school’s academic profile). Working at BHS for over 7 years my informal observations led
me to say that the administration, faculty, and staff demographics were largely White.
BHS prided itself on the number of curricular options it provided for students. Academic
programs such as International Baccalaureate, Advanced Placement (AP), Advancement Via Individual
Determination, Honors Courses, Regional Occupational Program, and Career Technical Education were
available for students on campus. Additionally, resource programs such as the Junior Mentor Program,
extracurricular activities including 28 athletic sports, performing arts (dance, drama, instrumental music,
and vocal music), digital media, and culinary arts allowed students to explore a diverse range of
curricula. A strong alumni association, educational foundation, and 34 school connected organizations
(booster groups) helped financially support the campus community and individual programs.
Narrowing down to the music programs, Beach High School offered both instrumental and vocal
music classes for students. Most of the instrumental classes were assigned to the instrumental music
teacher, while choir and piano classes were assigned to the vocal music teacher. In acknowledging my
own biased view and reflecting on experiences as a vocal music teacher for 7 years at BHS, our district
leadership has offered no internal accountability system for what is taught or practiced in these music
classes. In referring to “internal accountability” I turn to an explanation provided by Elmore (2002):
By this [internal accountability system] we mean that there is a high degree of alignment among
individual teachers about what they can do and about their responsibility for the improvement
of student learning. Such schools also have shared expectations among teachers, administrators,
and students about what constitutes good work and a set of processes for observing whether
these expectations are being met. (p. 21)
The only accountability practice in place for music is site principals dictating what is expected of music
programs and classes that exposes power dynamics at play in this organizational context. These

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administrative choices are solely based on producing several performances throughout the year rather
than focusing on curriculum choices.
Having no uniform internal accountability (at our site, zone, or district) allows present inequities,
such as deculturalization, to be perpetuated as students are exposed to a music education where
teachers default to teaching what they know while maintaining ignorance (Garrett & Segall, 2013). As
music teachers, we are only given the opportunity to meet with each other once or twice a year. This
prevents us from socializing and collaborating professionally (Brookfield, 2010; Horn & Little, 2010;
Stanley & Conway, 2015) to reflect and question our current instructional practices. Elmore (2002)
discussed how schools are hostile towards the learning of adults, which brings hostility to the learning of
students. Preserving this system results in harm for music students as teachers are prevented from the
opportunity and expectation of learning together on ideas such as building sociopolitical consciousness
(Ladson-Billings, 2006; Spikes, 2018) and learning opportunities that resist deculturalization. This allows
White students to be exposed to a narrow curriculum where diversity is devalued and perpetuates the
curricular loop of deficit mindsets mentioned earlier.
In our BHS zone, students at the five elementary schools all received different music
experiences, then fed into our zone’s only intermediate school and arrived there with vast differences in
musical knowledge and ability (e.g., music note reading, singing confidence). For example, the
elementary schools in the neighborhoods of the 80% White and more affluent City 1 had support in
providing adequate classroom instruments, musical showcases, and community support in music, while
schools in the 60% White but less affluent City 2 had to make decisions about which ensembles could be
offered before or after school and which music courses could not be taught due to instrumental
limitations. Schools in City 2, where 40% of the student population is not White, allow for greater
diversification in music selection, but also punish teachers whose programs do not meet Western music
standards by devaluing their students’ performances and music courses (e.g., administrators are verbal

21
about their negative feelings or experiences for school performances, music classes, or even the
teacher) which promotes deculturalization. By the time students reach high school music programs the
disparity in musical ability is apparent and those who felt unsuccessful in their elementary and
intermediate journey lose interest in pursuing future music experiences. As was discussed by KellyMchale and Abril (2015) this causes an issue for music programs and teachers since fewer students end
up choosing music and leads to retention issues that ultimately affect class schedules.
At BHS our principal pushed a concept called “zone articulation” that was supposed to
encourage teachers to articulate between primary and secondary levels what we wanted our students
to learn. As of this study, most of the elementary music teachers elected to teach their own curriculum
in K–3 general music classes, and some school sites offered ensembles such as: orchestra, band, and
choir before or after school in Grades 4–6. Since my first year at BHS, I had spoken on the differential
opportunities being created and the inequities present for students of lower socioeconomic status who
could not attend ensemble rehearsals before or after school and received an unaligned music education
experience in general music classes during the school day. There was no current method to measure
how, or what, music literacy was taught to students at the elementary level. Additionally, elementary
music teachers felt burnt out. At our zone concerts, several of them expressed their need to slow down,
be able to provide quality resources (like instruments) to students, as well as their concern about how
music classes were scheduled throughout the day at the primary level.
At the intermediate school level there was one music teacher present who taught band,
orchestra, and choir. Although all three of those subjects were music related, there was an intense
demand on that teacher coming from knowing how to teach all those instruments, plan performances,
provide meaningful lessons, and have time for the additional teacher duties such as planning, meetings,
and outside duties. The issue of this school site having limited elective offerings also created a

22
recruitment issue for the music program, which in effect caused recruitment and retention issues for the
music programs at the high school level.
In explaining how the structures in place were situated in this organization, I was brought back
to a quote by Elmore (2002), where he stated, “At the moment, schools and school systems are not
designed to provide support or capacity in response to demands for accountability” (p. 3). It is evident
that this organization promoted a system where teachers were denied resources necessary for critical
work and reproduced the status quo of White supremacy. This presented an adaptive challenge (Heifetz
et al., 2009). When music teachers are busy thinking about student retention, performances, scheduling,
and other duties, there is little time to pause and reflect on practice (alone or with others) that can
cause disruption to the way music is taught to students.
As teachers are deprived of the opportunity to develop criticality in their pedagogy, the
perpetuation of deculturalization maintains a mindset where teachers are overextended for the
“common good.” This type of structure ensures that teachers promote dominant ideologies and
prevents spending time in professional learning communities, which is considered by most to be time
away from “working” (Elmore, 2002). Music teachers typically work in isolation as there is usually one or
two music teachers at any given school site. This isolation promotes and reinforces entrenched practices
(Stanley & Conway, 2015). Working in an unaccountable system brought its own challenges, but in the
context of this study the challenge of creating the space to introduce critical music pedagogy that had
the potential to cause disruption was evident. Without the ability to engage in discourse with others,
promote professional learning, or have time to engage with students about their cultures, traditions,
and beliefs, the perpetuation of deculturalization was ensured in this organization.
Informal conversations with music teacher colleagues in my district showed that several of the
elementary music teachers believed that our students and families “do not care about music
performances,” which created a sense of defeat for them. By employing deficit mindsets (Bartolomé,

23
2004; Howard & Rodriquez-Minkoff, 2017; Kelly-Mchale & Abril, 2015), educators’ low expectations
limited opportunities that engaged students in rich, diverse learning experiences (Fink, 2013). Given
music teachers were overextended and felt devalued by the district, they often resorted to simply doing
their job without putting in additional effort to improve pedagogy for their students. By examining how
the music programs at the elementary schools fit into the context of the secondary music programs we
could examine what was truly being taught in our music courses, how our teachers were making sense
of their practice, and how their practice was limited to what they know and had the capacity to enact.
To engage music educators in critical approaches, a safe environment where teachers access focused
discourse with other teachers was needed so they could engage in reflective musical inquiry (Stanley &
Conway, 2015) and critical reflection (Brookfield, 2017) to disrupt the entrenched inequities described.
Role
At the time of this study, I was in my 8th year as a high school choral music teacher at Beach
High School. Returning to the classroom after the COVID-19 pandemic created special circumstances in
several choral classrooms, not just at my school site, but across the country. Music teachers shared
informally how their attention was shifted into recruitment strategies, building up performance
practices, and navigating post-pandemic academic challenges with students. As a choral music teacher, I
too faced the challenge of re-building my music program and recruiting enough students to maintain a
sustainable vocal music teacher position at this school site. In returning to in-person teaching in 2021,
the role of AP Coordinator was added to my teaching role to maintain full-time status. This role
continuously shifted my attention away from teaching music throughout the school year.
Additionally, my administration tasked me with being a part of isolated discussions to sort out a
strategic plan with California Proposition 28 funding. Potentially, this state funding would be used to
supplement our visual and performing arts programs and could help address inequities in the structures
present in our district by providing staffing resources and creating sustainable funds that could be used

24
throughout the year for our arts programs. Along with these duties, I also taught sections of piano class
at BHS, and worked as the vocal music director for our theater department’s annual spring musicals
after school.
In describing how the historically entrenched inequity (the perpetuation of deculturalization in
music education) and its differential opportunities were expressed in my organization, I touched upon
how teachers were always kept “busy.” In examining my own role as a teacher, I, too, fit that structure
and perpetuated the same inequity through my work by defaulting to teaching the way I was taught.
Rather than being afforded the time to engage in professional learning, I was kept busy worrying about
classroom teaching, after-school activities, and administrative tasks. On one end, I understand the
importance of pausing, reflecting, and engaging in discourse; however, on the other, I was constrained
by my position to maintain job stability. To pause and reflect on my practice I first needed to be able to
sustain it by preserving student numbers in my music program, something that could not be done at the
high school level alone. When we have stable student recruitment and retention, my teaching position
could be classroom-based, and would afford me the luxury of daily time to engage in critical reflection
and critical pedagogy.
I wanted to focus on this adaptive challenge (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016) of time
constraints and the need to support music teachers to enact critical music pedagogy because I believed
in the need for critical pedagogy and addressing the potential resistance that comes from asking others
to step away from their everyday routines. Adaptive challenges such as this are often difficult to
navigate because “they usually require changes in people’s assumptions, perceptions, beliefs, attitudes,
and behaviors” (Northouse, 2016, p. 262). In my context, this included persuading my colleagues to
change their perceptions on pausing and reflecting on their practice to develop new learning
opportunities for students. For music teachers to disrupt deculturalization in our music programs, I
contend that adaptive leadership was necessary to address the entrenched inequity discussed in this

25
study. Adaptive leadership requires us to tackle tough challenges by mobilizing others while wrestling
with “normative questions of value, purpose, and process” (Heifetz et al., 2009, p. 14). Essentially, we
can only address adaptive challenges by working with others to bring about change. Insight into what
others value in the organization would allow us as leaders to build interventions that motivate change
while acknowledging the loss others will feel and wish to resist (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016).
Fortunately, the nature of low oversight, and ability to plan my own performances, pick my own
repertoire, and create my own curriculum afforded me the freedom to engage in critical musical work.
Additionally, this was something I could do with my music educator colleagues as well. Since my first
year at BHS, I worked closely with the music teacher at the intermediate school. Britney, taught band,
orchestra, choir, yearbook, and was a technology coach for her school site (it was a lot!).3 When we first
met, I expressed my interest in a better pathway for choral music between our sites to build up the
vocal music program and potentially hire an additional music staff member at the intermediate school.
Doing so would provide time to recruit, provide positive performance experiences for our students, and
more time for us to focus on our teaching practices.
Britney and I had done something every year called a “zone concert” where we planned a vocal
music showcase with groups from the high school, middle school, and our five feeder elementary
schools, thus showcasing our “zone.” We also had her choir group perform at our high school concerts
throughout the year to provide a better performance setting for her students (doing so allowed them to
be part of a concert where they could observe and be part of the talents of the high schoolers). Previous
feedback from students and parents had been overwhelmingly positive.
Since Britney and I had a close working relationship, I built up the confidence to ask the
following question: How do I engage with a music teacher colleague, in my district, in critical discourse
3 Britney is a pseudonym to protect my colleague’s confidentiality.

26
about our instructional practices to lead to critical consciousness? To address this question, this
dissertation took an action research approach which is an “historical starting point for researchers in
music education to consider studying their own practices” (Stanley & Conway, 2015, p. 132). The
following sections will present the study’s conceptual framework that informed how this question was
addressed as well as how I reflected on my own practice throughout the process.
Conceptual Framework
Conceptual frameworks are used to explain how a system of concepts, assumptions,
expectations, beliefs, and theories inform a research study (Maxwell, 2013). The conceptual framework
for this study pieces together various theories and actions that shaped how a teacher colleague and I
engaged in critical discourse focused on critical pedagogy in music education through critically reflective
inquiry.
A visual representation of my conceptual framework is shown in Figure 1 and split between
three levels. The outer, third level (blue box) represents critical pedagogy as a tool we aimed to use to
resist deculturalization within our broader social justice ideology. While at a much broader level, this
long-term goal ultimately drove the first, more concrete, level, where my colleague and I engaged in
critically reflective inquiry to move toward resisting deculturalization. Surrounding, but not permeating
just yet, is the second level (light brown box) where music education as it exists in the American public
education system is represented. In the first level (tan circle), is our engagement in critical discourse via
critically reflective inquiry and our ultimate attempt to promote critical reflection on our instructional
practices as part of resisting deculturalization in music education. The work within this most concrete
level of the conceptual framework is the focus of this study, and enabled me to answer the following
research question: How do I engage with a music teacher colleague, in my district, in critical discourse
about our instructional practices to lead to critical consciousness?

Figure 1
Conceptual Framework
27

28
Through this critically reflective inquiry I aimed for using critical discourse, as andragogy, to elicit
developing a critical consciousness to inform and question our beliefs, assumptions, and instructional
practices in our classrooms. The diamond shapes illustrate how social justice in music education propels
an interaction between a teacher colleague and me (a practitioner scholar using andragogical and
adaptive leadership moves). Specifically, I engaged in facilitating critical discourse as an andragogical
move focused on the tenets of critical pedagogy in music education. Facilitating critical discourse
allowed me to strive for critical reflection by using disorienting dilemmas to move towards embracing
constructive disorientations in my participant. Analyzing our current instructional practices and
questioning ways we have perpetuated the status quo in music education through a critical lens
ultimately moved my participant towards developing her critical consciousness.
I believe that the actions represented in this conceptual framework steered us towards
developing a critical consciousness, a concept defined in the following section, as we co-constructed an
understanding of critical pedagogy in music and became more critically conscious in questioning how
our instructional practices contributed to differential learning opportunities and outcomes for students
in our classes. In the following section, I will describe the theories that shaped this framework and
supported our engagement with critical pedagogy in music education.
Facilitating critical discourse is the central action that took place in my study as I engaged with
my participant in critically reflective inquiry. For the purposes of this study, I bridged the tenets of
critical reflection (Brookfield, 2017; Howard, 2003; Larrivee, 2013; Mezirow, 2000), conditions of critical
discourse (Mezirow, 1991, 2000, 2003; Milner, 2003), and inquiry (Brookfield, 2010; Cochran-Smith &
Lytle, 2009; Stanley & Conway, 2015) together with a reflective cycle (Rodgers, 2002) to establish the
concept of critically reflective inquiry. By engaging in critical discourse via critically reflective inquiry with
my colleague, as the adult educator in this space, I employed the andragogical moves discussed with
elements of adaptive leadership (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016) as I led my adult participant

29
towards developing her critical consciousness (Abrahams, 2017; Brown, 2004; Milner, 2003; LadsonBillings, 1995).
Critically Reflective Inquiry
Stanley and Conway (2015) explored a culture of shared inquiry in music education where
community, collaboration, and conversation with others were prioritized in reflecting on instructional
practices. The music inquiry process shared by Stanley and Conway (2015) focused on self-study
methodologies where there was a focus on professional and self-improvement, reflection and inquiry
were made public, collaboration for validation of findings was required, openness and vulnerability were
expected, and led to a reconceptualized role of the teacher (pp. 130–131). In their work, they pointed
out the value in providing teachers with protected spaces to vent about and question their teaching. In
these protected spaces it is important to acknowledge that collaborators may fall into the trap of
normalizing problems of practice in ways that are not productive.
Reflective inquiry (Brookfield, 2010) opens the pathway for learning how to critically analyze
problems of practice. Engaging with reflective inquiry requires us to explore assumptions that frame our
ways of knowing around such problems and can inform the responses we generate to deal with them.
Slowing down, coaching through, and carrying out these reflective acts with others allows us to enact
reflection-on-action in our practices and keeps tendencies to jump to conclusions without thorough
analysis at bay (Rodgers, 2002).
Studies have shown that reflective inquiry that exercises individualistic focuses are not as
beneficial for teachers (Conkling, 2003). Additionally, critical reflection (defined later) can only occur in a
trustful atmosphere where errors can be made public and will not lead to negativity (Brookfield, 2017).
Combined with the andragogical moves that I will continue to describe, the preceding concepts and
authors outline the reflective actions that I contended, and still contend, would lead me and my
colleague towards cultivating a critical consciousness (defined later) by collaborating and reflecting

30
together. Throughout this critically reflective inquiry, a reflective cycle (defined in the next section) kept
us accountable on our progress towards becoming critically conscious.
Reflective Cycle
Teachers can support and sustain professional growth through social practices that invite
reflection (Conkling, 2003). Observational skills are needed for teachers to process and make decisions
based on what they are experiencing (Lindroth, 2014). To step into the work of conceptualizing critical
pedagogy in music, I facilitated critically reflective inquiry influenced by Rodgers’ (2002) reflective cycle,
which promotes developing teachers’ capacity to observe critically and take intelligent action on
newfound understandings. While Rodgers (2002) does use the word “critically” in her explanation of the
reflective cycle, she does not clarify if her use of “critical” goes as far as questioning assumptions based
on positionality (e.g., race, gender, social class). Therefore, for this study, I maintain the critical lens of
questioning assumptions through critical reflection as will be explained in the next section. The
reflective cycle encompasses four phases where participants (a) learn to see, (b) learn to describe and
differentiate, (c) learn to think from multiple perspectives and explanations, and (d) learn to take
intelligent action (Rodgers, 2002), which lay the foundation for the overall reflection I sought with my
participant throughout my study.
Within the larger reflective cycle (Rodgers, 2002), I organized content that facilitated smallerscale reflective moves as we progressed through each phase of the reflective cycle. I planned for the
content of each session to move through the following three different phases: establish, articulate, and
reflect (EAR). EAR shaped our use of critical discourse in each session of this study as I established my
participant’s understanding of new and previous content, articulated learning new content, and
reflected on how new content plays into questioning assumptions and envisioning new learning
opportunities aligned with our inquiry and critical pedagogy. I continuously used EAR as we discussed

31
and attempted to develop actionable strategies that led us towards becoming more critically conscious
music educators.
My teacher colleague and I started each session by establishing our understanding of new and
previously learned content with each other. As Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2017) stated, “if
we understand more about how people understand themselves, their work, and the world, we are
better positioned to communicate and connect in ways that matter for social justice” (p. 464). To better
understand my adult learner’s learning progress and how she made meaning throughout this study, I
used the following four ways of knowing typology instrumental, socializing, self-authoring, and selftransforming (Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano, 2017). Using EAR, I established an understanding of
my adult learner’s learning process by entering her perspective through the use of questioning (Tharp &
Gallimore, 1988) in our discourse where she provided insight into prior experiences, current knowledge,
and curiosities. This allowed us to enter a collaborative space with a co-constructed understanding of
the goals for our communicative learning—understanding what our discourse with each other means
(Mezirow, 2003).
After establishing where my learner’s learning was, I moved into the second phase of EAR where
I articulated learning new content. Using questioning techniques (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) such as
guiding questions (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) like, “Do we need to revisit an old topic or are we up for
something new?” allowed me to assess and develop moves necessary for transformational learning
(defined later) as I guided my participant in learning new concepts. After articulating new content, I
moved into the next phase of EAR where space was given to reflect on our ongoing instructional
practices through critical discourse. In our critical discourse I facilitated the questioning (Tharp &
Gallimore, 1988) of assumptions on how our instructional practices contributed to, or could interrupt,
deculturalization in the music classroom so that progress was made towards uncovering a disorienting
dilemma (Mezirow, 1991). Modeling (Loughran & Berry, 2005; Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) critical

32
reflection (defined later) on how I questioned instructional choice(s) also served as an important form of
assistance to move from disorienting dilemma to constructive disorientation as my participant became
familiar with the term and its tenets.
Each weekly 1–1 session in the 4-week cycle within my 12-week study used EAR as we
transitioned between phases of Rodgers’s (2002) reflective cycle. For example, the first 4 weeks (Cycle
1) sat in “learning to see,” the next 4 weeks (Cycle 2) sat in “learning to describe and differentiate,” and
the last 4 weeks sat in “learning to think from multiple perspectives and form multiple explanations” of
the reflective cycle. Within each cycle, the content for each week’s session was organized using EAR as
old content was revisited and new content was brought into the space. EAR restarted each week as it
helped organize our understanding of the content present in the selected phase of the reflective cycle
(Rodgers, 2002). The goal at the end of the study was to move my participant towards entering the
phase of “learning to take intelligent action” as we ultimately moved towards becoming critically
conscious educators with capacity to enact critical pedagogy in music education.
Critical Reflection
Developing an understanding of critical pedagogy in the music classroom and engaging with
critical discourse in this critically reflective inquiry process required that we engage in critical reflection.
Critical reflection is defined by Brookfield (2017) as “the sustained and intentional process of identifying
and checking the accuracy and validity of our teaching assumptions” (p. 3). This kind of reflection
focuses on uncovering the power dynamics that create and maintain hegemony—ideas, structures, and
actions that benefit a small group in power but are viewed by the majority as natural, or preordained
(Brookfield, 2010, 2017). Howard (2003) described critical reflection as an attempt to “look at reflection
within moral, political, and ethical contexts of teaching” (p. 197). Larrivee (2008) offered the explanation
of teachers using critical reflection to reflect on ethical implications of classroom practices and their
consequences on students. In this view, critical reflection provides a way for teachers to analyze their

33
own practice while also acknowledging the social conditions that sustain their practices. I sought to use
critical reflection, and its tenets, as a tool within our critical discourse to reflect on our instructional
practices using a critical lens throughout our critically reflective inquiry.
Teachers who are critically reflective strive towards being fully conscious of the world around
them (Larrivee, 2008). Critical reflection sits at the top of a pyramid (Level 4) and differs from other
types of lower level reflective practice such as pedagogical reflection (Level 3) which focuses on teaching
practices and enhancing student learning; surface reflection (Level 2) where teachers examine teaching
methods and achieving predefined objectives and standards; and pre-reflection (Level 1) where the
focus is on classroom situations and is often reactive (Larrivee, 2008, p. 348).
There are two distinct purposes to critical reflection: analyzing power and uncovering
hegemonic assumptions (Brookfield, 2010, 2017). Understanding how power structures present in our
organizations drive our systems allows us to realize those forces outside our contexts that influence
organizational norms and subsequently our practices. Becoming aware of the influences of power lets us
notice the oppressive dimensions of practices we regard as neutral when in reality they perpetuate the
White supremacist status quo. The second purpose of critical reflection involves uncovering hegemonic
assumptions, examining those assumptions that we accept as being in our own best interest, and
realizing how they work against us and serve the interests of those in power. Brookfield (2017) offered
four lenses for teachers through which to view assumptions while engaging with critical reflection
students’ eyes, colleagues’ perceptions, personal experiences, and theory and research (p. 7). Engaging
with these critical reflection lenses through discourse helps reveal the inequities and oppressions that
lurk beneath our everyday realities (Brookfield, 2010). In my study, I used Brookfield’s (2017) suggestion
of personal experience as a “fruitful” lens (p. 248) with which to begin uncovering power and hegemony
as such experiences are necessary aspects of critical pedagogy.

34
To promote transformational learning, adult learners must become critically reflective of how
power relationships and the perpetuation of inequities have shaped their meaning-making to take
action in finding solutions (Mezirow, 2000). Critical reflection coupled with self-knowledge can help us
better understand and transform ourselves and others as we continue to approach our work in social
justice as lifelong transformers (Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano, 2017). Using critical reflection as a
tool within our discourse helped my adult learner reflect on her experience of a disorienting dilemma
(Mezirow, 1991) and aided her developing critical consciousness. A disorienting dilemma is usually an
event where we recognize a discrepancy between our assumptions and actual perspectives (Brookfield,
2010; Mezirow, 1991, 2000). These dilemmas can often be traumatic and lead us to question the
assumptions that shape our realities. By using critical reflection, the goal was to examine a disorienting
dilemma to elicit a constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020). Therefore, critical reflection could help
induce a true transformation by allowing us to examine the feelings, beliefs, and values that shape our
experiences while critically engaging with the reflective cycle (Rodgers, 2002) and planning a new course
of action.
As we prepare to engage with social justice and enact new learning opportunities, it is
imperative that we critically reflect (Brookfield, 2017; Larrivee, 2008) on such acts as “blind spots may
prevent us from seeing the injustice in ours” (Jorgensen, 2015, p. 17). Critical reflection played an
important role in how I assessed my work as a researcher and how my participant was given the skills
necessary in moving towards developing her critical consciousness. Since I was first introduced to critical
reflection over a year ago, I have acknowledged several disorienting dilemmas in my work as a choral
music educator and as a person making sense of their own reality. As explained in the introductory
section, I had become conscious regarding the intertwining of sociopolitical and hegemonic influences in
education and how I sustained complicity with the status quo through my teachings.

35
I believe that my work with critical reflection helped shift my way of knowing from being a
socializing knower (oriented strongly towards others’ opinions, values, and thinking as “best”) towards
building the internal capacity of becoming a self-authoring knower (one who can author their own
systems of beliefs, and not be “run” by others). In following the Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano
(2017) typology, I could engage in necessary conflict without feeling torn apart, share honest thoughts
and feelings with others, work to rewrite oppressive narratives, think systematically about my role in
organizational and societal challenges, and design and critique new initiatives for change. However, as I
continued to build up my skills in criticality, I also possessed the self-efficacy—an individual’s perceived
capabilities (Zee & Koomen, 2016)—in meeting the goal of becoming a self-transforming knower (one
who develops their own systems of belief and are open to further reflection and evolution). I
acknowledge additional critical work was, and is still, necessary to instill the higher order capacity to
consistently critique my own ideology and belief systems with others.
Understanding my positionality, through critical reflection, amplified my awareness of how
marginalized voices are silenced in our world. As a member of two marginalized groups, engaging in this
historical and visionary work was difficult as I paused, unpacked, and reacted to generational injustices
that we have endured over the years. In using critical reflection, I also resisted the urge to challenge
historical narratives without first understanding that as racial groups move into dominant positions,
dominant actions were at some point believed to be a type of social justice. The dominant group, being
the ones who are afforded the luxury of crafting society, worked under the notion that they are trying to
unify citizens for the common good. I contend that uncovering this allowed me to build critical discourse
with my participant, a White woman and socializing knower (one who orients towards others’ opinions,
values, and thinking as “best”), in a way that didn’t feel like an attack on her identity based on biases
that have shaped how I made sense of the world, but rather a perspective I used that required our
critical reflective inquiry to dive deeper into cultural competence in using critical pedagogy.

36
Constructive Disorientation
Throughout this study I intended to lead my teacher colleague towards “constructive
disorientation” (Wergin, 2020) to move her towards critical consciousness as an outcome of our
critically reflective inquiry. Constructive disorientation is defined by Wergin (2020) as, “a sweet tension
between curiosity, an innate human quality, and disquietude, a disturbance in our perceptual field that
demands our attention” (p. X). Constructive disorientation is one where there is a sense of curiosity
induced by the disconnect between our current state and the state we desire to be in along with a sense
that one is capable of dealing with the disconnect. Essentially, it is present when we make meaning of a
perceived disturbance and feel encouraged to follow it. Wergin (2020), distinguished constructive
disorientation from being in the state of a productive zone of disequilibrium (PZD) where interventions
in organizations generate “attention, engagement, and forward motion, but not so much that the
organization (or your part of it) explodes” (Heifetz et al., 2009, p. 29). He warned that individuals need
to experience constructive disorientation themselves to manage any type of organization disruption in
the productive zone of disequilibrium (Wergin, 2020, p. 58).
Adaptive learning (learning required when gaps between values people stand for and realities
they face are present), autonomous motivation (intrinsic and extrinsic motivators), a sense of efficacy
(feeling that one is competent in a learning tasks), and a socially connected environment are required
for constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020). The goal in creating a constructive disorientation in
others is to present a challenge that is clear and manageable; exists within a flexible structure where
skills required for action can be matched; promotes our ability to create optimal settings for work
(distraction-free); and has clear criteria for performance, concrete feedback, and lack of fear of failure.
We want to avoid shifting into technical perspectives and employ thinking that promotes learning where
we can rise to adaptive challenges through transformational perspectives. In music education this would
be like shifting the question of “Why are students not signing up for the music program?” (technical

37
perspective) to “How does my selection of repertoire contribute to feelings of alienation in students and
possibly lead to lack of retention in my music program?” (transformational perspective). We do this by
creating opportunities for constructive disorientation where we experience that disconnect of where we
are and where we need to go along with the capability to address that disconnect.
Wergin (2020) also contended that the arts provide a powerful way to encounter constructive
disorientation by “serving as the bridge between mere sensation and true experience, by engaging all of
our senses, by cultivating moments of tension, and by challenging us to expand our perceptions and
rearrange our meaning schemes” (p. 126). Through artistic encounters we can engage with a pathway
from lived experience to constructive disorientation. With artistic expression the power of empathy can
challenge us to rearrange the way we see the world through exploring artistic curiosities. Simply singing
a piece of music from another culture will not induce a constructive disorientation but engaging with
others and broadening our understanding of diverse ways of knowing with profound levels of respect
and trust, can.
Discussing critical pedagogy in music education through critical discourse and promoting critical
reflection through critically reflective inquiry was intended to present disorienting dilemmas in my
teacher colleague. However, those dilemmas alone would not be sufficient in addressing the historically
entrenched inequity—deculturalization in music education—and our work towards social justice which
drove this study. I aimed for constructive disorientation so that, together, we could move closer towards
developing our critical consciousness to develop visionary, actionable moves that explore our enactment
of critical pedagogy in our own music classrooms within the context of our organization. This, I contend,
enabled us to make progress on addressing the collective challenge (Heifetz et al., 2009) of providing
equitable learning opportunities for students that value diversity and contributions from all cultures
through music education.
Adaptive and Andragogical Moves

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To engage my participant in critically reflective inquiry, I employed andragogical moves,
including those discussed so far, influenced by elements of transformational adult learning theory. In
this section, I will detail what theories influenced, and continue to influence, my thinking of andragogy,
what specific moves I used to facilitate critical discourse, and how I strove to create appropriate learning
conditions for my participant.
Transformational Learning Theory
My andragogy was and continues to be informed by transformational learning theory. In
transformational learning theory, teachers aim to provide ourselves and adult learners a foundation for
the processes involved in uncovering the roots of our assumptions and preconceptions (Mezirow, 1991).
Andragogy has been defined by Mezirow (1991) as a way in which adults learn while enhancing their
abilities as self-directed learners. Through critical reflection, andragogy helps adults elaborate, discover,
and transform how systemic structures and social contexts have shaped the ways they view and interact
with the world. To facilitate transformational learning, we must transform meaning-making perspectives
(assumptions and expectations that shape how we perceive the world), which frequently operate
outside of consciousness, and make them more inclusive and reflective so new beliefs and opinions that
promote truth and justified actions are generated (Mezirow, 2000). Engaging with this learning theory
allows us to create and discover our own purposes, values, beliefs, and meanings rather than working
uncritically with those that we assimilated through others. This allows us to gain control of our lives as
clear-thinking decision makers who can work towards developing a critical consciousness (defined later).
Transformative learning can be a threatening, intense, emotional experience where adults
become aware of the assumptions that have guided our lives prior to achieving criticality. As with critical
pedagogy, conceptualizing historical structural references and societal power dynamics at play will
uncover how we learn and how that learning came to be. Understanding how new instructional
approaches, like critical pedagogy, were filtered through my learner’s existing meaning-making

39
perspectives informed how I connected it to what she already knew. To create the ideal learning
conditions (Arao & Clemens, 2013; Mezirow, 1991) for transformative learning I employed tenets of
critical reflection (Brookfield, 2010; Larrivee, 2008) and critical discourse (Mezirow, 1991, 2000, 2003) to
lead us towards constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020) and developing my participant’s critical
consciousness. This was important for my conceptual framework since adult learning is rooted in
transforming meaning perspectives so we ultimately learn how to take social action (Mezirow, 1991).
Facilitating Critical Discourse
Developing the conditions and skills for transformative adult learning and reasoning is the
essence of adult education (Mezirow, 2003). The main andragogical move that I employed in this study
was the use and facilitation of critical discourse, or the active dialogue with others that allows us to
better understand the meaning of an experience (Mezirow, 2000). The ideas of praxis (existing within
and changing the world) versus solidarity (entering into the lived reality of another) in critical pedagogy
(Hill, 2021) drew me towards communicative learning (Mezirow, 2003) and critically engaged dialogue
(Milner, 2003), which reference dialogue as a tool in becoming aware of the assumptions, intentions,
and controversial issues that inform the ways in which we think and communicate with others.
Assumptions are those beliefs about the world that guide our actions (Brookfield, 2017). Milner’s (2003)
view on critically engaged dialogue expands this questioning of assumptions to include dialogue around
race to acknowledge differences, recognize individual life experiences, and pursue freedom in our
thinking as, “we (as people with multiple roles and positions) cannot work for freedom on behalf of
others until we are free ourselves” (p. 194). Douglas and Nganga (2013) referred to the capacity of
utilizing dialogue to subvert dominant positionalities around those we teach and ourselves thus
providing what they call “radical love.” Mezirow (2003) referred to this as the process of engaging with
critical-dialectical discourse where we question and assess interactions around us to arrive at a best
judgment. At first, I viewed dialogue simply as a conversation between two individuals, however, the

40
ways in which it becomes critical and elicits free judgment for ourselves is how it was shifted, for this
study, into critical discourse.
Discourse, as Mezirow (2000) explained, is how we can fully assess the way other adults
interpret their experiences, which requires us to pause and reflect before speaking (Milner, 2003). What
is important is establishing the ability to respond non-defensively during discussion of sensitive topics
and criticism (Brookfield, 2017). The critical discourse used in this study was shaped by the following
foundations of critical discourse:
● Have accurate and complete information.
● Be free from coercion and self-deception.
● Have the ability to weigh evidence and evaluate arguments.
● Have the ability to be critically reflective.
● Be open to alternative perspectives.
● Have equality of opportunity to participate.
● Accept an informed, objective, and rational consensus as a legitimate test of validity.
(Mezirow, 1991, p. 198)
Additionally, our critical discourse around race and cultural identities included discussions about
our positionality, as peers in our organizations, and how we teach our White students to value diversity
in and around their communities. Critical discourse in transformative learning values “freedom, equality,
tolerance, social justice, civic responsibility, and education” (Mezirow, 2000, p. 16) and sees these traits
as basic needs to constructively acknowledge the experience of others while making meaning of our
own experiences. These requirements of critical discourse (Mezirow, 1991, 2000, 2003) and critically
engaged dialogue (Milner, 2003) guided how I created the necessary learning conditions for facilitating
critical discourse that enabled us to explore critical pedagogy for music education as we questioned how
our own musical instructional practices came to be and how we continued to perpetuate the status quo.

41
The goal of using critical discourse was to elicit critically reflective thinking between my teacher
colleague and me where, together, we could acquire critical awareness and the understanding essential
to questioning our own assumptions. The dialectical act of questioning and answering, such as one
would do in a Socratic seminar, has been viewed as a powerful form of assistance in formal learning that
calls for an “active linguistic and cognitive response” (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988, p. 59). My use of factual,
probing, and guiding questions (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) was operationalized under the notion of
developing my colleague’s critical consciousness through our critical discourse so that she could become
an active and rational adult learner who would engage with critical reflection, question a disorienting
dilemma, and ultimately take action towards change via constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020).
Mezirow (2003) contended that becoming a critical self-reflector is necessary to fully develop
skills in reflective judgment—the ability to partake in critical discourse involving the assessment of
assumptions and beliefs. Essentially, adults at the highest level of reflective judgment can offer a
perspective on their own perspective, which Mezirow (2003) argued is necessary in transformative
learning and critical discourse. Assessing reflective judgment, combined with critical reflection, allows us
to fully understand the meaning of our experiences and develop logical adult reasoning in critical
discourse. These two cognitive structures (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988)—or provisions for thinking and
acting—of reflective judgment and critical reflection influenced how I organized and justified our
understanding of critical pedagogy in music education and they ways our instructional practices could
potentially align with its tenets. Additionally, the use of modeling, or offering behavior for imitation
(Loughran & Berry, 2005; Tharp & Gallimore, 1988), provided a form of assistance for my learner to
make meaning (Mezirow, 2000) while engaging with intricate concepts such as critical reflection within
our critical discourse.
Establishing Learning Conditions

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I contend that cultivating our understanding of critical pedagogy in music through critical
discourse enabled me to elicit transformational learning on the part of my colleague. To do this
successfully, there were learning conditions, or guidelines, that were established to promote such
transformations. Mezirow (1991) argued that engaging with critical discourse requires a reasonable level
of safety, acceptance of others with varying perspectives and social cooperation (p. 199). This can be
done by coming into the discourse space as an adult educator who accepts where my learner’s priorities
are, where they stand on meaning perspectives, anticipates difficulties and dangers, and aims to prevent
any interactions that can contribute to manipulation.
Educational settings are relatively safe places in which to try out new roles and ideas (Mezirow,
1991). Safe spaces in education generally provide an environment with basic discussion guidelines
where learners can participate and express themselves freely without fear or denial of experience (Arao
& Clemens, 2013). However, advocates for social justice have expressed that critical spaces call for
various perspectives related to race, gender, and poverty to uncover counternarratives, which are topics
that can produce controversy in discourse (Brown, 2004). When groups come together to discuss such
issues and majoritarian views lose privileged status this can be painful to some (Jorgensen, 2015) and
can be problematic if not normalized (Horn & Little, 2009) correctly. Additionally, moving to a different
future requires that people feel psychologically safe in letting go of the present (Coghlan, 2019).
However, Arao and Clemens (2013) discussed that risk is necessary to learn and engage with social
justice and requires group members to participate fully and truthfully when counter-narratives are
present together with majoritarian views. Therefore, in shaping the learning conditions for the discourse
I used in this conceptual framework, I worked towards creating a brave space as defined by Arao and
Clemens (2013).
Creating a brave space required unpacking the idea of safety and working together with my
participant to create ground rules for our critical discourse. We had to define what brave space meant

43
to us by having a conversation where we decentered dominant narratives and established
conversational routines where both perspectives were valued and were susceptible to critique. Given
our two identities, as mentioned, we both had differing perspectives and experiences on what we
believed constituted “good” music teaching. Since critique is an innate aspect of adult learning
(Mezirow, 1991), and is required for us to examine the misuses of power along with owning up to our
abuses (Brookfield, 2017), moving towards a brave space positioned us for critical discourse while
remaining rational and accepting of the values of the learning community. This agreement between my
participant and me was important as we discussed and analyzed power dynamics embedded in our own
interactions and created a space where we both could establish ways to prevent tunnel vision in
learning and avoid potential harm and/or conflict.
The ways in which I shaped the andragogy for this study using transformational learning theory,
critical discourse, and establishing learning conditions were essential in leading my participant towards a
developing critical consciousness. Within the critically reflective inquiry, transformational learning
theory informed how I promoted learning for my participant as we explored critical pedagogy in music
education. My facilitation of critical discourse allowed us to have conversations with each other where
we could acknowledge oppressive practices in society as well as in our judgment while developing a
critical consciousness to elicit new ways of thinking around our music pedagogy. Moving towards
establishing a brave space allowed us to take risks with our critical discourse as we worked towards
envisioning a new way of teaching that promoted the voices of marginalized students in our classrooms.
The next section will explore how adaptive leadership theory shapes the andragogical moves I sought to
enact.
Adaptive Leadership
Heifetz et al. (2009) defined adaptive leadership as the “practice of mobilizing people to tackle
tough challenges and thrive” (p. 14). In adaptive leadership the goal is to help others deal with change

44
that challenges their priorities, beliefs, habits, and loyalties and has origins in understanding tensions
among people over needs, ideas, and preferences (Northouse, 2016). Six tenets of change shape
adaptive leadership (a) change that enables the capacity to thrive, (b) change that builds on the past, (c)
change that occurs through experimentation, (d) change that relies on diversity, (e) change that
displaces and rearranges old DNA, and (f) change that takes time (Heifetz et al., 2009). Calling for change
requires that leaders focus on the adaptations required of people in response to their changing
environments (Northouse, 2016). Essentially, adaptive leadership allows us to discover how people
change and adjust to their new circumstances.
Being called a “leader” is not a requirement of adaptive leadership, in fact, being called a leader
sometimes is a reward that those in power use to promote the perpetuation of the status quo.
Northouse (2016) explained that “it [leadership] is not defined by position, so anyone can exhibit
leadership” (p. 258), therefore supporting my use of it as an adult educator. Brookfield (2017) discussed
how to broaden our understanding of critical reflection from the teaching setting into one where we can
use it to exercise leadership. He coined the term of critically reflective leadership using principles like
that of adaptive leadership. For example, critically reflective leadership is not limited to a formal
designation as leader, as it can also be enacted by someone with little positional authority. As Brookfield
(2017) stated, “Leadership is just as much about getting other people to speak as it is about speaking
yourself” (p. 246). A similar characteristic is presented by Heifetz et al. (2009) when they discussed their
view on leadership as being a “verb, not a job” (p. 24).
I expected to enact adaptive leadership behaviors by working with my teacher colleague as a
facilitator who could help identify the adaptive challenges that are present in our current instructional
practices. Like the use of critical reflection and critical discourse, identifying these challenges can only be
done by understanding others’ priorities, beliefs, habits, and loyalties (Heifetz et al., 2009). Brookfield
(2017) backed up the notion that to uncover assumptions of power and hegemony we must consider

45
personal experiences, including those of others, which are also tenets of critical pedagogy. Mandating
others to critically reflect is not a useful way of using critical reflection and creates an exercise of power
where we say critical reflection is just a good thing to do (Brookfield, 2017). Identifying adaptive
challenges such as how to become critically conscious through critical reflection informed my actions as
I took into consideration how we should not “critically reflect” just to say we were critically reflecting.
As I shaped my role as an adult educator and facilitator through the adaptive leadership lens in
this inquiry, I sought to employ an authority in this interaction that would help us both engage in
adaptive work. As a leader, I understood that the ways in which we make meaning today do not
determine how we make meaning in the future (Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano, 2017). There was
potential for any of my moves to fail, therefore, my understanding of adaptive leadership guided how I
observed interactions in this inquiry, interpreted those observations, and how I designed any
interventions for any potential adaptive challenges.
From the six adaptive leadership behaviors I particularly focused on “regulating distress” within
my inquiry as my facilitation of critical discourse required that we enter a disorienting environment.
“Regulating distress” (Northouse, 2016) refers to monitoring the stress of others, and the self, to keep it
within a productive range to guide others towards shared goals. Regulating distress includes being
attentive to the holding environment in which interactions occur, providing direction to help others feel
a sense of clarity in uncertain situations, and regulating stress within ourselves (Northouse, 2016). For
example, seeking to establish a strong holding environment by co-creating productive discussion norms
allowed me to provide direction during disorientation for my participant as will be discussed in my
findings.
Critical Pedagogy
Critical pedagogy in music education was the content discussed in our discourse through the
critically reflective inquiry. This postmodern instructional model views education as a conversation

46
between students and teachers (Abrahams, 2007) and does not come with a singular definition (Hill,
2021). As mentioned earlier, Milner (2003) defined critical pedagogy as “a form of instruction, which
rejects oppression, combats injustice, gives voice to marginalized people, fights the maintaining of the
status quo; and critical pedagogy encourages instruction that promotes radical action in the classroom
and beyond” (p. 199). Additionally, critical pedagogy is an “approach to education that involves
liberation,” and, “values learning experiences as an avenue for bringing forth social change by engaging
in criticisms of capitalism, inequity, injustice, and other social ills that plague institutions and the larger
society” (Douglas & Nganga, 2013, p. 62).
Critical pedagogy is derived from the teachings of Paulo Freire who believed that “students
came to learning experiences with knowledge they gleaned from their own life experiences” (Abrahams,
2017, p. 14), which shifts paradigms of teachers being the only source of knowledge to one where
teachers and students co-construct new knowledge (Abrahams, 2017; Douglas & Nganga, 2013; Milner,
2003). Hess (2017) explained that using this pedagogy allows teachers to recognize that student
identities have or lack privilege in relation to other students within our classrooms and in society.
Understanding inequities that arise because of this differential privilege allows teachers to shape how
knowledge and practice is curated for student success in and out of the classroom using these varying
perspectives. In this type of education, students identify how to resist hegemonic systems that exist
around them and make something new—a change. Hill (2021) discussed that critical pedagogy is a
collective process of discovery while engaging with the world, does not provide predetermined answers,
and begins with a problem. Essentially, as Douglas and Nganga (2013) explained, using critical pedagogy
in education provides liberation and paves the path to social change through criticisms of inequities and
injustices.
The goal for anyone engaging in critical pedagogy is to develop and induce critical consciousness
(Abrahams, 2017; Brown, 2004; Ladson-Billings, 1995; Milner, 2003) also known as “conscientization—or

47
developing critical insight into one’s social reality through reflection and action” (Hess, 2017, p. 173). Hill
(2021) furthered Freire’s definition of conscientization as the process in which the oppressed realize and
identify all the unjust aspects of our society that work against them. Rather than plainly recalling
information, a characteristic of the “banking” model of education, developing critical consciousness
allows both teachers and students to affect a change that breaks down systems of oppression and
engages in social justice with the co-construction of new knowledge (Abrahams, 2007).
In music education more specifically, there is power in promoting social justice values not just in
the community but in society (McCarthy, 2015). Scholars have put critical pedagogy at the forefront of
reconceptualizing social justice in music education (Hess, 2017). The current structure of choral music
education in public education often lacks student agency and is conductor centered while placing
students in a powerless position where they experience uncritical ideologies (Abrahams, 2017; Perkins,
2019). This inherently hierarchical classroom structure of conductor (with power) versus student
(without power) allows for the manipulation of conductors’ role so they are revered as the only voice in
the room (Hill, 2021). Maintaining this structure where teachers are the sole decision makers
perpetuates students becoming mindless cogs that see no benefit in utilizing independent thought or
criticality (Abrahams, 2017). If we reward engaging with a critical perspective in music, then teachers
can analyze what their role is in the classroom and within the context of their own realities as they shift
towards balanced power dynamics between themselves and students.
Abrahams (2007) explained the development of a teaching practice he named “Critical Pedagogy
for Music Education” which is guided by the following four questions: “Who am I? Who are my
students? What might my students become? What might my students and I become together?” (p. 1).
He discussed using these questions to move away from content specific lesson objectives lessons
towards lessons that shift power structures towards valuing and acknowledging students’ life
experiences. Abrahams’ (2007) advocacy represents the notion that engaging with a critical pedagogy

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allows for connections between students’ lives and the music being taught in classrooms to offer
plentiful opportunities for connected musical experiences. Moves such as reflecting on repertoire
selection, or that which is left unselected, can reveal biases in choosing music literature and whose
voices are silenced in the classroom (Hill, 2021). Hill (2021) expanded on the importance of reflection on
our actions in the music classroom as we move toward praxis (existing within and changing the world)
and solidarity (entering into the lived reality of another). Understanding solidarity through a critical lens
helps us prepare for constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020) as we learn to find the value in the lived
experiences of others, such as our students, and instill a relational environment in our classrooms.
Differentiating between praxis and solidarity allows us not just to observe these oppressive systemic
structures in our music pedagogy and classrooms but informs ways in which we can seek to change
them.
Establishing this relational structure between teacher and students allows for reciprocal
teaching in the music classroom where students and teacher can ask questions of each other on
selected music topics, repertoire, performance practices, and more (Abrahams, 2017). Milner (2003)
supported such an engaged and critical pedagogy where teacher and students connect with each other
and classroom lessons to acknowledge different perspectives, individual life experiences, and work
together towards freedom from societal oppression—resisting deculturalization. Abrahams (2007)
explained how teachers can resist critical pedagogy as they do not comprehend the benefits of students
teaching the teacher, and do not wish to undergo transformation themselves. However, if we prioritize
relational ways of knowing and co-constructing knowledge against performative goals (where the only
focus is on presenting exceptional, usually Eurocentric, musical performances) in the music classroom
then we can incentivize paradigm shifts and invite our ability to confront biases about Western music
education (Perkins, 2019).

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Abrahams (2017) offered five tenets for the use of critical pedagogy in music education which
we used to guide our understanding of potential, critical instructional strategies. The first is “education
is a conversation where students and their teachers pose and solve problems together” (Abrahams,
2017, p. 14). While employing this action might be problematic at times in the choral rehearsal where
the students’ focus is to sing, critical conversations can be had in outside forums such as an online
discussion boards where students have an equal opportunity to respond. The idea behind this tenet is to
promote a more active role between students and teachers in co-constructing knowledge.
The second tenet is “Education broadens the student’s view of reality” (Abrahams, 2017, p. 15).
Changing the way in which we perceive the world is one of the central actions of critical pedagogy—the
acquisition of a critical consciousness. Shaping conversations with students around marginalization or
questioning how we value music from other cultures can help with paradigm shifts in the music
classroom. For example, one way to do this is to allow students to explore why assumptions are made
about December holiday concerts presenting music that is normally associated with Christmas with no
regard to other religious holidays (something that we discussed in our critical discourse).
The third tenet is “education is empowering” (Abrahams, 2017, p. 15). Through the
development of a critical consciousness students can then be invited to make choices on repertoire, coconstruct meaning on navigating musical scaffolds, and establish an environment where students and
teacher participate in decision making and management. Shifting power from teacher only to students
and teacher allows for the exploration of inherent power structures present in music and society at large
to enable critical thinking.
The fourth tenet is “education is transformative” (Abrahams, 2017, p. 15). Cultivating ways for
both teacher and students to have a change in perception allows for a transformational experience
where critical consciousness is developed and the dynamics of the classroom are changed for the better.

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Lastly, the fifth tenet is “education is political” (Abrahams, 2017, p. 15). Understanding how the
interactions in the music classroom, school building, and the community influence power dynamics for
control allows us to develop ways in which to resist such constraints. Currently, several music programs
are held accountable by the performances put on by students. Having students understand the
ramifications that teachers can face in this light allows the enactment of critical pedagogy to continue
when students can influence decisions surrounding music repertoire from various cultures while
committing to learning and performing such music with high expectations.
Since there is no “one size fits all” approach as there is no one simple definition for critical
pedagogy, these tenets were used in our discourse to inform ourselves of instructional strategies and
actions that could develop our own critical pedagogy in music and my participants critical consciousness.
While attempting to understand what enacting a critical pedagogy for music education looked like, we
also took into consideration the importance of not pitting the Western musical canons against music
from other cultures. Hess (2017) warned that doing so can amplify cultural inequities that are already at
a breaking point in our society such as instilling values where Western music is viewed as superior to
“other” pieces of music. Instead, Hess (2017) argued that dismissing majoritarian musical techniques
such as Western classical music and understanding of music notational systems clouds the potential of
intertwining these ideas across cultural boundaries and the ability for a range of music to co-exist in the
same plane. Ultimately, we still operate within the confines of a music education system where
notational literacy and technical knowledge are required for further education in music. If music
teachers decenter such knowledge and skills, then we create a paradox in critical pedagogy where we
place students at risk of additional differential learning opportunities and outcomes where they do not
have access to the currency required to further their music education. As music educators engaging in
critical pedagogy, we must think carefully prior to enacting action plans using critical pedagogy that can
place students at a disadvantage later. The goal in understanding these tenets within our critical

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discourse was to remain vigilant in our anti-racist efforts inside and outside the classroom and provide a
critical pedagogy that “does not ignore the canon, but rather creates a possibility for a recognition of the
hierarchies and structural inequities that shape our everyday realities” (Hess, 2017, p. 184).
Actions
Music education in the United States continues to perpetuate deculturalization by promoting
surface level cultural competency through educational movements such as multiculturalism (McCarthy,
2015). As discussed earlier, while multiculturalism might promote inclusion of music from other cultures
it leaves the teacher as the holder of power with room for certain music/cultures to be valued over
others and excludes discussions around race and ethnicity from being in the classroom. Maintaining this
mindset sustains limited learning opportunities around diversity and manifests negative attitudes and
beliefs towards marginalized racial groups, perpetuating White supremacy (Shaw, 2015). Shifting to a
critical lens where teachers learn to include student voices in classroom decisions, such as in music
repertoire selection, and question the assumptions that drive their instructional practices is essential in
creating a more balanced critical pedagogy where power is shared between teacher and students.
Change in my context was encouraged through weekly inquiry with another music teacher
colleague where critical discourse around critical pedagogy in music education allowed us to disrupt
deculturalization by developing a critical consciousness to interrupt White supremacy in our
instructional practice. In the adult learning environment I cultivated, my participant was moved towards
critical reflection to become better equipped in developing a critical consciousness around our music
pedagogy and the experimentation of future actions grounded in critical pedagogy for choral music
education. This aligned with the following research question: How do I engage with a music teacher
colleague, in my district, in critical discourse about our instructional practices to lead to critical
consciousness?

52
The conceptual framework in Figure 1 shows the purpose of the critically reflective inquiry in
this study was to leverage constructive disorientation(s) that move us towards infusing critical pedagogy
into our instructional practices and cultivate our critical consciousness. Specifically, I outlined how my
theory of change informed my thinking in creating constructive disorientation in my participant by
developing her critical consciousness using critical discourse to uncover inequities in our current
practices and align future learning opportunities with critical pedagogy in music education for students.
The long-term goal of the study aimed to embed critical pedagogy as an ongoing tenet of our practice in
the music classroom as we disrupt deculturalization in music education. The short-term goal of the study
sought to elicit constructive disorientation(s) in my participant to move her towards the early stages of
developing a critical consciousness as she began to develop future learning opportunities for students.
My actions in this study took place in a holding environment (Northouse, 2016) where
interactions with my participant enabled us to use critical discourse that moved towards a brave space.
Our discussions were centered around positionality, or how one is situated between the intersection of
power and other social factors such as race and gender (Douglas & Nganga, 2013), to uncover aspects
and assumptions of our identity. Connecting our positionality to discussions on race allowed us to move
towards engaging with the tenets of critical pedagogy. These discussions brought in tenets of critical
reflection as a tool to question assumptions about our positionality and how it influenced the type of
musical instructional practices we utilized in the classroom.
As noted earlier, the Rodgers (2002) reflective cycle guided the overall 12-week structure of this
action research study. Within each weekly session, EAR (establish, articulate, reflect) guided the actions
and planning of content similar to how one would structure a class session moving from individual
review, small group discussion, and whole group discussion. The 12-week sessions were split up into
three 4-week cycles:
• exploring positionality via critical reflection (learn to see)

53
• connecting positionality to practice via critical reflection (learn to describe and differentiate)
• connecting practice to critical pedagogy (learn to think from multiple perspectives)
At the end of the third cycle my goal was to cultivate a developing critical consciousness in my
participant, induced by constructive disorientations, where she would learn to take intelligent action
(Rodgers, 2002) moving forward with critical pedagogy in music education. The actions for this study are
outlined in Table 1.

Table 1
Action Plan
Cycle Objectives Activities Progress Indicator
Week 0 Facilitator will be able to
communicate how weekly
meetings support the overall
purpose of the study.
Facilitator will be able to
communicate how meetings will
be built off previous weeks’
discussions so that discourse
topics can be aligned.
Co-create norms for engaging in critical discourse.
Co-create an understanding of our weekly
meetings.
Co-create goals for the use of critical pedagogy in
our music classrooms.
Facilitator, through questioning, will be
able to gain specific insight on
participant’s expectations of discourse
norms during this study by getting on
the balcony and listening to
participant’s needs.
Cycle 1 Participant will uncover their own
positionality and recognize how it
influences our ability to reflect.
Participant will contrast different
levels of reflection, and
specifically, question their own
positionality via critical reflection.
Facilitator will be able to assess
ability to enact andragogical
moves, informed by conceptual
framework, via critical reflection.
Session 1:
Activities to introduce positionality.
• “I Am From…” poem
• video on Intersectionality (Kimberlé
Crenshaw)
• establishing definition of positionality and
intersecting identities
Session 2:
Establishing levels of reflection.
• Larrivee (2008) levels of reflection
• Larrivee (2008) reflective practice too
• How does positionality influence reflection?
Participant attempts to engage in critical
discourse using a critical lens in
questioning how positionality
contributes to hegemonic
assumptions.
Participant attempts writing a critical
reflection that questions hegemonic
assumptions about her own
positionality.
54

Cycle Objectives Activities Progress Indicator
Session 3:
Exploring positionality via critical reflection.
• revisit Larrivee (2008) levels of reflection
• disorienting dilemma, critical reflection,
and constructive disorientation example
• Homework: writing a critical reflection on a
moment where positionality was
questioned by another person(s) in the
context of teaching music.
Session 4:
In the field progress analysis
Critical reflections
Facilitator attempts to engage and
establish participant’s understanding
of positionality and critical reflection
through critical discourse by
analyzing questioning and modeling
techniques that provide data on the
use of adaptive leadership move of
“regulating distress” while reflecting
on these interactions to inform usage
of a brave space.
Cycle 2 Participant will explain how their
positionality influences music
teaching practices and affects
student learning opportunities.
Participant will be able to list the
tenets of critical pedagogy in
choral music education.
Session 5:
Reviewing positionality and critical reflection
• establishing current understanding of
positionality and critical reflection
• Discussion: how deculturalization (HEI) has
been perpetuated in music education.
• Through discourse, discuss how our
positionality affects and influences our
practice.
Participant uses critical discourse to
identify how White supremacy plays
out in PK–12 spaces and has been
internalized through teacher
preparation programs in music
education.
Participant recognizes and discusses
critically how teacher race, culture,
55

Cycle Objectives Activities Progress Indicator
Participant will be able to critically
reflect on a disorienting moment
of practice where student
positionality was not considered.
Facilitator will be able to assess
ability to enact andragogical
moves, informed by my
conceptual framework, via critical
reflection.
Session 6:
Introduction to critical pedagogy in choral music
• discussion on foundational tenets of critical
pedagogy in choral music
Session 7:
Analyzing current practices.
• Analyzing how positionality influences
current procedures for music repertoire
selection.
• example of critical reflection on a moment
of practice
• Homework: writing a critical reflection
where student positionality and
ideas/contributions were not considered in
a moment of practice.
Session 8:
In the field progress analysis
Critical reflections
gender, and background play a role in
creating learning opportunities for
students.
Participant demonstrates improved
writing ability of a critical reflection
that questions assumptions and
biases present in our own music
pedagogy (possible constructive
disorientation).
Facilitator attempts to engage and
establish participant’s understanding
of how race affects practice through
critical discourse by analyzing
questioning and modeling techniques
that provide data on the use of
adaptive leadership move of
“regulating distress” while reflecting
on these interactions to inform usage
of a brave space.
56

Cycle Objectives Activities Progress Indicator
Cycle 3 Participant will interrogate
instructional practices to consider
how we are responsive to
students’ race, gender, and
cultures.
Participant will seek to develop
lesson activities that provide
students with opportunities to coconstruct knowledge in music that
is shaped by students’ knowledge
and experiences (learn to take
intelligent action).
Facilitator will be able to uncover
and assess my ability to enact
andragogical moves, informed by
my conceptual framework, via
critical reflection.
Session 9:
Connections to critical pedagogy
• Establishing current understanding on
tenets of critical pedagogy in music,
education & strategies (Abrahams, 2017).
• Discussing what it means to develop a
critical consciousness in ourselves.
Participant critically describes how
practice has sustained White
supremacy and created differential
learning for students who do not
adhere to Western practices in music.
Participant uses critical vocabulary to
describe how power dynamics in the
classroom can be shifted towards a
student-teacher balanced approach.
Participant demonstrates improved
writing of a critical reflection that
questions assumptions and biases on
critical pedagogy.
Facilitator attempts to engage and
establish participant’s understanding
of how race affects practice through
critical discourse by analyzing
questioning and modeling techniques
that provide data on the use of
adaptive leadership move of
“regulating distress” while reflecting
on these interactions to inform usage
of a brave space.
Session 10:
Attempting to enact critical pedagogy.
• Co-constructing an activity that engages
with critical pedagogy to use in a future
music lesson.
Session 11:
Critically reflecting on practice.
• Analyzing our critical pedagogy activity
through a critically reflective lens.
• Reflecting on our progress of understanding
positionality, critical pedagogy, and critical
reflection.
• Homework: A critical reflection on
individual experience in learning about
critical pedagogy in music education.
Session 12:
In the field progress analysis
Critical reflections
57

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Research Methods
My action research study allowed me to gauge how successful I was in developing my
participant’s critical consciousness while eliciting constructive disorientation(s) that drove her desire in
developing future actionable moves that support the use of critical pedagogy in her instructional
practices. After critical reflection, I can say that my own practices defaulted to the way I was taught to
teach choral music, and my own lack of agency to engage my students in discussions around race and
cultural competence perpetuated White supremacy. I made the same inference about my participant’s
music curriculum because we guided our students through similar performance experiences and
collaborated heavily on our instructional practices throughout the year. We had internalized a colorblind
approach where musical performances were valued and rewarded rather than engaging music
performance, selection, and discussions through a critical lens with students.
Addressing our complicity to White supremacy and deculturalization in music education was
done through promoting the tenets of critical pedagogy as social justice in our work. To document those
actions, I used a qualitative action research (Lochmiller & Lester, 2017) approach. Lochmiller and Lester
(2017) defined action research as “a primarily qualitative research methodology that provides a
framework to systematically examine problems or challenges within practice-based settings” (p. 233). To
see how I led and facilitated critical discourse with my colleague, I observed my own interactions with
my participant as well as her use of language. I also used critical reflection to consistently question our
progress as we moved towards becoming critically conscious in this study. This section will detail my
methods for this action research.
Participant and Setting
This study took place during the Fall 2023 semester at my school site, Beach High School. This
qualitative study employed purposeful, non-probability sampling (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016) as the
participant was selected based on relevance to the research question and the field of music. The

59
participant chosen was, at the time of this study, a vocal music teacher, worked in my school district,
and more specifically worked at the intermediate school that feeds directly into my high school
program. This also created a very convenient sample (Johnson & Christensen, 2017; Merriam & Tisdell,
2016) for this study, however, the aim of this study was to disrupt current practices in a specific school
zone and not generalize findings to a larger population. As such, purposefully sampling a colleague in my
school district made sense for a qualitative action research study. The study took place over the course
of 12 weeks composed of three cycles with weekly individual 1–1 meetings in both my own private
office and in her music classroom.
Participant
As shown in my conceptual framework in Figure 1, I engaged with a teacher colleague in this
study. At the time of this study, Britney, a pseudonym, taught at the intermediate school level as a
White woman with over 15 years of teaching experience. Britney taught choir, band, orchestra,
yearbook, and took the role of being a digital fellow—someone who helped others with district
approved technology—at her school site. There were several roles she had taken on to keep her position
full-time, however, during the academic year for this study she solely focused on teaching music courses
which afforded her some time to focus on music pedagogy. Based on previous conversations, Britney
had expressed an interest in engaging with music as a White woman willing to explore the critical
aspects of diversity and race to provide better learning experiences for her students.
Using Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano’s (2017) ways of knowing typology and based on
informal observations, I contended the type of learner that Britney was. The ways of knowing are
instrumental, socializing, self-authoring, and transformative. I contended that Britney was a socializing
knower based on interactions with her over the past 7 years. Socializing knowers make meaning while
considering others’ perspectives but will defer to others’ opinions and values as the “best” way to view
things to meet their expectations.

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In interactions where we planned concert performances together, many times, we would have
discussions on the need to diversify our musical repertoire selections for our students. In those
conversations, Britney affirmed my sentiments to program music in different languages, particularly in
Spanish, with music that is relatable and connected to student experiences. However, her responses
sometimes included language such as, “Whatever you think best,” which highlighted her willingness to
work together, while deferring to my viewpoints and opinions when making the final decision. In a later
section, I discuss how power dynamics potentially play a role in such interactions and conversations.
Drago-Severson and Blum-DeStefano (2017) highlighted that providing safe spaces for socializing
knowers can allow them to “dive into sensitive issues, practice sharing their honest thinking and feeling,
and recognize that sidestepping conflict and critical conversations won’t sweep important issues neatly
under a rug” (p. 470), I sought to provide this safe space in our interactions by seeking to establish a
strong holding environment where I could “turn up the heat” to push our thinking (Northouse, 2016).
Britney had also expressed many issues with the ways our current system of practices
contributed to reproducing harm in music pedagogy for students in our district. She was not afraid to
raise her hand and offer an opinion on this situation with other music teachers, and sometimes was one
of the louder voices in the room asking for change from administrators and district directors. However,
these conversations were not normally focused on race and prejudices as they were solely based on
music pedagogy and program issues. In conversations about race we had between each other, I heard
her acknowledge her identity as a White woman who could identify inequities between students of
marginalized communities, but also as someone who struggled with addressing such larger systemic
issues. From these observations, I believed that Britney could make the jump into the early stages of
being a self-authoring learner who could think critically about her reality. In my findings section, I discuss
how interactions in this study address this claim and potential shift in my participant.

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Setting of Actions
Although no research requirements were explicitly outlined by our district, prior to beginning
my study, I notified and received permission from both of our principals on our intent to engage
ourselves in critical discourse around critical pedagogy in music education. I sought to explore my ability
to facilitate critical discourse and elicit constructive disorientation through analyzing my own actions in
weekly individual meetings after school hours. This study took place over the course of 12 weeks split up
into three 4-week cycles. The first 3 weeks of each cycle involved individual meetings that traded off
between my office and her own music classroom. The first three meetings of each cycle lasted
approximately 45 to 60 minutes and consisted of critical discourse related to learning new content on
positionality, critical reflection, and critical pedagogy. In the 4th week of each cycle, I engaged in in-thefield progress analysis.
Data Collection
This study was a critically reflective inquiry where critical discourse and critical reflection
allowed my participant and me to work towards developing a critical consciousness and co-constructing
meaning around critical pedagogy in our instructional practices. My efforts in data collection included
observing, recording, (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016), and writing descriptive reflections (Larrivee, 2008) on
our weekly interactions to showcase Britney’s transformational learning experience, or lack thereof, in
learning about critical pedagogy through critical discourse. The language used in our discourse was
analyzed for evidence of critical thinking around issues of race, and how the perpetuations of dominant
ideology were highlighted in our current music teaching practices. In analyzing her shared verbatim
responses, I assessed her reflective judgment, or her ability to engage in critical discourse, to identify
where she was in her learning, and I leveraged that information to drive future actions throughout the
inquiry. Additionally, I used an attempted written critical reflection that she willingly shared as a
progress indicator for developing a constructive disorientation. I also wrote critical reflections to hold

62
myself accountable throughout the study in maintaining a brave environment, employing critical
discourse, identifying power dynamics, acknowledging my own assumptions and biases on my
leadership, and keeping the study ethical.
The primary goal of this study was to change current practices to “improve teaching, learning, or
leading” (Lochmiller & Lester, 2017, p. 240), and since qualitative studies place the researcher as the
primary instrument of data collection and analysis (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016) I gathered data in the form
of documents and artifacts and from observations. Documents and artifacts came from weekly lesson
plans for our individual meetings, reflective practice tool (Larrivee, 2008) results, developing a critical
pedagogy activity, my participant’s critical reflection, and my own critical reflections and analytic
memos. Observational data were created through jottings, and field notes informed by meeting audio
recordings. Combined, these sources allowed me to analyze my progress in eliciting a critical
consciousness in my participant through critical discourse on critical pedagogy in music education. The
next section will further describe each data collection approach.
Documents
Most of the documents collected in this study were newly generated material, or researchergenerated documents (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). Some existing documents, such as previously
developed lesson plans, were used when analyzing some of our current practices. However, due to
individual preferences, both of us had our own form of lesson planning and the media (e.g., paper,
digital, sticky notes) type of these documents did vary. In this case, such documents were referred to as
visual methods as defined by Merriam and Tisdell (2016). I generated weekly meeting agendas, asked
my participant to complete Larrivee’s (2008) reflective practice tool, and we both generated critical
reflections. Each type of document will be explained in the next section.
Weekly Lesson Plans. Attempting to facilitate critical discourse in our weekly interactions
required a lesson plan for each meeting. These lesson plans guided our discourse as we progressed

63
through the Rodgers’s (2002) reflective cycle. Creating such a plan provided us with clear expectations
on what to discuss and guided how we made progress towards engaging with critical pedagogy. The
agenda outlined our topic(s) for the meeting as well as learning outcomes that held us accountable
(Elmore, 2002) to our learning in our sessions together. The learning outcomes created for our individual
meetings also informed the types of questions (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) I used in our critical discourse,
some of which were also included on the lesson plans. Each meeting began with acknowledging what
our learning outcomes were and closed by discussing our progress towards those learning outcomes as
a closing strategy.
Reflective Practice Tool. Larrivee (2008) offered a reflection survey tool that allows one to
assess their level of reflective practice along with four steps on how to use it. The tool came in the form
of a chart where statements on one’s practice are answered by marking how often one engages with the
four levels of reflection from pre-reflection to critical reflection (step one). The tool is designed for both
a facilitator and a teacher to complete and Larrivee recommended sharing results in a collaborative
format (step two). In that collaborative discourse, we co-constructed goals that would help us move to
higher levels of reflective practice (step three). Lastly, we took those goals and embedded them into the
action plan section, also provided by Larrivee (2008), where we selected specific practice indicators to
inform action steps we would both take to make progress towards the desired change (step four).
This tool was useful for me to gauge at what level of reflection my participant initially engaged
with and what she self-selected as her own achievable progress. By understanding how she defined her
learning needs on reflection at the start of this study (Mezirow, 1991), my own action plan was adapted
to move closer towards achieving a transformative learning experience by the end. As I progressed
through each cycle of the study, I used Larrivee’s (2008) selected indicators on the facilitator portion of
the tool to assess my participant’s progress in developing the ability to engage with critical discourse
and critical reflection as we discussed critical pedagogy in music.

64
Critical Pedagogy Activity (Visual Methods). While we engaged with critical pedagogy in this
study, we took an opportunity to develop an activity that could potentially be used in a classroom that
embodies tenets of critical pedagogy in music education. Teachers enjoy planning their instruction
through various forms such as traditional lesson plans, online slides, jottings on a sticky note, etc.
Identifying lesson plans as visual methods—types of visual documents and images collected and
analyzed physically and online—allowed me to cater to my participant’s lesson planning styles while still
offering valuable data for the study (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). This activity was not realized in the
classroom during this study. However, once it was developed, we used it to analyze and reflect on our
attempt to enact critical pedagogy in music, and considered where it could fit in the context of a larger
lesson and unit plan.
Critical Reflections. I asked my participant to attempt to write two critical reflections in this
study. From my conceptualization of critical reflection, I defined written critical reflection as the process
of annotating a specific experience while striving to uncover power dynamics and challenge hegemonic
assumptions (Brookfield, 2017) which then allows us to move forward with intelligent action (Rodgers,
2002). At the end of Cycle 1, I asked my participant to attempt writing her first critical reflection on a
moment where her positionality was questioned. The intention was to have her willingly share it with
me in detail so I could use this to gauge her understanding of critical perspectives. If she did not want to
share, I would have asked her to discuss the comfortable aspects of what she wrote in our first meeting
during Cycle 2. Either way, her critical reflection would inform my overall action plan steps in the
preceding cycle. At the end of Cycle 2, I asked my participant to write a critical reflection where student
positionality and ideas/contributions were not considered in a moment of practice. However, she did
not share this written critical reflection with me as she chose to keep it to herself, but she was willing to
bring in aspects of the prompt into our critical discourse at the next cycle.

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To commit to my own work as a critical educator, I also produced three critical reflections after
each cycle during in-the-field analysis throughout the course of the study. I created these critical
reflections using a voice-to-text feature on a digital platform so that I could speak out loud (such as in
the car) and have my voice be notated into text. The purpose of these critical reflections was to
continuously question my own assumptions on how effective our weekly meetings were above and
beyond any content in my own field notes. This was done by asking (but not limited to), “How did my
positionality affect my responses in our interactions, or lack thereof? Have I considered other
perspectives? Am I meeting the goals of my study while committing to maintaining a critical lens in my
actions? Am I addressing power dynamics?” I created these critical reflections with the same purpose
given to my participant of annotating a specific experience while striving to uncover power dynamics
and challenge hegemonic assumptions (Brookfield, 2017), which then allows us to move forward with
intelligent action (Rodgers, 2002). Through critical reflection I strove to make progress on the purpose of
my study with the same critical approaches that I was trying to instill in my participant. These critical
reflections, along with the other documents discussed, were supplemented by observational data as
described in the next section.
Observations
Merriam and Tisdell (2016) suggested that to be a careful observer we must know what to
observe, such as “The physical setting, the participants, activities and interactions, conversation, subtle
factors, and your own behavior” (p. 141). Observational data were central to my study as most of the
interactions were between my participant and me in individual meetings. Given my goal to engage in
critical discourse, observations allowed me to document these back-and-forth interactions.
Understanding what is being observed helps maximize the possibility of conducting credible data
collection. Since I was the primary research instrument, and I participated in the co-construction of
knowledge in this study, I conducted observations through the means of participant as observer role—

66
one where the researcher is present and involved in the daily activities with participants in the field
(Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). Although each meeting was audio recorded, I also generated observational
data in the form of jottings and field notes.
Jottings. In each individual meeting, I wrote observational jottings as a form of field notes
(Merriam & Tisdell, 2016) on the discourse that was present in our interactions. I wrote most of my
jottings on my own version of our meeting lesson plans where I provided space for note taking. Most of
the jottings recorded information pertaining to the setting, times, language in the discourse, participant
body language, details about specific moments of practice, and any other pertinent moments that
informed how our use of critical discourse moved my participant towards critical consciousness. These
jottings better informed what was occurring in the moment and I used them for better recall when
creating descriptive reflections as I listened to our meetings’ recording.
Field Notes. The jottings and audio recording from my weekly meetings allowed me to write
field notes (Bogdan & Biklen, 2007) about our interactions. These reflections were highly descriptive—
with enough detail so readers felt as if they were there—of the setting, activities, and behaviors present
in our meetings as suggested by Merriam and Tisdell (2016). A reflective aspect came in through
observer comments that are added and shared to “let it all hang out” regarding my mistakes,
inadequacies, and prejudices (Bogdan & Biklen, 2007). These comments included information such as
direct quotations of what was said in the room as well as observer comments that reflected my own
feelings and reactions in the moment. The intellectual goal of gaining insight into what was going on
(Maxwell, 2013) is what drove these field notes so they could continuously be used to inform my action
plan as I progressed through the study cycles.
The nine 1–1 meetings of each cycle lasted approximately 45 to 60 minutes and provided me
with approximately 9.5 hours of total audio recorded data that were used to create field notes. The field
notes were typed and organized by speaker and timestamp on the audio recording. This allowed me to

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create a transcript of our interactions where I could notate questions and responses verbatim as I
identified vocabulary present in our discourse that guided my assessment of progress indicators. My
jottings also added information relative to my own thoughts or feelings that occurred in the moment
and amplified the descriptive and reflective aspects of my field notes as I sought to engage in my work
critically. After my study, I had about nine sets of field notes that allowed me to analyze my progress
towards eliciting critical consciousness in my participant. These field notes were supplemented by my
own critical reflections and analytic memos which expanded on experiences with a critical lens.
Data Analysis
Systematically organizing data to come up with findings is referred to as data analysis (Bogdan &
Biklen, 2007). This is where the researcher takes data and develops a congruence between it and the
research problem to elicit meaning, gain understanding, and develop empirical knowledge (Bowen,
2009). In this study, I took weekly agendas, responses to the reflective practice tool, lesson plans,
jottings, field notes, analytic memos, and critical reflections as forms of data that allowed me to analyze
my ability to elicit constructive disorientation(s) in my participant in hopes of developing a critical
consciousness about our instructional practices. As this study employed tenets of social justice, critical
reflection played an important role in data analysis as there are systemic forces that have taught us to
overlook potential ways in which we can cause disruption (Herr & Anderson, 2015). Engaging with my
participant in this action research project allowed data to be generated through every interaction we
had within the various learning cycles.
As action research, this study was cyclical (Coghlan, 2019) meaning that data analysis occurred
in-the-field during the study, and out-of-the field after the study. My 12-week study was split up into
three cycles of 4-weeks. Three weeks in each cycle were in-the-field enactment of leadership and
andragogy with my participant, and the 4th week was an opportunity to engage in in-the-field analysis
of how I made progress. Bogdan and Biklen (2007) suggested that memos to yourself be written about

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what you are learning or you think is emerging in the study. In the 4th week of each cycle, as well as
after the 12 weeks were up, I wrote analytic memos where I developed links between my findings.
These memos informed my actions in-the-field so that I aligned with the research question at all times,
but also opened up to critical approaches as required by critical discourse and critical reflection.
Essentially, these memos helped me stay on track, adjust as needed, while reminding myself to “practice
what I preach” in relation to the actions I was implementing.
A final analysis phase took place after the third cycle of my study when I was out-of-the field. As
a qualitative study, I employed thematic coding of my data with an eye towards how, if at all, I
supported my participant in accomplishing the short-term goals spelled out in the conceptual
framework. Ravitch and Carl (2021) referred to coding as the ways we assign meaning to the data. I used
my conceptual framework as a guide to develop a code book of a priori codes, and added emergent
codes, too, as I read through the data. As Miles and Huberman (2014) discussed, my list of codes was
derived and defined from the selected literature that informed my conceptual framework prior to
coding in the initial analysis phase. For example, some of my initial codes included “regulating distress,”
“questioning,” and “reflection.” As new themes emerged, these codes were defined and added to the
codebook based on moves, or patterns, I would begin to analyze. During a second phase of coding these
codes were revised as I began comparing them across the various instances to refine the datasets. This
included revisiting initial codes and expanding them into sub-codes, for example, “questioning” was
broken up into “factual,” “guiding,” and “probing” to establish a deeper correlation between the types
of questioning moves I found in the data. Qualitative analysis software allowed me to draw connections
between various counts of data and identify different themes, or patterns, with my coding as I began to
sort and make sense of the data (Ravitch & Carl, 2021).
As the primary researcher I considered how themes did not simply emerge from the data and
were constructed and developed through my perspective (Ravitch & Carl, 2021). Additional analytic

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memos were used to think through my coded data as well as check-ins with my dissertation chair in
which data were discussed to draw connections between these themes or to highlight emergent
observations. This allowed me to engage with my data critically to represent findings as accurately as
possible without bias. For example, initially I was not coding for “missed opportunities,” however,
meetings with my chair and reviewing my analytic memos and field notes highlighted a need to code
missed opportunities in my data so I could speak to my moves as a scholar-practitioner. Themes were
refined and revised during each coding cycle to determine the final data set and ultimately the findings
for this study.
Limitations and Delimitations
Action research seeks to re-professionalize practice in the face of attempts to deskill
professional work (Herr & Anderson, 2015), which motivated me to focus my study specifically on my
workplace. Given the purpose of this study was to examine how I supported my colleague to develop
her critical consciousness, I conducted careful and systematic analysis to examine how our discourse
changed, if at all, and what learning that change demonstrated. Limitations, or practical and theoretical
things out of our control, along with delimitations, intentional choices that nonetheless limits our
research, were present in this study.
Limitations
This study took place in the fall semester of the 2023–2024 school year at my school site. In
terms of data collection, the possibility that my participant may have skewed responses was a limitation
present in this study. Due to the nature of our friendship and work relationship my participant could
have been hesitant with certain responses as was evidenced when she chose to withhold one of the
written critical reflections with me. This limited what I was able to see and analyze about the progress
we made on some aspects of our critical discourse. She also may have used language that presented a
false sense of “agreement” with me throughout our interactions, which would limit work towards

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engaging in a brave space (Arao & Clemens, 2013). Ultimately, her willingness to participate determined
how much data I could generate for this study.
Being a novice researcher, and novice critical educator, created another layer of limitation for
my study. My ability to process information, engage with my participant, generate learning, and provide
new content affected the overall quality of my study. The possibility that I could fall short in some of my
actions or push my participant towards a destructive disorientation where she shut down and was
resistant to new content was considered. As mentioned throughout, my self-identified way of knowing
as a self-authoring knower (Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano, 2017) may have also limited my own
ability to be a critical reflector and thinker throughout the study. I may not have possessed or generated
enough skills to push my participant in the right direction when discussing race and critical pedagogy
which could have interfered with our progress in the study and potentially limited what I was able to
demonstrate in my research.
Delimitations
The purposeful selection of my participant is a delimitation to my study. I chose my participant
based on our close working relationship as music educators and our proximity to each other at our
school sites. I have also curated a specific conceptual framework through which I conducted my research
along with the specifics of each weekly meeting and larger cycles. My actions in each session and cycle
were guided by the theories I chose and were influenced by my understanding of their tenets.
Ultimately, this created a delimitation on how I conducted the study, interacted with my participant,
analyzed data, and learned from the process.
Credibility and Trustworthiness
Trustworthiness is the process of executing a study with rigorous thinking about methods and
analysis along with adequate evidence so that readers trust your findings. Credibility, or internal validity,
in a qualitative study refers to how close research findings match reality—are findings credible with the

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presented data (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). Methods like triangulation, member checks, spending enough
time in the field to let data “saturate,” and doing our own work to increase reflexivity are vital (Merriam
& Tisdell, 2016). Maxwell (2013) referred to this as a “validity check” that contributes to the credibility
of our findings (where readers have confidence in our findings), or our trustworthiness as a researcher
(confidence that we have accounted for the way we might pre-determine the outcome, or what we
found, if we didn’t account for our influence).
I used the experiences with my participant to present findings that were filtered through my
own perspectives as a qualitative researcher and understandings of what constituted good action
research (Coghlan, 2019; Herr & Anderson, 2015; Lochmiller & Lester, 2017). To maximize credibility in
this study, I used triangulation—converging multiple forms of data to corroborate findings—to reduce
the impact of potential biases (Bowen, 2009). In my jottings and field notes, I included verbatim
language to support my analysis and presentation of findings. Using verbatim language allowed me to
show what my participant said without summarizing or synthesizing information. This presented her
view without compromising data with my own perspectives. In my field notes, my observer comments
notated my own thinking throughout observations and interactions to create an accurate representation
of what occurred in our meetings while creating space between my own thoughts and interpretations.
To reduce bias in this study, my use of critical reflection helped establish trustworthiness.
Constantly questioning my assumptions, biases, and practices allowed me to establish trustworthiness
by continuously employing rigorous thinking on my actions and ways data was generated and collected.
Using critical reflection also held me accountable to my conceptual framework as I continued to process
generated data through a critical lens. In conjunction with critical reflection, bi-weekly meetings with my
dissertation chair provided me opportunities to reflect and engage with a critical partner. Doing so
shined a spotlight on blind spots in my thinking (Maxwell, 2013) and minimized threats to establishing
credibility and trustworthiness. For example, sharing my data with her allowed me to engage in peer

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review (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). I also kept a detailed audit trail of how my study was conducted and
how my reflections, questions, and actions led to my findings (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016) to increase
trustworthiness throughout my study.
Ethics
Ethical considerations in qualitative research require careful examination of the relationships
with research participants (Glesne, 2011). Preventing harm in this study required me to consider how I
may have unintentionally mistreated my participant. Glesne (2011) described five basic principles that
guide ethical considerations for institutional review board approval (a) provide sufficient information so
my participant can make an informed decision about participating (informed consent); (b) provide my
participant the opportunity to withdraw without penalty; (c) eliminate unnecessary risk (such as
maintaining their identity anonymous); (d) ensure the study’s benefits outweigh potential risks; (e)
ensure I have done the work to be considered a qualified investigator (credibility and trustworthiness).
My study took place in the workplace which makes the uncovering of identities easier for
readers through my sampling, data collection, and dissemination of findings. Since there are usually no
more than two music teachers at school sites in our education system this narrows down the pool of
potential participants. Dissemination of findings could potentially cause harm to my participant’s
reputation at our school site and district if my findings are not considered desirable by other staff
members or administrators. Although confidentiality is necessary it may at times become an
impossibility (Glesne, 2011). I attempted to maintain the right to privacy by giving my participant, school
site, and district pseudonyms throughout this study. However, this will not be a fool proof method as my
name, as a researcher, can easily be traced back to my workplace with a simple online search. To
prevent publishing anything that might infringe on my participant’s role at the workplace, I shared my
data with my participant to ensure that I captured her voice accurately in my writing, also known as

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member checking or respondent validation (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). Engaging in member checks
addressed ethical considerations and increased credibility and trustworthiness.
Physical collected data were secured in a locked cabinet and digital visual methods were
uploaded to a locked laptop accessible only by me throughout this study. Physical data and digital data
included only pseudonyms whenever necessary to prevent it being traced back to my participant.
Additionally, meetings were held in a secure space with locked doors where we could discuss freely and
be away from any wandering foot traffic.
As mentioned before, the participant and I had a close working relationship for over 7 years. We
considered each other friends and not just colleagues. Ethical dilemmas were present as our researcherparticipant relationship gained me access to intimate information. I carefully engaged with reflexivity—
questioning my own thinking and actions in research with the same scrutiny that I would apply to
others—on how to use such information to prevent publishing any findings that may discomfort or
betray our friendship (Saunders et al., 2019). I also acknowledged that the existing rapport could distort
the ways my participant took in information (Seidman, 2013), therefore, I engaged my participant with
formal, but familiar, language that was accessible as we discussed new content. Ultimately, my research
question strove to study my ability to elicit a developing critical consciousness in my participant, which
could be aided by the existing trust established in our friendship.
In our critical discourse, I anticipated the risks of my participant’s potential feelings of having
their privacy invaded, embarrassment when discussing certain moments of practice, or the
unintentional revealing of information (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016). In establishing our brave space (Arao
& Clemens, 2013), we established the peace hand sign as a cue whenever we felt we were entering a
territory we were not comfortable with as a reminder to ourselves to maintain an ethical stance in our
interactions. I did not want to construe any information my participant shared, and I also wanted to
provide her the opportunity to say things in this space that she felt needed to be “off the record.”

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Throughout the conceptual framework section, I mentioned how I viewed my participant as
someone I could co-constructing knowledge with. To have my participant feel the same way I also
acknowledged possible power dynamics that may be unspoken in the room. Our conversations on
critical pedagogy, critical reflection, and positionality all required discussions centered around race as
part of our social justice work. Social justice is about combating anti-racism, and anti-racism work
identifies power relations (Dei, 2005). As I took in the perspectives of my participant as data, I was
aware that my interpretations may not be an accurate reflection of what she has said. To combat this, I
turned to reflexivity by allowing my participant to view the data I collected and invited her to provide
feedback on my findings before publishing. Establishing member checks throughout the study so that I
presented accurate information was not only ethical, but also increased credibility and trustworthiness
in my work as a qualitative researcher (Merriam & Tisdell, 2016).
As a qualitative researcher, engaging in critical, anti-racist research, my goal was to bring to light
the inequities perpetuated by dominant ideologies within our instructional practices. I proposed to
accomplish this in my study by developing a critical consciousness in my participant via critical discourse
on critical pedagogy in music education and through critical reflection. With the ethical considerations
mentioned, as an anti-racist researcher I also committed to holding the power to veto any request to
omit information from being published that perpetuates White supremacy and maintains the status quo
(Dei, 2005; Glesne, 2011). Allowing my study to cater to the needs of the status quo did not align with
the overall purpose of the research question and I would not have executed ethical and trustworthy
research if I protected the majoritarian view (Solórzano & Yosso, 2002). Although this study took place in
our workplace, the content was rooted in self-study on our instructional practices with an intention of
promoting a transformative learning experience for my participant. Therefore, I did not seek to provide
positive findings on our instructional practices. Rather, I sought data that examined my own ability to
promote a transformation to move my participant closer to critical, anti-racist practices rooted in social

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justice. My own personal critical reflections allowed me to continuously engage with rigorous thinking
that kept my work ethically grounded in my stance as a social justice educator and researcher.
Findings
In this section, I discuss the findings from my action research to answer the following research
question: How do I engage with a music teacher colleague, in my district, in critical discourse about our
instructional practices to lead to critical consciousness? I argue that engaging my participant in critically
reflective inquiry about our instructional practices through facilitating critical discourse, exploring our
positionality, and employing the adaptive leadership move of regulating distress helped elicit a
developing critical consciousness on the part of my learner. More specifically, my findings will
demonstrate how my use of probing questions (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) and modeling (Loughran & Berry,
2005; Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) helped me facilitate critical discourse as defined in my conceptual
framework during our inquiry cycles. In using critical discourse, I will describe how understanding and
leveraging my learner’s positionality, as well as my own, along with analyzing her capacity for reflective
judgment (Mezirow, 2003) guided the planning and delivery of content. Additionally, regulating distress
by providing direction and co-constructing a strong holding environment (Heifetz et al., 2009;
Northouse, 2016) encouraged learning conditions that aligned with the beginning characteristics of a
brave space (Arao & Clemens, 2013). Combined, these andragogical and leadership moves allowed for a
learning environment where my participant and I learned more about ourselves, our instructional
practices, and ultimately moved towards developing our critical consciousness. Since this action
research study involved a focus on the self as a researcher throughout its design, I will also describe
where there were missed opportunities and moments of growth in my leadership while engaging with
my participant.

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Facilitating Critical Discourse
The design of my study was fueled by the facilitation and use of critical discourse between my
participant and me. In my conceptual framework, I defined critical discourse in this action research as
the active discourse with others that allows us to better understand the meaning of an experience
(Mezirow, 2000) through questioning assumptions, intentions, and controversial issues, such as race
(Milner, 2003), to inform the ways we think and communicate with others. In my study, critical
discourse included discussions on positionality, our instructional practices, and questioning assumptions
we have made about our world(s) through a critically reflective inquiry. My goal in using critical
discourse was to elicit learning opportunities aligned with developing a critical consciousness where,
together, we could question assumptions about our instructional practices. Assessing my participant’s
reflective judgment was an initial move that allowed me to gauge her capacity for engaging in critical
discourse. From there, my use of probing questions (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) and modeling (Loughran &
Berry, 2005; Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) helped facilitate critical discourse as I engaged my participant
with the planned content throughout each cycle of my action research.
Assessing Learner’s Reflective Judgment
Mezirow (2003) denoted that engaging with critical discourse freely and fully involves being
both critically self-reflective and having reflective judgment. To initiate the facilitation of critical
discourse, I first needed to assess my learner’s reflective judgment, or her capacity to engage in critical
discourse as I have defined. The highest level of reflective judgment is defined by Mezirow (2003)
through a quote from King and Kitchener (1994):
Individuals with fully differentiated abstract categories see the problematic nature of
controversies. The dissonance involved in understanding that a true problem exists conversely
pushes them to become active inquirers involved in the critique of conditions that has been
reached earlier, as well to become the generators of new hypotheses. Since the methods of

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criticism and evaluation are applied to the self as well as others, individuals see that the
solutions they offer are only hypothetical conjectures about what is, and their own solutions are
themselves open to criticism and reevaluation. (pp. 60–61)
King and Kitchener (1994) provided an example of Stage 7 reflective judgment, or the highest
level, through the example sentence of, “One can judge an argument by how well thought-out the
positions are, what kinds of reasoning and evidence are used to support it, and how consistent the way
one argues on this topic is as compared with other topics” (pp. 14–16). Essentially, adults at the highest
level of reflective judgment can offer a perspective on their own perspective, which Mezirow (2003)
argued is necessary in transformative learning and critical discourse. By aiming to create the conditions
for effective rational adult reasoning, assessing reflective judgment was necessary to fully understand
how my participant made meaning of an experience, and entered the experiences of others.
Using critical discourse that is consistent with my conceptual framework called for the
questioning of assumptions about our belief systems and controversial issues that inform how we think
about and communicate with others. To truly engage my participant in critical discourse, establishing a
reference point on her reflective judgment was essential. During Cycle 1, Session 1 of my study, I
engaged my participant in discourse about our positionality using an “I Am From…” activity (Brookfield,
2019). Adult learning theorists contend that one must know where their participants are in their
development (Mezirow, 1991, 2000) to set the foundation for learning to occur. Additionally, as stated
in my conceptual framework, critical discourse considers the ideas of praxis (existing within and
changing the world) versus solidarity (entering into the lived reality of another) to help with eliciting
critical consciousness (Hill, 2021). Therefore, after engaging in the “I Am From…” activity, I leveraged her
responses in describing her own identity (praxis) and how she related that identity to her own students
(solidarity) to assess her reflective judgment. The following example demonstrates the discourse that
took place between us after we completed and shared our “I Am From…” responses:

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J: Were there any particular emotions or feelings that stood out to you while you
answered some of the questions?
P: Yeah, you know, it’s like, that like, “I am from class” [hesitation in voice] I’m a middleclass, White girl, like so there’s, like a little bit of like, guilt, like I didn’t choose this
[referring to her own body]. Like, the only thing easier would be is if I were male, right?
So it’s, you know, so there’s a little bit of that, like, I gotta put that in writing. That’s the
cards I was dealt.
J: Can you tell me a little bit more about what that guilt means to you?
P: I mean, it’s just the way, especially when I’m working with students, right? I know. Well,
our students in particular. I can identify with some of them but even not. Like our
students tend to be like the “have a lot” and the “have almost nothing.” And so, I guess I
fall in the middle of that, but, like, I don’t have a good grasp of what it feels like for
those kids who share an apartment with 10 people. Like, I, simply, I can’t, I don’t know. I
just can’t really identify with that. I try, I try to imagine myself in that place and what it’s
gonna be like, and not ask them anything that would, you know, be impossible or even
uncomfortable for them. But the reality is, I don’t know what that feels like. I’ve always
had my own bedroom.
I used the guiding question (Sahin & Kulm, 2008)—“Were there any particular emotions or
feelings that stood out to you while you answered some of the questions?”—to invite my participant to
share information about her experience with the “I Am From…” activity. In her initial response she
willingly acknowledged her privileged status of being “middle-class,” and “White,” and she also shared
the feeling of having “guilt” associated with her positionality, which posed a dilemma from her
perspective. The way in which she continued on to say, “the only thing easier would be is if I were male,
right?” also gave me insight into her understanding of how gender roles play into privilege and

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positionality. She was able to recognize that there is privilege in our society, that she was someone who
embodies that privilege, and that there exists a higher level of privilege that she does not possess.
However, regardless of that privilege, she still felt guilt, a belief that is justified by her particular context
as a White woman since those as the “cards [she] was dealt.”
By asking her a follow up question about what “guilt means to [her],” I probed a deeper
understanding of a word she used to describe her emotions in relation to her positionality. She related
that “guilt” directly to her identity of being a middle-class, White woman and how it fit within the
context of her student population. She acknowledged her positionality fit somewhere between students
who “have a lot” and those who “have almost nothing,” which created a barrier, or dissonance, when
trying to get a “good grasp” on what life was like for students who “share an apartment with 10 people.”
As she continued on by saying, “I try, I try to imagine myself in that place” it showed that there
was some level of “active inquiry” driven by the “dissonance” that exists between her positionality and
that of students who “have almost nothing.” She then concluded with a remark that revealed her own
concluding solution, “But the reality is, I don’t know what that feels like. I’ve always had my own
bedroom.” This established the conjecture that she tried to relate to these types of students but had no
success, therefore providing me with a steppingstone for future topics in the facilitation of critical
discourse where that conjecture could be open to “criticism and reevaluation,” two key tenets of
reflective judgment.
Assessing assumptions and expectations of beliefs, values, and feelings are necessary and
indispensable for reflective judgment (Mezirow, 2003). Breaking down this isolated moment during inthe-field analysis established a reference point on my participant’s reflective judgment where she was
able to offer a perspective on her perspective, justified by her context. My participant’s description of
her positionality of being racially and socially privileged, along with her feeling of guilt from possessing
that privilege, established a knowledge perspective that is contextual and subjective as it is filtered

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through her own criteria for judgment. She then described the difficulty in relating her positionality to a
particular group of students, which entrenched a context-bound knowledge base around her White
positionality that limited her perception in relating to others with different positionalities. Based on King
and Kitchener’s (1994) seven levels of reflective judgment, assessing these responses allowed me to
conclude that my participant possessed the qualities of Stage 5 reflective judgment where beliefs are
established through context-specific interpretations (her positionality as a White woman who is willingly
curious about others) yet limited by perspective (her lack of ability to relate to those different than her,
although she knows those alternate perspectives exist). For example, a Stage 5 knower might say,
“People think differently and so they attack the problem differently. Other theories could be as true as
my own but based on different evidence” (King & Kitchener, 1994, pp. 14–16).
Modeling and questioning the assumptions she had about herself and her students (e.g., the
assumption that some of her students have 10 people in their apartment) was one of the goals for
critical discourse in this study. This interaction provided an opportunity to test the waters of critical
discourse prior to continuing with planned actions in the same session, and with succeeding actions
throughout each session and cycle. Select guiding questions and learning objectives in my weekly
agendas for each session were informed by this initial reference point of my participant’s reflective
judgment to facilitate critical discourse that would advance her ability to promote solidarity (Hill, 2021)
when questioning her assumptions about herself and her students.
Eliciting Critical Discourse via Probing Questions
In line with my conceptual framework, facilitating critical discourse in my study was driven by
the ability to question assumptions about how we make meaning of our positionality and how it informs
our instructional practice as part of developing our critical consciousness. Throughout my action
research, the use of probing questions played a vital role in how my participant and I engaged with
critical discourse. Sahin and Kulm (2008) described probing questions as a way to “push students to use

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previous knowledge to explore and develop new concepts and procedures” (p. 224). Probing questions
help to elicit thinking, promote deeper thinking, and justify ideas being presented. My use of probing
questions (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) allowed me to enter my participant’s reality with as much accurate and
complete information (Mezirow, 1991, 2003).
Throughout my data analysis I found over 120 instances of probing questions in our interactions.
My use of probing questions typically aligned with eliciting deeper thinking on the part of my learner by
pushing her to draw on her own knowledge to justify ideas and beliefs specific to topics and planned
actions on our meeting agendas for each session. Some of these questions used stems such as (a) “What
is your current understanding of;” or (b) “I’m hearing you say … can you tell me more about what that
means to you?” With these types of probing questions, I was building the question in the moment off
what my participant was saying to push forward with developing her thought process about a topic, or
simply to gather more information about her thinking before moving forward with the discourse.
By asking probing questions as part of critical discourse, I supported the development of my
learner’s critical consciousness by facilitating the questioning of assumptions about our instructional
practices. This was done by using her own words to inform my perspective on her (the intrapersonal
process of creating a model of the speaker by drawing on information about them), as well as
perspective taking by using her feedback to adapt current and new knowledge to her own perspective
(an interpersonal dimension) as described by Mezirow (2003). The following example, from Cycle 2,
Session 2, demonstrates my use of probing questions in critical discourse where the topic of
deculturalization in music education was being discussed:
J: What would be an implication for music students if we’re just promoting this education
that like you said, is very “Whitewashed?”
P: Yeah, I mean, less reason for [students] to continue if they’re not seeing themselves
represented, and when we get up and perform, and their parents are like, “tell us about

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this song?”, And they’re like, “I don’t know, my teacher just said to do it,” right? They
don’t, they don’t have any buy in. It’s one thing if the classical piece, we’ve talked about
it, and they love it, and they can explain like, “why we’re doing this,” but then it’s
another thing if they’re like, “we’re just doing it.”
J: What about their own identity?
P: Yeah, they need to see whatever you know, part of their culture represented. They need
to do that “Taylor Swift” medley because they love it. And they have those memories
forever. And when they talk to their friends, when they’re like, “Yeah, you should do
[music class] because we’re doing things that are really fun!” And other people are like,
“Oh, I see that you’re doing things that are relevant to 12-year-olds.”
J: What if a student does buy into it? And they say, “Okay, let’s go, let’s play the Bach, the
Mozart,” everything?
P: Yeah, there’s nothing wrong with that too it goes back to that like the artist, or the, “can
you separate the artist from the music?” Is it objectively good music? And then what the
heck does that mean? But is it quality? I mean, if it’s survived this long, there’s some
kind of reason for it. People find it enjoyable to play or listen to.
J: So if an orchestra student, or a choir student, comes into a program, and all we’re doing
is the like Western canon type of music, and they are inspired by that and then go on to
seek a music major as a career, seek to in the future possibly go into teaching: what’s
the outcome of them, valuing or accepting that Western Canon music, and only having
that experience, or that exposure, in their education?
P: Yeah, well, I think you can like something. I mean, hopefully, they were also exposed to
other things, right? Because everyone gravitates towards something. But, like, I think of
myself, and I’m like, I’ve played a lot of classical music. I don’t love classical music. If I’m

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going to sit down, and listen to something, I am never choosing classical music. And part
of my excuse is like, “Well, I try to, I can’t just listen to classical music.” I have to be like
pulling it apart, or like playing in my head or something, and I can’t, I can’t just listen.
But, but, it’s not what I choose to listen to ever. So, it is what I’m comfortable working
with playing, teaching, but it’s not what I love working with and playing and teaching. So
I think there can be both. I don’t know, there has to just be exposure. Everyone likes
their own thing. But, but, just having those conversations with people of various
backgrounds, which you know, our classrooms are not crazy diverse, but they’re not
completely, you know, anything. And so just encouraging the kids to have those
conversations to try out little bites of different music until they find things. You know,
like when I took the kids to see the Taiko drumming group last year. And they all loved
it, and most of them had never seen anything like that before. And then like I went
home, and looked it up online, like, show people and so, so just exposure.
J: And if students don’t get exposed?
P: And they don’t get exposed, then we have issues, right? Like that’s, that’s where it
continues and perpetuates.
J: What exactly?
P: Deculturalization.
In my initial probing question, using the term “Whitewashed” elicited previous knowledge on
the concept of deculturalization and how it affects student learning experiences. In her initial response
she commented on how students perceive music selections they learn and perform, and the dilemma
she identified when students know nothing about, or have no relevance to, the music they are learning
where student’s lose motivation to continue with music education if they don’t see themselves
represented in the music chosen and are “just doing it.” After listening to that response, I posed another

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probing question related to her students’ identity to gather more information about this view. She
followed up by describing that students need “part of their culture represented” and how it can
contribute to music students enjoying their time in music class, recruiting other students who may not
be in music, and receiving personal recognition for her choices in doing things “relevant to 12-yearolds.” She chose to make a colorblind connection to age rather than race, which led me to probe further
by asking the question “What if a student does buy into it?” in which I intended “it” refer to a
“Whitewashed” music curriculum to elicit her justification of that idea. Her response to that question
brought up a view that slightly differed from her responses to the previous two probing questions. In a
way, her response now defended why sometimes music from the canon can be justified in the
curriculum if it “is good music.” Almost immediately after saying this she posed a question back of,
“what the heck does that mean?” which gave me insight into how she was questioning an assumption
about music selection and what constitutes “good music?”
After those initial three probing questions, I presented a scenario, followed by an additional
probing question that served as an assistance question, or one that helps produce thinking that the
learner may not have produced on their own (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988). This scenario, which was
derived from an experience with my own positionality, was intended to serve as a precursor into how
the outcomes of deculturalization can be unintentionally reproduced by us as educators, which was the
topic I had planned for this critical discourse. I followed that scenario with an assisting, probing question
that adapted to current and new knowledge as I now had a better understanding of her current
perspective. I said:
So if an orchestra student, or a choir student, comes into a program, and all we’re doing is the
like Western canon type of music, and they are inspired by that and then go on to seek a music
major as a career, seek to in the future possibly go into teaching: what’s the outcome of them,

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valuing or accepting that Western Canon music, and only having that experience, or that
exposure, in their education?
She then shared her views about classical music, as a listener and a teacher, and one experience
she had with exposing students to a different style of music. In that response she continued using the
word “exposure” as something that she believed is necessary in the music classroom. Using the probing
question “And if students don’t get exposed?” elicited a connection between what she said and the
concept of deculturalization. She didn’t mention deculturalization right away, but she did recognize that
there may be issues with non-exposure and that it perpetuates something. Lastly, I probed that
response one more time which then prompted the response “deculturalization.”
By using probing questions, critical discourse was encouraged with my participant in a way
where her own responses elicited previous knowledge while making connections to new content (Sahin
& Kulm, 2008), in this instance the concept of deculturalization. Using her responses was essential for
probing as it cultivated her ability to elaborate and push her thinking while providing me with accurate
information prior to making an assumption about her meaning-making during our critical discourse. For
example, probing her initial response, I contend, allowed me to push my participant’s development of
critical consciousness by bringing the focus back into thinking about a “Whitewashed” music education
by using her initially colorblind responses to promote critical discourse. Providing an assistance question
allowed her to expand on her perspective as it related to the implications that colorblind choices bring
to the music classroom, and ultimately led to her establishing how deculturalization is perpetuated as a
result. Thus, probing questions within my facilitation of critical discourse promoted deeper exploration
of concepts for my participant and served as a model for her thinking and questioning of assumptions.
Throughout my data analysis I found 59 instances where probing questions initiated or
contributed towards 24 counts of critical discourse throughout my action research. While some of those
probing questions helped elicit or contributed towards critical discourse, this was not always the case. In

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11 of these instances my use of probing questions served to expand my knowledge about her thinking,
emotions, or feelings prior to starting a session as part of a pre-session check-in, a move that
contributed to the building of a strong holding environment (Heifetz et al., 2009). These questions were
as follows: “Could you share a joyous moment from this week, if any?” or, “Could you describe your
favorite type of ‘x’?” Here I was still probing for information based on my participant’s own perspective,
however, these questions were not intended to encourage critical discourse and served more as
contributors to our holding environment. These questions allowed my participant to continue justifying
her beliefs using her own words, while providing me information on what her perspective is like, or
allowing me to engage in solidarity (Hill, 2021).
Modeling as a Facilitator
My facilitation of critical discourse also included modeling (Loughran & Berry, 2005; Tharp &
Gallimore, 1988), which Mezirow (2000) argued can influence the way a learner makes meaning, as a
form of assistance for my participant. Modeling, or offering behavior for imitation, serves as a primary
method of initiating new behaviors (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) in children and adults alike. As music
teachers, modeling is at the core of our music pedagogy and is something that both my participant and I
engaged with daily in our classrooms. Loughran and Berry (2005) argued that the act of modeling itself
should be explicit where the model is describing what they are doing, and why, to build the learner’s
phronesis (practical wisdom to tackle a problem that does not necessarily have solutions based in
theoretical research). In this way, modeling involves a concentrated decision on the part of the model to
describe what they are modeling (or not) to the learner.
However, Tharp and Gallimore (1988) spoke to those modeling moves that are imitated without
explicitly stating the move. They described the ways in which young learners absorb and process
information, such as language use, from more mature members of their environment. Similar to ways in
which adults may imitate the latest viral trend to increase their social media rankings, or the use of

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modern, generational slang words as part of our daily vernacular, these imitated acts are not always
explicitly stated as being “models” from the person offering the behavior for imitation. With this in
mind, I was cautious in counting the instances where both types of modeling descriptors were present in
my data analysis.
I contend that my use of modeling allowed me to promote the development of my participant’s
critical consciousness by naming the explicit, and non-explicit, ways in which I attempted to view
alternate perspectives, question assumptions, and think through instructional practices as part of the
facilitation of critical discourse. For example, while implementing planned actions that included learning
verbose definitions for new theoretical content, I would model scenarios where my participant could see
how that new keyword, or definition, applied to my own thinking. The following section will be a series
of moments from our critical discourse in which I contend I offered modeling behaviors that contributed
towards my participant’s development of critical consciousness.
Defining Critical Reflection. In this first example, from Cycle 1, Session 2, we discussed what
different levels of reflection might look like in terms of reflecting on our instructional choices. In this
excerpt, I modeled my own thinking, and questions I would ask to induce a critical reflection while
incorporating an example more closely related to an earlier scenario my participant shared:
J: So, in [critical] reflection, what I’m thinking about is, let’s say I taught a lesson on how to
teach that whole note, and I chose to pull in a go-to folk song that students just have no
connection to, they don’t know, they’ve never heard it. I’m trying to not only teach
them the folk song, I’m trying to get them to get familiar with it. I’m talking about these
music notes, but I’ve not stopped to kind of pause and consider what would be
something that they could have related to that was better? Am I being conscious about
the identities in the room, and pulling information in that’s relevant to those identities?
Or to use your example from earlier, when I asked you to voice memo when you had

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that observation experience, like in that situation, you would take the emotional part,
but then question like, “why am I having that specific emotion about this XYZ thing?”
Like what, how, is my position as a White, middle class, woman who has acknowledged
that you know, there’s privilege. How am I coming to this from my worldview?
I explicitly stated, “what I’m thinking about,” as I began modeling what I may question if I
wanted to engage with a critical reflection on my instructional choices. I then followed up with an
example she shared earlier in the discourse to make a tighter connection to the act of questioning and a
scenario relevant to her. Immediately after my last sentence my participant jumped in and said:
P: But, at the same time, like, as I’m reading [the definition] I can see, “oh, yeah, these are
some of the things that music teachers have started talking about, using folk songs.”
Choosing your repertoire based on culture, or composer, and like actually thinking
about those and not just doing it because like, “that’s what someone taught me when I
was 10.”
This response demonstrated that she heard my example, re-read the definition, made a
connection to previous knowledge, and formed a new conjecture. When she said, “But, at the same
time,” it indicated to me that she may have been trying to push back on the topic of the conversation or
make a justification on something she has already thought about. While she did not explicitly state that
my model triggered her thinking, she made the comment of “not just doing it because like, ‘that’s what
someone taught me when I was 10,’” which aligns as a response to my last question of “How am I
coming to this from my worldview?” demonstrating that her meaning-making was being influenced to
an extent by this discourse, and my modeled question. Framing a connection to her positionality by
saying, “Like what, how, is my position as a White, middle class, woman” was purposefully modeled to
influence her thinking in future sessions, as will be demonstrated in later examples, because it is tied to
building an understanding of her “worldview.”

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Abrahams (2007) argued that developing a critical consciousness involves dimensions of coconstructing knowledge and opposing the banking models of learning. To promote this development,
modeling techniques were used that aligned with critical pedagogy and leveraged the shared
experiences in our holding environment (Heifetz et al., 2009). This included highlighting moments such
as questioning my own assumptions about the perspectives of my participant. This second example is
drawn from Cycle 1, Session 3 where I modeled my own written critical reflection. This was an
intentional planned action as part of my facilitation of critical discourse on the act of critical reflection.
In this critical reflection, I named the vulnerability I felt from an interaction I had with my participant
where something she shared about her identity caused a disorienting dilemma for me. This dilemma
prompted me to question my assumptions about her, and dig into assumptions that prevented me from
attending to the needs of my learner:
J: So I’m going to kind of share a critical reflection with you, and kind of give you an
example of what that disorienting dilemma was. I just want to kind of put this forward
out there in our brave space that the critical reflection is based off our interaction from
Week 1. And me going back to data analysis, and reading through how I was responding
to certain things, and just kind of catching myself on not engaging with something. So I
don’t want you to think that it’s a critical reflection on, like you, it’s a critical reflection
on me, and how I kind of failed to do something, in my opinion.
So, I printed it out for you. And obviously, it’s a little lengthy so I can read it if you’d like,
or if you’re just like, “can I just take five minutes and read it to myself?” Whatever works
for you. What would you like?
P: Yeah, I can read it to myself.
J: Okay. I’ll read it to myself too.
[We each spend a few minutes reading my printed critical reflection here. In silence.]

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P: Is there anything that you, do you still agree with what you wrote, when you wrote
that?
J: There’s parts of it that I feel like I still would love to dive into a little bit more as well. But
before I do that, just kind of want to ask you, like, what are your first thoughts on like,
what, this example kind of sounds like to you? Or, looks like, to you?
P: Yeah, I definitely think, I was wondering if you would say anything about it [participant’s
comment from Cycle 1, Week 1 that triggered my disorienting dilemma4
] when I shared
that. And you didn’t, and I don’t know if that was time based or if you know, what, what
your plan was. But, but yeah, I can see how that, you know, fits into, you know, is that
little bit of a disorienting dilemma. You’re like, “Okay, wow, in this moment, how do I
deal with that? Do I deal with that? Do I file it away for later? And then, and then to
think about it? You know, why? Why did I make the choice that I did?”
Brookfield (2017) described the power of modeling critical reflection in action by showing how
one engages themselves in the process. My initial response points to sharing a critical reflection with her
in our “brave space” to provide an example of a “disorienting dilemma.” Rather than just giving it to her
and making her read it, I prefaced what my critical reflection was about and how it related to what we
were learning about in our sessions. I then offered two methods of engaging with the document having
me read it, or having her read it herself followed by the question “What would you like?” In line with the
conceptual framework of my study, breaking down hierarchical structures of hegemony is part of
engaging with critical pedagogy and developing a critical consciousness (Abrahams, 2017; Douglas &
Nganga, 2013; Hess, 2017; Milner, 2003). This intentional move of sharing power in the space was
important to strengthening the holding environment as the content of my critical reflection could have
4 Comment has been redacted to preserve participant’s personal information regarding identity.

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made her uncomfortable if she was forced to read it out loud. Although I did not explicitly state it, the
way in which I provided options and deferred to my participant’s choice was my way of promoting a coconstructive environment where we both (student and teacher) could make decisions about our
learning—a tenet of critical pedagogy. Continuing to interact with my participant in this way allowed me
to practice leading our sessions with the same critical pedagogy moves that we were learning about.
After reading my critical reflection, she broke the silence by asking, “Is there anything that you,
do you still agree with what you wrote, when you wrote that?” Learning about my perspective sparked a
curiosity which led her to initiate discourse by probing me about what I wrote. I contend that her
probing question is connected to how I modeled the types of questions one would ask if they were going
to engage with critical reflection in the earlier example from Cycle 1, Session 2. By asking me a probing
question, she attempted to enter my “worldview” prior to making an explicit assumption or possibly
responding defensively about what was written in my critical reflection.
My response redirected the discourse by posing the probing question “What are your first
thoughts on like, what, this example kind of sounds like to you? Or, looks like, to you?” By anticipating
the potential presence of emotional or cognitive distress in my participant, redirecting evoked the
adaptive leadership move of regulating distress for my participant by providing direction (Heifetz et al.,
2009) into discourse that connected how questioning disorienting dilemmas inform our ability to engage
with critical reflection, which was the intended modeling move in this instance. However, directing the
conversation away from any potential emotional or cognitive distress created a missed opportunity by
not allowing emotions to enter our discourse as part of “turning up the heat” in the holding
environment. By recognizing the presence of potential emotional distress, our discourse could have had
the opportunity to move into a brave space by building trust and positioning ourselves to take
ownership over what was said in the moment.

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My participant first named her assumptions on my lack of response to the comment that
prompted my disorienting dilemma by saying, “I was wondering if you would say anything about
[participants comment] when I shared that. And you didn’t, and I don’t know if that was time based or if
you know, what, what your plan was.” She then provided hypothetical questions she thought I might ask
to move from the disorientation to a critical reflection when she said, “How do I deal with that? Do I
deal with that? Do I file it away for later? … You know, why? Why did I make the choice that I did?”
These questions, as part of her response, confirmed that she did make an assumption about my lack of
response and was hoping that I would share information to inform her perspective; which strengthens
the argument that she was imitating my behavior of questioning our “worldview” and “why am I having
that specific emotion?” prior to making a judgment as I modeled in Cycle 1, Session 2. Aside from
making connections between questioning disorienting dilemmas and critical reflection, my participant’s
response demonstrated she was ready to discuss my vulnerability, which led me to believe she felt
comfortable engaging in critical discourse with me, thus, promoting, and reinforcing my intention to
model the act of critically questioning our assumptions and promote critical discourse.
I initially modeled my critical reflection in this session because I asked my participant to prepare
and think about a moment where her positionality as a music teacher was questioned. From there I
wanted to see if we could identify a disorienting dilemma that would elicit her own critical reflection at
the next session. I contend that modeling my own critical reflection prior to asking her to publicly share
her own experience promoted the learning conditions necessary to model the questioning of
assumptions, bring vulnerability into the holding environment, and make connections to her own
disorienting dilemma. Later in the same session, Cycle 1, Session 3, she shared the details of an
experience where she felt her positionality was questioned, and the following discourse took place:
P: But, then along those same lines, because I had that bad experience, or that, that
disagreement there. I haven’t taken, I won’t, I don’t want to put my students in that

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setting where they would be exposed to that kind of critical feedback. [Hesitation in her
answer here. More of a realization hesitation versus a hesitant to continue answering
hesitation] That, that’s hard because now I’m filtering it for them, right? [laughs]
J: That’s what I would say is disorienting.
P: Like I’m filtering it for my students because I don’t want them to have that negative
reaction that I had.
J: And that, that’s what would drive my critical reflection because then I would ask, “What
happened during that interaction? How’s it affected me? And you know what, now that
I reflect on it as a result, it turns out that my students are not having those experiences,
and not being exposed to critical feedback, because of something that happened to me,
15 years ago, because of this one White guy?”
P: Yeah. And then I even had a mini conversation on Monday with a colleague, you know,
saying that I was like, “This is why I don’t take my kids to this thing.” And she’s like,
“Well, I do because I want them to. But, I just, like, I want them to have that
experience.” I’m like, “even though with only 10 kids in your ensemble, you know that
you’re gonna get that kind of feedback from these old White guys. So you would put
your students in that situation where there’s no possible way you could get a superior
rating, simply based on your instrumentation?” Because that’s one of the criteria. “You
would do that to your kids?” Like, I wouldn’t, because of this, but she would. So there
you go. That’s, that’s an interesting thing. Yeah. Do I need to reexamine myself?
J: And another tension there, right? Because yeah, like you’ve just said, it’s like, you have a
colleague that’s willing to put herself out there. Maybe she hasn’t had that experience.
And so now, now, you can have two examples where two people are trying to do the
same or trying to think about the same event, one person experiences things way

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differently than this other person. And so how did you react as a result of your
experience and how she reacted after her continuous experiences? And so then what
does that do now? Thinking about students, what does that do to the students right? To
her, how have her students benefited from those experiences and how have your
students possibly missed out on something, or missed out on just seeing other groups
perform? As a result of,
P: Yeah, my bad experience of it, not even a bad experience, my ONE experience like it was
what it was, and you know, it didn’t hurt me in any way. But I was, I was upset about it.
In this instance my participant engaged in discourse with me about a negative experience. When
she stated, “I don’t want to put my students in that setting where they would be exposed to that kind of
critical feedback,” she entered a vulnerable state that was subject to criticism as feedback on student
performance is a crucial part of our music education philosophies. She further shared vulnerability when
she said, “That, that’s hard because now I’m filtering it for them, right?” acknowledging with hesitation
that she knew her choice of not putting students in a setting where they could receive performance
feedback was causing a filtered musical experience for her students. When she explained this, she
entered a vulnerable space as I did earlier when I shared my critical reflection. Imitating this behavior
demonstrated that she felt comfortable in the holding environment to enter a vulnerable state where
we could critically engage with each other and question how our own positionalities affected our
current practices.
Earlier, in Cycle 1, Session 2, I modeled the starter questions (“How am I coming to this from my
worldview?” and “Why am I having that specific emotion about this XYZ thing?”) when introducing what
it means to critically reflect. Then, in response to my avoidance of the comment she shared that
triggered my own disorienting dilemma and prevented me from attending to her needs as a learner I
modeled my own critical reflection by saying it came from recognizing “how I kind of failed to do

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something, in my opinion.” Therefore, when she named how her actions mimic an unresponsiveness to
the needs of others because she is “filtering [learning experiences] for [students], right?” based on her
own “bad experience,” it showed she was imitating my behavior of questioning how her worldview
influenced her choices, highlighting this disorienting dilemma as a starting point that could move her
towards critical reflection.
I continued to guide her by stating that her “filtering” of student experiences could potentially
be a “disorienting dilemma” for her. As demonstrated, in the remainder of the transcript, I posed some
potential questions she could ask herself to move towards critical reflection. She went on to explain how
she had conversed with someone else about this experience and how their alternate perspective added
to her dilemma by asking, “‘You would do that to your kids?’ Like, I wouldn’t, because of this, but she
would. So there you go. That’s, that’s an interesting thing.” Ultimately, this interaction made her
recognize how her assumptions about this experience created a disorienting dilemma that should be
questioned further when she said, “Do I need to reexamine myself?” By questioning herself, she was
calling back to the way in which I stated earlier that my own critical reflection was based on “reading
through how I was responding to certain things, and just kind of catching myself on not engaging with
something,” which shows that she picked up on the language of questioning choice(s) and was now
imitating the behavior by asking if she needed to “reexamine” herself.
My participant’s willingness to enter a vulnerable space that was subject to criticism and
questioning showed that my modeling of critical reflection promoted our ability to engage in critical
discourse about disorienting dilemmas as we both shared vulnerable information about our
perspectives. After this interaction, in Cycle 2, Session 1, my participant did reexamine this experience
through an attempt at written critical reflection where she dove deeper into her disorienting dilemma
and allowed me to probe her reflection further through critical discourse in our session. Later, I will
discuss how modeling my own critical reflection, and vulnerability, allowed me to promote critical

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discourse while making connections between her own positionality and the effect it had on her
instructional practices.
Questioning Assumptions in Critical Discourse. I contend that the following two examples show
my participant’s development in questioning our “worldview” when interrogating her own assumptions
and choices as influenced by my modeling in Cycle 1, Session 2. In Cycle 2, Session 3, while discussing
the relationship between positionality and our instructional choices, my participant demonstrated
development in her ability to question her assumptions when discussing how our instructional choices
have an effect on student experiences:
J: How could considering our own positionality help in resisting the idea of
deculturalization in what we do in the classroom?
P: Yeah, no, I think it’s that constant reminder. Like, the constant questioning of myself as I
pulled music out, as I, you know, think of options like, “Okay, am I doing this because it’s
what these students need, or am I doing this because it’s what I’m comfortable doing?”
She explained that when she pulls music selections to pass out to students, as part of instruction,
resisting deculturalization reminds her to consider her positionality as she makes these choices. She
modeled how she would question her own assumption of choosing certain music by asking, “Am I doing
this because it’s what these students need, or am I doing this because it’s what I’m comfortable doing?”
Questioning what “students need” versus what is “comfortable” demonstrated a reference back to her
“worldview” when questioning herself, which is how I initially introduced and modeled the idea of
engaging in critical reflection when I posed and modeled the question “how, is my position as a White,
middle class, woman … How am I coming to this from my worldview?” This imitated behavior showed a
development in her critical questioning of her instructional choices which is aligned with moving
towards developing a critical consciousness. However, her response did not necessarily enter a critical
space where cultural competency was being considered in asking “what these students need.” There

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was no clarification on what she meant by “need,” which established a missed opportunity on my part
as a facilitator since I did not probe her statement further. Probing her use of “need” could have elicited
discourse where we question the process used by us as teacher to determine what students “need” in
our classrooms.
My participant showed growth in questioning her assumptions while discussing shared
experiences. In this example, from Cycle 3, Session 1, we were de-briefing a shared interaction we had
with other music teachers in our district outside of our holding environment. In a hypothetical scenario,
she modeled her questioning of assumptions when considering the positionalities of other adult music
educators while trying to promote the need for systemic change within our primary and secondary
music curriculum:
J: By having everybody share their story, and then by you trying to see if you can match up
how their stories match up to their teaching, what would you say that would be giving
you information on, an example of?
P: Their, everyone’s positionality. The way we are a product of our life experiences.
J: How would that information help you equate to causing a change within those adults?
P: I feel like we, if we could understand where we’re coming from a little bit better. Maybe
it breaks down some of those barriers that we’ve put up of, “You’re wrong to do it this
way.” If we can see like, “Oh, you’ve just never had experience in orchestra. So why
would I expect you to understand how that would work?” I just feel like there’s,
everyone has that little spark for that reason. Why they do the things, but we’re not
sharing it. We’re just like, “This is the way I do it.” But, we’re not talking about why we
do it.
In this example, my participant shared how there is a connection between positionality and the
instructional choices we make in our classrooms. I contend that my modeled questions from Cycle 1,

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Session 2 and Session 3, discussed earlier, allowed her to build a cognitive structure, or a provision for
thinking and acting (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988), around the types of questions one would ask in
questioning assumptions. She initially presented the idea of hypothetically wanting to engage the other
music teachers in discourse about their positionality by having them “share their story” and seeing if she
could match the story to their teaching styles. I probed her by asking, “What would you say that would
be giving you information on?” to which she responded, “everyone’s positionality.” I probed her again
by asking, “how would that information help you equate to causing a change within those adults?” She
then described how understanding where other adults are coming from (their positionality) would help
us break down the barrier that currently exists of saying “you’re wrong to do it this way” (an assumption
made by us). Her reasoning demonstrated that she remained consistent with my modeled idea of
questioning our own “worldview” and identifying how positionality plays a part when questioning our
assumptions about ourselves and the actions of others. When she expressed trying to enter the
worldview of others (solidarity) to understand how it affects her own judgment it shows she was
imitating my modeled behavior of considering positionality when questioning our perspectives.
My participant asserted that understanding the experiences that have shaped those music
teachers could be leveraged to question our own assumptions, which inclined her to question “why
would I expect you to understand how that [playing in an orchestra] would work?” She concluded by
reiterating that as teachers we are prone to state “this is the way I do it [teach]. But, we’re not talking
about why we do it,” which aligns with one of the purposes of engaging in critical reflection and
developing a critical consciousness—questioning assumptions about our “worldview” and constantly
asking “why?” on the choice(s) we make.
Explicit Versus Non-explicit Modeling. In some of the previous examples, I modeled without
explicitly saying to my learner that I was modeling for her. Throughout my action research there were 14
instances when I explicitly named what I was modeling versus 37 instances when modeling was not

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explicitly stated for my participant. This next example, from Cycle 3, Session 3, is one where I modeled
explicitly as we discussed choosing repertoire for a December concert and ways in which we could
question our own assumptions when making music selections:
J: But how might you change that process for next year? Given what we know now, where
even though you’re presenting them a piece that you, you know, and love, and it’s
something that you’re comfortable with. What would be an alternative option?
P: Yeah, I think, you know, like I said about having a conversation with choir like, “What are
their traditions?” I could have that conversation much earlier with them. You know,
“what movies do you watch?” I mean, that’s another part of Christmas for me, is like
watching certain movies, like we must watch these in December. Period, end of
sentence. Like it’s not Christmas unless we watch this. But, a lot of people don’t have
that tradition because again, streaming services and such. But, a lot of music that kids
are exposed to does come from movies. And so, you know, just finding, finding what it is
earlier so that I can present to them some curated choices that are musically
appropriate, like level appropriate, and then, like, just guiding that conversation a little
bit more rather than a free for all.
J: Just to kind of, like, this is not me judging, or anything. I’m just trying to model the
questions I would ask myself if I had done that. Obviously, you have to step out, look at
what the process was. But even just asking, like, “Okay, why?” We’ve talked about,
“Why did I default to a piece that I already know? Is it because I’m teaching it, because
it’s easy for me to teach? Or is it because I just didn’t choose something and I need
something quick?” And that’s okay. That happens right? But, the idea of critically
stepping back and thinking, “I’ve again defaulted to something that is just this versus
trying something different,” or being in that uncomfortable state of, “Let me learn how

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to teach something that I may not be so comfortable in.” Just, just to kind of promote
that idea of, “We don’t just do what we do every time.” And we’ve talked about, “we
change every year,” so yeah. I’m just modeling what I would ask. Not saying like, you
made a bad decision by choosing that song.
In her initial response, following my probing question of, “What would be an alternate option?”
my participant explained what it would look like if she had a conversation with students about their
backgrounds to inform her own music selection process. She presented her justification for hypothetical
conversations where students inform her practice and how that information could be leveraged to
curate music selected, which as discussed earlier enabled a co-constructive environment that promoted
critical pedagogy. I explicitly stated that I am trying “to model the questions I would ask myself if I had
done that” where “that” referred to her idea of having a conversation with students before I proceeded
to model questions I would have asked to induce critical self-reflection on my intentions and
instructional choices.
After a brief side comment following this exchange, my participant circled back by saying:
P: Yeah, yeah. But, I mean, the conversation could be even wider. You know, it’s like, “Yes,
traditionally, we have a concert in December. It doesn’t have to be Christmas.” We’ve
had that conversation. It could just be, “what does winter feel like to you?” Right?
Because I’ve also done pieces like the “Abominable Snowman Chase,” and I have a
couple others that didn’t fit this year, but the you know, they’re, they’re like, you know,
“In the Still of the Night,” or something and just like wintry type pieces and, and seeing
what else might resonate with the kids.
With this response, she contributed to the critical discourse by expanding on her thought from
earlier, by stating, “the conversation could be even wider.” This comment indicated that she was
pushing our discourse further after my modeled questions. By saying, “We have a concert in December.

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It doesn’t have to be Christmas,” she demonstrated how she stepped back to think about what a concert
in December could be versus thinking about the various choices she could make while conforming to a
Christmas concert, a hegemonic act. The comment of “it doesn’t have to be Christmas” showed that she
was willing to take on an alternative perspective from what is usually done and was considering how not
all students may resonate with Christmas as a major part of their life despite it being a majoritarian
holiday entrenched in December music concerts. Following this thought, my participant then modeled
her own question by saying, “What does winter feel like to you?” With this question she noted what she
might ask students to learn more about their “worldview” on winter to shift the focus from Christmas to
a season—something we can collectively experience.
As a facilitator, my verbalized train of thought was offered as an action for imitation for my
participant’s own development of critical consciousness, the practice I was trying to cultivate. Her
contribution following that model demonstrated that she was ready to engage in critical discourse about
shifting a concert that is traditionally dominated by Christmas to a theme that disrupts this hegemonic
act and might relate to more of her students. She was able to model her own question and justification
for other alternatives that could “resonate” with students. Her questioning demonstrated an alignment
to breaking down hegemonic practices, resisting deculturalization, and developing critical
consciousness.
Ultimately, through each session, I could only hypothesize that the modeling behaviors I offered
were working as I intended, especially because I wasn’t always explicitly naming them as acts of
modeling. However, as my study and our critical discourse developed with each session, I could see my
participant begin to ask questions about her assumptions in ways that aligned with a developing critical
consciousness and that of a critical self-reflector, behaviors I had modeled in earlier sessions. In our final
meeting, Cycle 3, Session 3, my participant and I had the following exchange:

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P: But building that, those sentence frames, right? Those little, that vocabulary of, “How
can I respond to things like that in a non-threatening way?” Which you’ve done great in
our conversations, but like building that library of, “Okay, the next time that happens, I
could respond this way.” And have that kind of pre-thought out in your head, “If
someone says something like this, I can respond like this.”
J: Yeah. You say I’ve done that great in our conversations, could you give me an example?
[we laugh]
P: I don’t know if I can give you word for word examples, but, like I definitely have picked
up on the ways you asked me questions. And taken that to the other adults that I’m
working with. It’s just like in the observations that I did last week, and I focused less on
writing down what was happening, and more on questions that I wanted to ask them.
J: Interesting.
P: And specifically praising them in, so that it wouldn’t seem, so, wouldn’t seem like I was
criticizing them. Like, “Really, I want to know, what’s your rationale here like, or have
you thought about doing this other thing, like no judgment, I just want to know, is this a
thing you’ve thought about?” And really phrasing that in a way that would seem nonthreatening to make them think.
Here my participant described her awareness of the types of questions I had asked her
throughout our critical discourse. She first highlighted that she recognized the importance of asking
questions in a “non-threatening way,” and called attention to the way she had observed me engage in
that behavior by saying, “Which you’ve done great in our conversations.” To keep in line with my actions
as a facilitator of critical discourse, I probed her response further by asking, “You say I’ve done that great
in our conversations, could you give me an example?” She responded that she had “picked up on the
ways [I] had asked [her] questions,” highlighting that my non-explicit use of modeling had served to

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influence her behaviors with “other adults” she had worked with. She explained the purpose of this nonthreatening questioning was to further probe their beliefs and perspectives. She said she does this to
praise responses from other adults so that it “wouldn’t seem like [she] was criticizing them,” as she
pushed them to think further. When repeating things she said to her colleagues such as “I want to know
… like no judgment,” she used some of the words I had used in my interactions with her earlier, thus
demonstrating an imitation of my behavior. For example, in an earlier session I had said to her “this is
not me judging, or anything. I’m just trying to model the questions I would ask myself if I had done that.
… Not saying like, you made a bad decision by choosing that song.” By using the word judgment and
saying that she was asking questions, not criticizing, my participant imitated my modeled behavior.
Loughran and Berry (2005) discussed that learners need to see into all practice and not just the
“good things we do” (p. 200). There were moments throughout my study where I named mistakes or did
not use a critical lens in my justification of ideas and instructional choices. Doing so allows our learners,
and us as models, to challenge phronesis and question the practicality of our moves as we enact them.
While I offered my participant 51 instances of modeling, I contend that about 7 counts were not
intentionally observed and imitated by my participant. These unsuccessful moments were either
followed by a one-word response such as “yeah” from my participant, or moments where the discourse
came to a halt and had to be shifted. However, I argue that the presence of modeling behaviors
throughout my study, whether explicit or not, allowed my participant the opportunity to conceptualize,
through promoting phronesis, the many theories and concepts that were part of my planned actions.
While every modeling move may not have been absorbed, her commentary on my use of questioning
highlighted a major andragogical move in my study. As discussed earlier, my use of probing questions
was essential to the facilitation of critical discourse. Hearing my participant praise this move specifically
by saying she “picked up” on how I asked her questions, and then transferred that knowledge to
another space with other colleagues brings attention to Loughran and Berry’s (2005) argument for

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modeling where they say it “is about us ‘doing’ in our practice that which we expect our students to do
in their teaching” (p. 194).
Exploring Positionality to Inform Perspectives
Positionality, or how one is situated between the intersection of power and other social factors
such as race and gender (Douglas & Nganga, 2013), was a central topic within our critical discourse.
Exploring our positionality through critical discourse allowed us to question our instructional choices
through understanding how experiences with music, and teaching, have been formed through our
different positionalities. Having discourse around positionality, and how it influenced our choices,
beliefs, and values, then exemplified the idea of “praxis” versus “solidarity” (Hill, 2021) as discussed
earlier to consider alternative perspectives in our actions and how they can affect others.
By tying positionality into our discourse, a total of 59 counts throughout this study, I contend
that I fostered a learning environment where we examined our positionalities in the service of
questioning assumptions to help us explore our current practice and discuss hypothetical future actions
that aligned with critical pedagogy as defined in my conceptual framework. In doing so, I supported my
learner in developing her critical consciousness by leveraging our positionality throughout our discourse
to question assumptions about ourselves, our students, and each other. This move allowed us to step
back and consider how the world is seen, and experienced, through someone else’s perspective
(solidarity), and how we affect change, or maintain the status quo, in that world (praxis). The following
will be a series of examples where positionality was explored throughout our critical discourse.
In Cycle 1, Session 1 we initiated the idea of exploring our positionality by engaging in the “I Am
From…” activity (Brookfield, 2019). After sharing and discussing some of our responses, I probed by
asking:
J: How are we conditioned to describe and determine who we are? How have we been
told to describe “this is your identity,” and is it just black and white?

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P: Right. And that comes so much from culture and family also, you know. I, my parents,
my parents were like, no demands on me, everything I put on myself, right? And they
also don’t talk about anything ever. [laughs] So, I feel like my, my construct of myself is
very internalized, and I haven’t had people putting pressure on me to be one way or
another. But, a lot of people do get that from, from families. I know you felt it from your
family. And you know, [Husband] talks about it coming from a very different socioeconomic level than I do. And what, that, what that does to you growing up.
Her response indicated an acknowledgement that parts of our identity are influenced by
external factors such as “culture and family,” but also the internalized pressures that we put onto
ourselves to be a certain way. She also made a connection between her husband coming from a
different socio-economic background than she does, and how she understood the way it shapes
experiences for someone as they are growing up. Internalized pressure and socio-economic differences
were two topics that were present in our critical discourse as we questioned assumptions about our
own, and others’, positionality. During in-the-field analysis, after Cycle 1 and prior to Cycle 2, the idea of
internalized pressure was something that kept recurring in our discourse.
My study aimed at using critical pedagogy as new content, building on previous knowledge, and
questioning our current instructional practices as part of our critical discourse to develop our critical
consciousness. Therefore, in Cycle 2, Session 1, internalized pressures were challenged when discussing
the outcomes of taking, and not taking, students to annual choral festivals. Typically, at these festivals,
students perform and are adjudicated, or critiqued, by a judge in several categories. Then, depending on
the number of points, the ensemble receives a ranking ranging from “superior” at the top to “fair” at the
bottom. I probed her perspective by asking:
J: What’s wrong with taking the feedback and getting the rating?

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P: Right, exactly. Yeah, nothing. we could you know, I’m just I’m trying to protect
[students] and like still as I like, I wrote [a critical reflection], and I’m saying it I’m like,
“No, I still don’t, I don’t want to put them in a place where they would get,” and so I
guess that’s like, like, kind of, “God, am I good enough? Can I help them be good enough
to get that excellent or superior?” Right? I wouldn’t want to take them and have them
get a “good” because I know it says “good,” but what that means is that’s a C that’s a
“Yeah, you just showed up” like if you’re getting a “fair,” you shouldn’t have come. But
that was also a conversation that I was having with [another music teacher], who’s like,
“oh, whatever, let them get a ‘good’ it’s fine.” Like, I think that, but I think that would
hurt my students, maybe it wouldn’t. Maybe, they would tell me that would be okay, so
that’s just a conversation I haven’t had with them.
J: What’s the pressure to get an “excellent” or “superior?” Like, where’s that coming
from?
P: Internally, because when I went as a student [orchestra student], if we didn’t get a
“superior” we were rating ourselves and we were so disappointed. I don’t, like, I think
yeah, like you go to festival to get a “superior.” You go to festival wanting a “Unanimous
superior” [one where both judges grant a “superior” rating].
J: So now you have this internalized feeling
P: [Interrupting] YES! A+ or nothing. Me, based on me.
J: Which, we would call that?
P: [Hesitantly] Yes, there we go, positionality. The thing that I grew up doing, and like
you’d be the best, or you don’t show up. If you’re gonna show up you would be the
best.

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J: I think it’s important. Like, right now you just, not admitted, but, like went into the part
where you’re saying it was because of your experience growing up as an orchestra kid
that you were told that, right? That positionality piece and how that plays into your
choices in the classroom. I don’t think, I don’t think you’re trying to protect them. Just to
push back a little bit. I think you’re trying to protect you. But, from what, from who?
P: Yes, exactly because my principal doesn’t know what festival is. There’s nobody asking
me to do it.
This interaction was pivotal as it came while engaging in discourse about a critical reflection she
wrote naming an experience she had as a young teacher taking a student ensemble to a festival. Her
responses showed how her experiences as an orchestra student, and now music teacher, contributed to
her perspective on festivals and the questions and assumptions present in her disorienting dilemma
(Mezirow, 1991). She initially mentioned that she was trying to “protect students” from having the
experience of receiving a low rating, but she also connected it to asking, “God, am I good enough? Can I
help them be good enough to get that excellent or superior?” That connection highlighted that while
she may have been filtering student experiences based on wanting to protect them there was also some
likelihood that she was trying to protect herself. My assumption on this perspective grew when she said,
“I know it says ‘Good,’ but what that means is that’s a C.” This assumption was confirmed by her
response to the question, “What’s the pressure to get an ‘excellent’ or ‘superior?’ Like, where’s that
coming from?” Where she immediately responded with “Internally,” and described how her own
experience as a student influenced this perception.
Making the comment, “So now you have this internalized feeling,” to which she responded,
“YES! A+ or nothing. Me, based on me,” allowed me to follow up with a guiding question, or a kind of
question that leads learners to think the way the teacher wants them to think (Sahin & Kulm, 2008) led
her to make a connection to positionality while reiterating the reasoning behind her belief. When she

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said, “Yes, there we go, positionality,” it showed her acknowledgement of how her own positionality,
which is partially shaped by her music education experiences, is illuminated in her disorienting dilemma
(Mezirow, 1991) because she could now identify how these internalized feelings played into her
instructional practices and affected student opportunities.
Saying, “That positionality piece and how that plays into your choices in the classroom,” helped
model and frame my thinking prior to questioning my assumption of her dilemma. Stating, “I don’t think
you’re trying to protect them [students]. Just to push back a little bit. I think you’re trying to protect you.
But, from what, from who?” probed her perspective further. Naming how I thought she was trying to
protect herself rather than her students signaled a move towards entering a brave space (Arao &
Clemens, 2013) by naming my assumption, however, provided the probing question “from what, from
who?” opened an opportunity for her to engage me back on that assumption.
Employing probing and guiding questioning techniques helped me facilitate critical discourse
where I could leverage an experience to make a connection between positionality and our instructional
choices. Helping my learner make this connection allowed us to continue fleshing out how positionality
influences us, consciously and unconsciously, as we discussed her critical reflection in this session.
Although we are not specifically addressing race, gender, or socio-economic status in this instance, in
line with the concept of “praxis,” having an awareness of our own positionality, and the experiences
that shaped us growing up, allowed me to question why she made choices in her work as a music
teacher. Building this understanding first then allowed us to work towards establishing “solidarity” using
a critical lens as our sessions continued.
This final example from Cycle 3, Session 3, demonstrated my learner’s growth in understanding
how positionality plays a role in our work and towards establishing solidarity with others:

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P: I am again, so thankful that I teach music. I don’t know if I could teach any other subject
where I didn’t have the freedom to do this, to have those conversations with the kids
and to adjust based on the realities of our time.
J: Yeah. And it’s, it’s true we are kind of spoiled in that way. [we laugh] I know we’ve
talked a little bit about, like, our adult colleagues, right? And the idea of like, “the
traditions and norms that they instilled as musicians transferred with them until, you
know, their adulthood,” and, so, like the idea of critical pedagogy in the music
classroom, well what does it do post music classroom, or what can it do post music
classroom for our students?
P: Yeah, I feel like it’s helping me keep an open mind about that, that reminder that we
have different experiences, and then I can’t make judgment calls about anybody else.
Because we have that different positionality. And to be more willing to have hard
conversations with colleagues.
J: Well, hopefully you can take some of this and apply it into a future interaction.
P: Yes, yeah. Well, and I also mentioned before, like it’s helped me in conversations with
student teachers and new teachers.
J: What we’ve talked about?
P: Yeah, yeah. To you know, shaping how I pose questions to them and, and address the
choices that they’re making. Trying to guide them to think about this stuff [our critical
work] as well, like, “put yourself in the kid’s shoes, does this make sense from their
point of view?”
Having positionality be part of our critical discourse was intended to aid the development of
critical consciousness in my participant by considering how instructional choices are influenced by our
own, and others’, positionality throughout our sessions. She began this interaction by referring to the

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freedom we as music teachers in this district had in planning our curriculum so that we could engage in
critical pedagogy and have conversations with students to inform our practice. Although the discourse in
our study was geared towards thinking about our own students, I also noticed that powerful
connections were made when we related the discourse to how we work with other adults around us.
Posing the question about our adult colleagues’ positionality and how they are also influenced by
“traditions and norms that they instilled as musicians” helped to initiate the interaction. She responded
with the awareness that “we have different experiences” and that she “can’t make judgment calls about
anybody else because we have that different positionality.” This part of her response aligned with the
overarching theme of questioning our own assumptions about ourselves and others as part of
developing our critical consciousness but didn’t go far enough to how we can interrogate the choices
our colleagues make. She then added that these traits include a willingness to “have hard conversations
with colleagues” where she indicated a responsiveness to how she engages with others, highlighting a
move from “praxis” towards “solidarity” in her thinking. In fact, she said that our sessions have “helped
[her] in conversations with student teachers and new teachers” by “shaping how I pose questions to
them and, and address the choices that they’re making.” This showed how she was thinking about her
own actions and assumptions prior to questioning others, in this case student teachers and new
teachers, about their instructional practice—praxis. She continued by adding, “Trying to guide them to
think about this stuff as well,” and asking other teachers to “put yourself in the kid’s shoes, does this
make sense from their point of view?” This indicated her capacity to move forward and have
conversations with others about establishing “solidarity” in our practice—demonstrating her developing
critical consciousness.
The preceding three examples illustrated how exploring positionality served as an integral part
of developing a critical consciousness or “critical insight into one’s social reality through reflection and
action” (Hess, 2017, p. 173). To establish my participant’s understanding of “praxis” versus “solidarity” I

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first needed to establish her own perception of her positionality, as partially shown in the example from
Cycle 1, Session 1. Aiming to learn more about the person I was trying to change promoted “solidarity”
for myself as a facilitator of learning. Uncovering information about my participant’s internalized
pressures, which was part of her positionality, was essential in assessing how I facilitated critical
discourse, as seen in the example from Cycle 2, Session 2. Lastly, the example from Cycle 3, Session 3,
demonstrated how my participant began thinking about her own positionality (praxis), how it related to
helping others make a change (solidarity), and served as data of my participant possibly shifting in the
Drago-Severson & Blum-DeStefano (2017) typology from a socializing knower (one who looks to others
for guidance) to a self-authoring knower (one who can author their own systems of beliefs, and not be
“run” by others) as she demonstrated the capacity to promote critical work on her own and with others.
Positionality served as the catalyst for the facilitation of critical discourse that we engaged with
in this study. Understanding more about who we are and how we, and others, are positioned in the
world allowed me to facilitate critical discourse, using probing questions and modeling techniques, in
ways that were supportive of my adult learner’s developing critical consciousness. For my participant,
diving into her positionality allowed her to see ways in which she had been blinded to certain
assumptions and judgments about her own teaching practices and those of other adult educators, which
enabled key moments of critical reflection. As we progressed through each cycle, my participant began
to engage in critical discourse in which she acknowledged how positionality plays a factor in the choices
she made in her classroom. Ultimately, the critical discourse involving aspects of positionality helped her
developing critical consciousness because of the way it allowed her to think about praxis (existing within
and changing the world) and solidarity (entering into the lived reality of another). My contention in
describing her critical consciousness as “developing” comes from the fact that while several
conversations included acknowledging our positionality and that of others, many times the discourse
was focused on experiences rather than race or ethnicity or other power structures in our society. To

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establish a deeper connection to cultural competency, and alignment with the critical aspects of our
discourse as described in my conceptual framework, discussing issues of race and/or power structures in
those experiences could have strengthened the connection and cognitive structure necessary to
critically critique our instructional choices.
Adaptive Leadership: Regulating Distress as a Facilitator
Employing the adaptive leadership move of regulating distress helped create the learning
conditions necessary to develop my participant’s critical consciousness throughout my study. Heifetz
Grashow, and Linsky (2009) defined adaptive leadership as the “practice of mobilizing people to tackle
tough challenges and thrive” (p. 14). As I strove to prepare my participant to engage with critical
pedagogy, or “the work,” there were instances when my role as facilitator of critical discourse required
leadership behaviors to maintain an ideal learning environment with the learning conditions we sought
to establish—namely a brave space (Arao & Clemens, 2013). Because our critical discourse could
potentially cause distress in the learning environment, I decided to employ the following two tenets of
regulating distress as informed by adaptive leadership: providing direction and creating a holding
environment (Heifetz et al., 2009).
Providing Direction
A tenet of regulating distress comes in the form of providing direction for your learners (Heifetz
et al., 2009). Northouse (2016) described providing direction as a way to identify adaptive challenges
and framing them in a way that can be addressed. Essentially, by doing so a leader helps others feel a
sense of clarity and order by reducing stress in uncertain situations. I contend that my actions in
providing direction allowed me to facilitate learning in a way that was conducive to my participant’s
development of critical consciousness.
There were 42 instances during the study when I provided direction to my participant. A
majority of these moments came from the opening and closing of our sessions in the form of introducing

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and reviewing learning objectives with my participant before engaging in any content. At the beginning
of each session, I reviewed what was covered in the previous session. Then, I invited my participant to
review the learning objectives and guiding questions planned for the current session. For example, I
would say, “Well, today we’ll be talking about critical reflection. So I’m going to just invite us to go
through the learning objectives together. If you don’t mind.” In other instances, I would read the
learning objectives out loud for her, she would read the guiding questions, and vice versa.
Inviting my participant to read through the objectives and guiding questions together or in
turns, was intended to promote a sense of ownership and order over our learning. I also invited my
participant to ask any questions about the session agenda to continue promoting a co-constructive
learning environment. Providing direction in this way allowed me to orient our discourse back towards
our planned content after our check-ins in a clear way, while making connections to previously learned
content and the preceding session.
At the end of each session, I also reserved space for closing comments that were initiated by
asking, “Have we made any progress towards our learning objectives? If so, which ones?” Asking probing
questions as we closed each session allowed my participant to recall previous knowledge about our
discourse by going back to our learning objectives or guiding questions, and making connections
between what we said we were going to do versus what we did. Providing direction in this way allowed
me to establish a co-constructive learning environment that aligned with the tenets of critical pedagogy,
along with pushing for ownership and accountability in our learning. After our closing comments or
questions, I also gave a small preview of what we would be covering in our next session. These
statements prefaced how the current session connected to future sessions. They included phrases like
“next week, I am going to ask you to bring in a moment where,” or “for the rest of this cycle we will be
discussing” I wanted to keep my participant engaged with our sessions, and this served as a way to
promote what was going to come next. Northouse (2016) spoke to the confusion present in setting out

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to reach goals as sometimes the goal is obscure or entangled with competing goals. By providing
direction in this way, I allowed my participant to see how the content covered in the current session
would inform the next to provide a sense of certainty and reduce potential stress in the holding
environment. Essentially, I offered a vision as part of my direction (Heifetz et al., 2009) for my learner,
because striving to cultivate a critical consciousness (an adaptive challenge in my study) can be
disruptive and disorienting.
There were 18 instances where I provided direction within a more central part of our discourse.
In the modeling example from Cycle 1, Session 3, discussed earlier, an example of providing direction
was evident when I redirected the conversation from a question my participant asked to one where we
went back to examine a portion of my written critical reflection:
P: Is there anything that you, do you still agree with what you wrote, when you wrote
that?
J: There’s parts of it that I feel like I still would love to dive into a little bit more as well. But
before I do that, just kind of want to ask you, like, What are your first thoughts on like,
what, this example kind of sounds like to you? Or, looks like, to you?
Although I could have gone into more detail about my own feelings and thoughts about the
interaction she was referring to, this would have limited the potential of the intended modeling move
that I was trying to establish for my learner. By acknowledging her comment, I allowed my participant to
feel heard rather than ignored. It was true that I did want to dive into my own critical reflection more
with her. However, doing so would not have strengthened my modeling move in the way that I had
intended. As discussed earlier, anticipating the potential presence of emotional or cognitive distress in
my participant after reading my written critical reflection called for providing direction. In posing the
probing question of “What are your first thoughts on like, what, this example kind of sounds like to you?
Or, looks like, to you?” I was able to clearly provide direction for our discourse so that we could continue

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discussing the act of critical reflection. Doing so potentially reduced the emotional distress that could
have come into the environment had she felt defensive about what I wrote in my critical reflection—an
assumption I made since my disorienting dilemma was about a comment she made. Staying focused on
identifying what makes a critical reflection “critical” was more beneficial for my learner in developing
her critical consciousness in this instance.
Providing direction also included the reframing of new language, or content, to allow my
participant to make connections between previous knowledge and our critical discourse. As I aimed to
cultivate my participant’s critical consciousness, I leveraged providing direction under the lens provided
by Heifetz et al., (2009) where they described how “you have to help people navigate through a period
of disturbance as they sift through what is essential and what is expendable,” (p. 28). In this example,
from Cycle 3, Session 3, I provided direction for my learner by reframing the language of
deculturalization to prompt connections to critical pedagogy in the following interaction:
J: And so the, the idea of deculturalization. We had talked before about like, everything
that we consider to be like “good music,” or that was “the good thing to do,” how it’s,
it’s basically creating this new cultural identity, and ignoring the identities that people
bring into our space, and how that perpetuates this like, you know, White supremacist
idea of like, “this is how things are supposed to be and we’re going to reward you only
when things are looking the way they’re supposed to be and forget everything else.” So
how does using critical pedagogy help us to basically say, “this [the current music canon]
can exist, but we can also bring these [multicultural] ideas into this larger structure and
system?”
P: Yeah, I think you just said it, just to acknowledge that, to acknowledge the fact that
there is all of this tradition, and in general, there’s nothing wrong with that. Until, it

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takes over and pushes out other people’s things. So this exists, but what else can exist
alongside it?
J: Yes. And the idea that like it’s not canceling out. I mean, we know that there’s still good
music from what we do. And it’s just the idea that, [Western Music] is not the only
thing. There are other things that we can borrow and use as well and incorporate into,
but they can all exist in the same sphere. It’s not going to be like one trumps the other
kind of thing. [I begin pulling up Hess (2017)] I was trying to find this article because I
wanted to read you a little blurb from it. Okay, so, [Hess (2017)] said, “The paradigm
typically privileges Western classical music with reading notation above genres of music
and types of music that do not use western standard notation. This privileging, is a
result of a cycle of education. So the cycle goes, “(1) we start with an understanding of
music derived from and well suited to one particular mode of musical engagement and
practice” So, this would be your, “this is how we play violin. This is good posture. This is
technique, this is position one and two” Okay, then we continue on, “(2) we craft a
definition of musicianship, derived from its basic tenets and demonstrated primarily on
instruments that have evolved in its service.” So this would be, “you’re in orchestra and
in orchestra we only play violin, viola, cello, bass, whatever. And that’s it. Sorry, you
can’t do anything else.” So then we continue on, “(3) We privilege curricula and
pedagogy that serve to nurture that kind of musicianship.” This goes back to your
example from your written critical reflection where the White guy scolded you by
saying, “Why are you putting cellos in the middle of the orchestra? That’s not how we
do things. Cellos go here, violins go here,” right? Then we continue on, “(4) we select
students for advanced study on the basis of criteria well suited to those modes of
practice.” So we say, “Oh, that kid is such a great player that knows how to listen, that

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kid this,” and so we reward those students for always following the way things are done,
right? Okay, [the author] continues on, “(5) then we hire faculty to serve the needs and
interests of such students” We usually say things like, “Oh, that teacher is going to teach
these students to value exceptional musicianship!” [The author] adds, “(6) and then we
assess success in terms of the extent to which the norms and values of that tradition
and its conventions are preserved.” And then we make comments like, “Wow, that
teacher knows how to make that orchestra sound like the Boston Symphony Orchestra,
and like wow, look at that.” And we continue just like
P: Perpetuating the cycle.
Here, providing direction came in the form of framing how deculturalization promotes a White
supremacist idea in music education prior to asking the probing question of “So how does using critical
pedagogy help us to basically say, ‘this [the current music canon] can exist, but we can also bring these
[multicultural] ideas into this larger structure and system?” By framing prior to asking the question, I
elicited previous knowledge for my participant as she considered how deculturalization plays a part in
our current practices, and how we have already identified this as an act of White supremacy. My
participant’s response showed that she was making surface level connections between what I said by
sharing her own interpretation of my words along with the question of “So this exists, but what else can
exist alongside it?”. However, her statement of “there is all of this tradition, and in general, there’s
nothing wrong with that” prompted me to provide further direction with the article by Hess (2017).
Referencing this article brought in an alternate perspective grounded in literature to facilitate
critical discourse on how the hegemony in our instructional practices perpetuates deculturalization in
music education. As demonstrated in my last response, I provided direction by breaking up the
referenced material from the article. I did this by reading a quote from the excerpt and then providing
examples that were better described by using our shared musical language. For example, when I said,

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“This goes back to your example from your written critical reflection,” and “cellos go here, violins go
here,” I was able to draw a connection to Hess’s (2017) argument about privileging Western “curricula
and pedagogy” by leveraging my participant’s own experience. After my response, my participant
finished my sentence by answering how we are complicit in “perpetuating the cycle” demonstrating
how providing direction in this way led to a stronger understanding of how White supremacy exists and
is reproduced in music education.
Creating a Strong Holding Environment
Northouse (2016) defined a holding environment as “creating an atmosphere in which people
can feel safe tackling difficult problems, but not so much so that they can avoid the problem” (p. 266). In
my study, the holding environment was not limited to the physical space in which we were meeting but
went beyond that to integrate a psychological space where our critical discourse could take place. Our
holding environment welcomed a common history and shared musical language as well as discussion
norms that allowed us to operate safely and work towards a brave space (Arao & Clemens, 2013). The
following examples demonstrate the steps I took as a facilitator to establish a holding environment that
fostered the development of a critical consciousness: establishing norms, turning up the heat, and
moving towards brave space.
There were 19 instances of less critical moments that served a role in promoting a shared
language and common history in the holding environment such as a check-in, an icebreaker, or
questions at the start of our sessions. Check-in moments allowed me to gauge my participant’s
motivational capacity to engage with content for a particular session to regulate tensions in the holding
environment by monitoring her stress. For example, check-in questions such as (a) “What is something
that you have done in the past week to bring you joy?”; (b) “What is your favorite fall snack?”; (c) or
“Anything good you want to share? Anything bad you want to share?” allowed us to leverage our shared
history to ease into the holding environment and establish a level of safety prior to moving into “tackling

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difficult problems” (Northouse, 2016). I contend that checking in at the beginning of each session
established a level of humanity in our interactions where we could learn about the personal
entanglements that exist alongside the work we are trying to do. While this study strove to cultivate
critical consciousness for my participant’s professional work, learning more about her feelings,
emotions, and beliefs outside of the professional sphere reminded me to consider these factors in our
discourse as I aimed to move her towards a more critical space.
At the beginning of my study, I met with my participant to establish discussion norms. We
discussed the outline of my study, what was expected of my participant, and we took the time to create
discussion norms and goals for our sessions. Establishing productive norms lives under the umbrella of
regulating distress in adaptive leadership theory (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016). I contend that
creating these discussion norms allowed us to begin creating a strong holding environment by
promoting a space where we co-constructed expectations to hold each other accountable. Our
discussion norms included the following:
● Be present.
● Speak your truth.
● Foster brave space.
○ one step further than a safe space
○ Brave space is one where you are not going to be judged, one where you speak up.
○ Be able to have conservations and not be attacked.
● Give love, take love.
● Engage in ongoing dialogue.
● Move up, move back (show a peace sign).
● Tap out when, if, necessary.

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I want to highlight “foster brave space” because this was a norm I introduced as one that I
wanted to intentionally work towards in our sessions. Fostering a brave space included emphasizing the
need for courage “rather than the illusion of safety” in our discourse (Arao & Clemens, 2013, p. 141). As
suggested by Arao and Clemens (2013), my participant and I both agreed to set the parameters of what
a brave space looked like for us. Considering the amount of time we were going to set aside for each
session, and the topics I wanted to cover, we chose to define brave space as “one where you are not
going to be judged, one where you speak up.” The idea here was to promote ownership of our discourse
by speaking up about ideas, beliefs, values, or feelings without worrying that there was going to be
judgment on one side or the other.
In looking back at my actions in this moment, I recognized that while the intention was to
establish a brave space, perhaps our initial norms should have been furthered by using language that
was more closely related to the advice Arao and Clemens (2013) offered. For example, “Be able to have
conversations and not be attacked,” on its own reinforced the ideals of a safe space because it does not
hold participants accountable for what is said. Since ownership of intention and impact matter in a
brave space, this norm could have been strengthened by being reworded to truly align with the
establishment of a brave space.
Moving towards a brave space was warranted in my study as my facilitation of critical discourse
about positionality, critical pedagogy, critical reflection, and deculturalization were topics that
necessitated us questioning our assumptions about ourselves, others, and what we do in the classroom.
To work towards developing my participant’s critical consciousness, we had to engage in discourse that
would move beyond a safe space as we rearranged our beliefs and perspectives on our instructional
practices. Throughout my action research, I attempted to strive for a brave space in the holding
environment by highlighting opportunities to hold each other accountable for our actions.

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To promote a strong holding environment, Heifetz et al., (2009) and Northouse (2016) spoke to
the importance of “turning up the heat” on issues to fuel discourse, but not so much that it becomes
ineffective in tackling the issues being discussed. In my study, topics were brought up where I needed to
turn up the heat to promote critical discourse that allowed us to question assumptions in a way that
aligned with developing a critical consciousness. For example, in the following excerpt from Cycle 3,
Session 1, I turned up the heat by pushing back on some assumptions my participant had about our
music colleagues at the elementary level. This allowed me to create a strong holding environment
where I moved her to think about the ways we have addressed creating change in others without
questioning our actions and held beliefs. After discussing the teaching practices of our elementary
colleagues’, where they promote the idea of students having “fun” in music versus focusing on building
up performance ensembles, the following interaction took place:
J: So then going back to like, where elementary is at, what is wrong with moving your
students to just having fun in music in seventh and eighth grade?
P: Because then they wouldn’t, not that, not that we can’t have fun and become musically
literate. We have a lot of fun. It just doesn’t look like games all the time, but sometimes
it does. But yeah, there’s nothing wrong with having fun. But, that doesn’t serve my end
goal of sending students out to the world who can have intelligent musical
conversations, or participate in a variety of musical activities.
J: And I think when we’re thinking about them as elementary teachers, at least the ones
we particularly work with, when I hear them talk, I’m not hearing them talk about
musical literacy. I’m not hearing them talk about sequencing and pathways. I’m just
hearing them like you said, talk about students having “fun” and them having great
performances, because it seems like for them, the pressure is to have good
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P: Yes, they’re feeling it.
J: And so, I’m just, I’m asking these questions, because I’m trying to get us to think about
how we tend to push what we want onto other people without listening to what those
other people need, or want, and letting them inform what we want to change.
P: [Jumping in] Well then, but then I wonder what they do want because I tried to push
that today. And then they were like, “but we can’t, but we can’t, but we can’t have” like,
“I don’t care what we can or can’t tell me what you want. If you could make your own
job, what would it look like? And would you do that December performance? And half
of you have new principals, so are they really screaming at you to do it [performances]?”
Right? So how much of what they think they’re being pressured to do are they actually
being pressured to do?
J: I want you to ask yourself that question.
When my participant mentioned “that doesn’t serve my end goal” she was establishing her
musical teaching philosophy of creating musicians who can “have intelligent musical conversations, or
participate in a variety of musical activities.” I then highlighted the juxtaposition that existed between
her philosophy and that of our elementary music colleagues’ who focused on the pressures they felt in
providing their communities with “good performances” where students have “fun.” She acknowledged
that our colleagues feel that pressure which allowed me to push back on her initial response by speaking
to how we “push what we want onto other people without listening to what those other people need …
and letting them inform what we want to change.” By saying this, I turned up the heat in our discussion,
but prefacing it with “I’m trying to get us to think about” shared the heat in the holding environment
between both of us.
My participant then jumped in with an almost defensive reaction where she tried to defend her
actions in an earlier interaction with our colleagues’ where she “tried to push” their thinking. She made

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evident what she wanted to hear from the elementary team when she said, “I don’t care what we can or
can’t, tell me what you want,” and she was defensive in her response when she questioned, “And half of
you have new principals, so are they really screaming at you to do it [performances]?” This
defensiveness signaled that she had frustrations with the actions of our elementary colleagues and their
lack of response in creating change in their instructional practices. Their pushback on changing their
curriculum, or pathways, drove her to question “how much of what they think they’re being pressured
to do, are they actually being pressured to do?” I turned up the heat further and reminded her to turn
back towards questioning her own assumptions by saying, “I want you to ask yourself that question” to
suggest that she too should think about the ways in which she is, or isn’t, pressured to focus on music
literacy and by whom. This allowed me to foster a stronger holding environment by intentionally turning
up the heat while attempting to move our discussions into a more critical space where our assumptions
could be questioned and examined.
While this moment served to turn up the heat, another missed opportunity was present when I
failed to regulate distress further and make a connection to constructive disorientation (Wergin, 2020).
Following my last question, I could have directed the conversation into a critically reflective space where
we discussed how the disorienting dilemma of being “frustrated” was being played out. By engaging the
dilemma with critical discourse, we could have potentially made a connection, or elicited, a constructive
disorientation between our frustrations, our assumptions, our complicity with the status quo, and how
our responses to our adult colleagues did not promote a critical approach. By not making this
connection I potentially limited the growth of her critical consciousness in this interaction.
During our last meeting, Cycle 3, Session 3, we were discussing our ability to establish a holding
environment through our common history as music peers and friends. Since this study asked us to
venture into a sensitive territory on several aspects, I contend that our shared history helped us develop
a strong holding environment as we engaged in critical discourse. In this example, my participant

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highlighted her perception of our holding environment as she discussed her comfort level in interactions
with me given our shared history:
P: Like I mean, I’ve always felt comfortable having a conversation with you, and, but there
were things that we talked about that were like, “Okay, that was a little bit
uncomfortable.” And, and so I think the more we do it with ourselves, it gets easier to
have those conversations with students as well, and to take what happened in you
know, an adult conversation, and tweak that and make it so that it can be okay for
students to participate in as well.
J: Can I just ask you since I’m curious, like what have, like what makes you feel like you can
have a conversation with me, what, what has made you?
P: Just embracing that discomfort. Like just saying that, the brave space, right?
J: Yes.
P: And it’s okay. And like, I know, we know we’re not going to judge each other. Like that’s
where you come from. That’s where I come from. And we can share that and
understand each other better.
In this interaction I was immediately drawn to my participant’s comment where she stated that
she felt comfortable having a conversation with me even though “there were things that we talked
about that were like, ‘Okay, that was a little bit uncomfortable.” She started by saying, “I’ve always felt
comfortable having conversations with you” which pointed to the shared history that existed in our
already established relationship as friends and music colleagues. However, she went on to say that even
then, there were uncomfortable moments. This comment pointed to the sensitive nature of our
discourse, and I contend that our shared history enabled her to push through the discomfort she
sometimes felt in our interactions. In probing her on what made her feel that way she added that it was
“embracing that discomfort” as part of our “brave space,” and that “we know we’re not going to judge

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each other.” By saying, “we know,” she signaled a shared history with each other. Her response to my
question subsequently informed me on what brave space meant to her and how she recognized the role
it played in our interactions throughout my study.
Relating back to the ideas of “praxis” versus “solidarity” in developing a critical consciousness,
my colleague summed up her perspective about our holding environment by saying, “that’s where you
come from. That’s where I come from. And we can share that and understand each other better.” By
making connections to the content across our sessions, namely about our different positionalities, my
participant shared how her own positionality and that of others is vital to “understand each other
better,” even if there might be “discomfort.” This language aligned with what someone who is moving
towards a critical consciousness might say as it establishes conjectures where “praxis” is acknowledged
and a move towards “solidarity” is demonstrated. However, this language does not necessarily align
with that of a brave space. Arao and Clemens (2013) cautioned that the idea of no judgments reiterates
a safe space rather than a brave space where participants take ownership of their intentions and their
impact. Therefore, this also highlighted a missed opportunity on my part to have strengthened the
concept of brave space for my learner since I did not push back on her comment.
In a holding environment, adaptive leaders can regulate distress by helping others attend to
issues, orchestrate conflicting perspectives, and facilitate decision making (Northouse, 2016, p. 267).
Without the creation of a strong holding environment, the facilitation moves discussed up to this point
would not have been as impactful in the development of my participant’s critical consciousness.
Establishing a holding environment, through establishing discussion norms, turning up the heat, and
striving for a brave space, allowed me as a facilitator to regulate distress in confronting adaptive
challenges within our critical discourse. The holding environment included moments where I could turn
up the heat on issues, like in discussing disorienting dilemmas as described earlier, or using probing

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questions to elicit critical discourse. In my data corpus there were a total of 34 interactions that merely
attempted a “brave space,” but still played a part in turning up the heat in the holding environment.
Employing the adaptive leadership move of regulating distress by providing direction and
creating a strong holding environment where my participant could feel comfortable in our interactions
aided the development of my learner’s critical consciousness. I engaged in this move by working
towards mobilizing my participant “to tackle tough challenges and thrive” (Heifetz et al., 2009, p. 14),
and monitoring any potential discomfort while turning up the heat to “keep it within a productive
range” (Northouse, 2016, p. 266). Providing direction to reduce the stress that people may feel in
uncertain situations (Northouse, 2016) was necessary to keep learning objectives clear and the learning
process orderly for my learner. Establishing a holding environment that leveraged a common history
allowed us to engage in critical discourse where we could question assumptions about our practice,
about ourselves, and others, and to consider “praxis” versus “solidarity.”
Missed Opportunities
Since this action research study involved a focus on the self as a researcher throughout its
design, this section describes where there were missed opportunities and moments of growth in my
leadership while engaging with my participant. In some cases, I refer to examples I have previously
discussed while in other cases, I present new data from other interactions.
A Lack of Cognitive Structuring
My conceptual framework for this study included eliciting “constructive disorientation” (Wergin,
2020) for my participant as an intended outcome of our critical discourse. Constructive disorientation
involves a sense of curiosity, induced by the disconnect between our current state and the state we
desire to be in, along with a sense that one is capable of dealing with the disconnect. My conceptual
framework demonstrated my desire to support my learner’s constructive disorientation through

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exploring disorienting dilemmas where my participant could develop critical consciousness, thus
prompting visionary, actionable instructional moves grounded in critical pedagogy in the long-term.
A disorienting dilemma is an event where a discrepancy between our assumptions and actual
perspectives exists (Brookfield, 2010; Mezirow, 1991, 2000). Throughout my study there were 17
instances of disorienting dilemmas in our discourse, in particular in my participant’s responses.
However, there was only one time when I named my participant’s response as a disorienting dilemma
and explicitly highlighted that discrepancy for my participant. Failing to name, or guiding my participant
to name, other moments where she was experiencing a disorienting dilemma diminished my ability to
facilitate learning because no explicit cognitive structuring, or provision for thinking and acting (Tharp &
Gallimore, 1988) was provided. For example, in the interaction from Cycle 2, Session 1 discussed earlier,
my participant was working through questioning an instructional practice as part of her attempted
critical reflection. In this instance I highlighted the connection she made to positionality; however, she
uncovered another potential disorienting dilemma. I failed to slow down as a facilitator to acknowledge
this, because I was so focused on her connection to positionality:
J: What’s the pressure to get an “excellent” or “superior?” Like, where’s that coming
from?
P: Internally, because when I went as a student, if we didn’t get a “superior” we were
rating ourselves and we were so disappointed. I don’t, like, I think yeah, like you go to
festival to get a “superior.” You go to festival wanting a “unanimous superior” [one
where both judges grant a “superior” rating].
J: So now you have this internalized feeling.
P: [interrupting] YES! A+ or nothing. Me, based on me.
J: Which, we would call that?

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P: [Hesitantly] Yes, there we go, positionality. The thing that I grew up doing, and like
you’d be the best, or you don’t show up. If you’re going to show up you would be the
best.
J: I think it’s important. Like, right now you just, not admitted, but, like went into the part
where you’re saying it was because of your experience growing up as an orchestra kid
that you were told that, right? That positionality piece and how that plays into your
choices in the classroom. I don’t think, I don’t think you’re trying to protect them. Just to
push back a little bit. I think you’re trying to protect you. But, from what, from who?
In my last response, I named how her positionality played into the choices she made for her
practice and then probed an assumption I made about her perspective. It would have been more
powerful to slow down and name how her awareness of positionality and the effect it had on her
instructional practice presented a disorienting dilemma. By naming the disorienting dilemma prior to
making the assumption of “I don’t think you’re trying to protect them. Just to push back a little bit. I
think you’re trying to protect you,” I could have scaffolded the process with questions that moved us
from acknowledging the disorienting dilemma to working towards a constructive disorientation via
critical reflection. Moving towards constructive disorientation by engaging in critical discourse about the
disorienting dilemma would have built my participant’s efficacy in engaging with critical reflection as
part of her practice. Ultimately, if I aimed to provide my participant with the cognitive structure
necessary to develop a critical consciousness, then slowing down and giving the work back to her
(Heifetz et al., 2009) would have strengthened this skill for her.
Similarly, there were 22 instances where constructive disorientation was observable in my
participant’s responses. However, there was not one instance where I named something she shared as a
constructive disorientation. For example, as we were wrapping up Cycle 3, Session 1 we discussed

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frustrations about the current music pathway in our district and addressed how we have historically
tried to create change with our music colleagues:
P: So, so, there’s a lot that we don’t know about [our colleagues]. And that really impacts
our discussion on how we view each other.
J: Yeah. I mean, to align it with our learning objective. I think that’s where the critical
reflection piece starts building up. There’s our dilemma. We’ve been trying for years to
get people to change something when we haven’t even stopped to learn who they are,
or learn more about them. So then what does that say about us? [we laugh]
P: Well, and I think we try to learn a little bit about each other on a personal level, but it
would be maybe more valuable, and more meaningful to learn about each other on a
musical level.
J: And we need to have, like a, PLC situation.
P: Yeah, and not just make assumptions that we’re all music teachers who’ve all had the
same experiences because we’ve clearly had very different experiences.
J: Yay. Okay, and then [goal] number two is, be able to describe what it means to cultivate
a critical consciousness within ourselves.
When she said, “I think we try to learn a little bit about each other on a personal level, but it
would be maybe more valuable, and more meaningful to learn about each other on a musical level,” I
could have taken a moment to probe this justification further to see what she meant by learning at a
“musical level” and why that was more “valuable” for her. Probing this instance would have
strengthened the connection between this comment and the next response where she said, “and not
just make assumptions that we’re all music teachers who’ve all had the same experiences because
we’ve clearly had very different experiences.” Both responses indicated that there was some curiosity

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that was driven by the dilemma that we don’t really know our music colleagues and that it “impacts our
discussion on how we view each other,” which highlighted a potential constructive disorientation.
While our critical discourse included instances where we talked about what constructive
disorientation looked like, I contend that failing to probe her response, and guiding her towards
recognizing her own constructive disorientation, created a missed opportunity for my learner. Instead, I
continued the discourse by saying, “Yay. Okay, and then [goal] number two is,” which showed that I just
wanted to move on to addressing the next topic. Again, I contend that naming the disorienting dilemma
would have served as a cognitive structure (Tharp & Gallimore, 1988) to better understand how critical
reflection can move us towards constructive disorientation and the role it plays in developing our critical
consciousness.
Fear Limited Facilitation of Critical Reflection
Earlier, I discussed how I strove for a brave space throughout my study and named two missed
opportunities to move towards a brave space in our holding environment. During data analysis, I
discovered a continuous comment that I failed to push back on throughout our critical discourse. The
comment was something my participant said about students who “share an apartment with 10 other
people.” While I had a visceral reaction to this comment each time, I failed to address it. Thus, after I
was out of the field, I was driven to explore my lack of engagement with this comment, and why I failed
as a facilitator to push back, especially if I was trying to promote a brave space.
Under the lens of adaptive leadership (Heifetz et al., 2009; Northouse, 2016), the role of the
facilitator is to wear various hats to address adaptive challenges. As a teacher this was a familiar role as I
was the adult in the room who must manage learning, maintain a physically, mentally, and emotionally
safe learning environment, etc. Because of the various hats leaders wear simultaneously, sometimes the
actions that we enact don’t always unfold as expected. In my study, I wanted to use opportunities to

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promote critical self-reflection and push back to cultivate a brave space with my participant especially
because I asked her to attempt and learn to do the same in our holding environment.
When I first heard her make a comment about students who “live in an apartment with 10 other
people,” it was triggering. As a Mexican-American growing up in Southern California this was a
stereotype I heard throughout my life, and one that was partially true for myself, family members, and
close friends. Hearing her make this comment did elicit some internal defensiveness that I had to
regulate as part of my own personal distress (Heifetz et al., 2009). The first time I heard her say it, in
Cycle 1, Session 1, I understood what she was trying to describe and how it initially had an impact on her
ability to make connections to others’ positionalities:
P: Well, our students in particular. I can identify with some of them but even not. Like our
students tend to be like the “have a lot” and the “have almost nothing.” And so, I guess I
fall in the middle of that, but, like, I don’t have a good grasp of what it feels like for
those kids who share an apartment with 10 people. Like, I, simply, I can’t, I don’t know. I
just can’t really identify with that.
After she said this, I did not push back on it, rather I continued the discourse to focus on
developing our awareness of our own positionality. Looking back now, failing to address the comment
after this first instance presented a missed opportunity because I could have elicited a learning moment
on the idea of “praxis” (Hill, 2021), and cultivated an awareness of why that mindset exists in her
worldview. However, this was Cycle 1, Session 1 so I also recognize that, given the many hats I was
wearing, it could have been cognitive overload to do so in the moment.
She made a similar comment a second time in Cycle 1, Session 2, and in Cycle 2, Session 2, as it
related to her instructional choices. In these instances, she was trying to reason that she had an
awareness about her students and how she would not expect students take instruments home to
practice because “some kids live in an apartment with 10 people, and playing trumpet at home or even

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singing is not going to be an option while anything else in that apartment is happening.” Again, I failed
to push back on her comment because I was focused on making connections to the idea of being a
critical self-reflector, which created a missed opportunity to promote a more critical approach to
entering others’ positionality. In failing to address this comment, I forfeited the possibility of questioning
her deficit ideology about a subset of our students who might be from low socio-economic backgrounds.
It also prevented the opportunity to discuss how this assumption meant that she denied her students
the chance to take their instruments home for more practice.
In Cycle 1, Session 3 I referenced her comment, hoping that I would be able to get her to
acknowledge it as seen in the following interaction:
J: I know that in previous conversations, like you’ve mentioned, like we talked about, like
being White and the ideas of like, “Well, I don’t know what it feels like to live in an
apartment where there’s a lot of people,” or like, you know, “bread and butter,”
situation. And so I just kind of wanted you to think about the tension between those
two, and how that can play into the decisions we make into our classroom.
P: I do actually have, if it doesn’t throw things off track. I actually, as you said that, have a
memory of the first time that I was as a White girl in the minority. And it threw me.
J: Tell me more. Tell me more.
Saying, “you’ve mentioned” brought an awareness to previous discussions about how our
identities and worldview “can play into the decisions we make into our classroom.” She responded by
avoiding the comment of “apartment where there’s a lot of people” and instead talked about an
experience where “[she] was as a White girl in the minority.” I allowed her to speak on that experience
instead of pausing to push back or keeping us focused on the “tension” that our worldviews create. By
saying “tell me more,” I gave her permission to move the discourse to a place where she had been in a
disadvantaged position, not ever coming back to how she othered her low socio-economic students.

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Failing to push back on my participant’s comment created the following two missed
opportunities: it meant I didn’t work towards creating a brave space in our holding environment and I
didn’t push her thinking in ways that would have moved her towards critical consciousness. By not
recognizing my participant’s comment as problematic the first time she brought it to the discourse, I
prevented her from taking ownership over what she said (a tenet of brave space). Her comment did
impact me personally and addressing it could have allowed us to work through where this worldview
came from by eliciting critical self-reflection. This could have potentially brought us to a brave space and
built-up efficacy in pushing back on each other in future sessions. As discussed earlier, looking back now,
although we strove for a brave space, perhaps our norms and practices were more aligned with that of a
safe space to begin with.
In stepping back and questioning critically why I failed to pushback, I uncovered that during our
sessions I was not taking the time to slow down because of fear. Fear of causing distress, fear of
potentially losing my participant, fear of impacting our working relationship, and fear of affecting our
friendship all played a role in how far I pushed. While analyzing my experiences in-the-field I wrote:
I am holding back on some of the responses I am hearing. Part of it comes from my own
processing time of what is happening in the moment, but I think another part of it comes from
some fear of pushing back when I hear her say things like, “I don’t know what it’s like to live in
an apartment with 10 people” or “I have never been in situations where things are working
against me.” In reality, I can relate to both of those things, yet I am unable to bring those
experiences into the room when we are discussing. My hesitation is sitting with fear of saying
something hurtful, but then in holding back I am failing to “turn up the heat” in the space in
order to facilitate a true transformative learning experience. Is my hesitation coming from my
own feelings of not wanting to revisit/acknowledge how those relatable experiences have
shaped my worldviews? ... I also have to acknowledge that some of my own feelings come from

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not wanting to look “dumb,” or from feelings of not being taken seriously because my
experiences would be seen as “less than” compared to what she is sharing. But that is just an
assumption.
Critically reflecting on my fear and trying to unearth what was driving it created a learning
moment for me as a facilitator. The comments she made were relatable to my own personal life. I had
moments in my childhood where family members crammed into one household as we helped them
migrate to the United States, and I had several moments in my life where “things worked against me” as
a Mexican-American and via the intersectionality of being a gay male. As shown in my critical reflection,
I acknowledged how staying silent prevented me from “turning up the heat,” but at the same time I was
also hesitant to revisit how those past experiences have shaped who I am today. I had a fear of “looking
dumb” or seen as “less than” if I shared how her comments were hurtful because of an assumption I
made about how she might view me as a person. I assumed that she might view me in a certain light
when in reality I never gave us the opportunity to explore how she would have actually reacted if I did
stop and relay how her comments made me feel.
By not addressing her deficit-oriented comment, I personally continued experiencing distress
from her comments. I also failed to allow her to enter my worldview which hindered a moment where
she could establish solidarity with me because of assumptions I made about her as it related to me. As a
facilitator, recognizing this missed opportunity, I want to continue building up my own capacity with
critical reflection so I can promote the work I want others to engage in within myself as well.
Conclusion
Measuring someone’s critical consciousness, or conscientization, is not something that can
feasibly be done in the span of this one action research qualitative study. However, data from this study
demonstrated my learner’s growth in critical consciousness through my intentional and systematic
choices within this study. Based on the interactions presented in my findings and in my data corpus I

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contend that my participant made progress towards critical consciousness but remained at an
introductory, or developing, level. This contention is based on my findings demonstrating (a) how critical
discourse was facilitated through my use of probing questions, modeling, and exploring positionality; (b)
the adaptive leadership move of regulating distress, which included providing direction and creating a
strong holding environment managed learning; and how (c) addressing missed opportunities in
cultivating a brave space and providing cognitive structures on how disorienting dilemmas could
become constructive disorientations through critical reflection could have furthered my participant’s
critical consciousness. Lastly, I am reminded of the importance of acknowledging a leader’s fear and the
role it plays in regulating personal distress and positioning myself to critically push back on others as a
facilitator of learning to cultivate a stronger critical consciousness.
Afterword
Engaging in action research and the dissertation writing process has taught me a lot about
myself as a facilitator of adult learning and as an advocate for transformational learning in music
education. In this final section, I will discuss how the experience of engaging in my study has influenced
my leadership and ability to engage with critical work to lead instructional change. I will also discuss
where I am in my path moving forward as I continue to develop my practice as an educator and leader.
Understanding Where I Am Now
As a music educator, I have endured having to justify or defend my work in several ways
throughout my studies and career. As a student, people have questioned my choices for pursuing music
education. As a teacher, I frequently had to defend arts education and the important role it plays in
creating well rounded students. Throughout my studies in the doctoral program, I often found myself
isolated as one of the only music educators in our program. There were times when I felt like my work as
a music teacher was only seen as something “fun” or “entertaining” and not taken as seriously as being
in administration or teaching a core subject. I found myself wanting to shift away from music education

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to try and explore a different field for my study, one where I could make a difference and learn about
myself under a more “serious” lens. However, I began to notice how the adult educators we studied like
Mezirow (1991) and Wergin (2020) made connections to the arts through their theories of learning and
it began to shift my perspective.
For example, Wergin (2020) discussed how the arts serve as a way to bridge sensations with
true experience by “engaging all of our senses, by cultivating moments of tension, and by challenging us
to expand our perceptions and rearrange our meaning schemes” (pg. 126). The arts allow us to either
create or make meaning of a disturbance and therefore can be used as a source of constructive
disorientation. Wergin (2020) went on to explain how different forms of art can also create disorienting
dilemmas for others as they are exposed to new thematic ideas that can challenge worldviews. This
made me reconsider what my role as a music teacher, musician, and music colleague had the potential
to do and it drew my focus back to music for this dissertation process.
During one of our class sessions I remembered a discussion where we named how important it
is for us to consider how we can be leaders even in contexts where we are not in a leadership position
(Brookfield, 2017). We also discussed how our work as leaders of change necessitates making small
moves to build an army of agents that can go out to enact said change. Finding and cultivating
relationships around us that promote the work we strive for caused me to stop and think about how I
could make the most meaningful impact through this study. Since this was the first time I would be
facilitating learning to address an historically entrenched inequity, I realized that striving for social
justice in the context of music would allow me to learn more about myself and the role music can play in
developing a critical consciousness. Since music has played such an important and developmental role in
my life, and continues to teach me more about myself as a teacher and leader, I realized this context
was exactly where I needed to be.

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While some progress in developing a critical consciousness was made in my study, I
underestimated how emotionally and mentally taxing this work was truly going to be. Interrogating the
self and our belief systems sits at the heart of “practicing what you preach,” which is something that I
have continuously been saying about our work in this program. Critical reflection sits at the heart of “our
work” and through this process, I found just how difficult it can be to continuously push yourself to
reflect critically. There are various layers that one must consider when it comes to critical reflection and
intentionally questioning our own actions. At the beginning of my study, I assumed I would be able to do
this frequently and with ease as I had already practiced beforehand. However, every time I thought I had
it right, I would find myself uncovering blind spots where I missed opportunities to critically reflect on
my practice such as failing to listen to what my participant was sharing with me, or the fear that came
from pushing back on hurtful responses. I am thankful for my trust in critical peers and my dissertation
chair who helped shine a light on such shadows and provided me the opportunities to grow as a leader.
With this study I have also gained a better understanding of my own positionality and the ways
my own choices affected the learning of others. For one, I have considered how important it is to be
true to yourself and who you are as a person to make growth as an educator. Knowing how I viewed the
world as a Mexican-American, middle-class, gay male allowed me to shine a light on how I presented
ideas, or questioned assumptions, in myself and for my participant. Considering my experiences in music
education compared to those of my participant allowed me to step back and carefully navigate how I
would try and move her towards developing a critical consciousness. In this process I was reminded that
considering positionality, both my own and that of others, is an ongoing process where we must
constantly build upon our repertoire of knowledge to drive us towards eliciting the change we seek.
Inviting and considering the perspectives of others present in the learning environment, and those not
present, is something I seek to improve as my leadership grows and I facilitate adult learning in
educational spaces.

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As a result, I have become more aware of considering how my positionality influences the way I
process everyday interactions around me. I have become intentional in my efforts to question
assumptions I make about my music colleagues and the ways in which I can offer push back on
comments they make that contribute towards deculturalization. For example, when considering the
learning experiences of our mostly White student population, I push back on my colleagues’ deficit
views about programming diverse music by stepping back to intentionally question how their past
experiences and positionality as music teachers shape the comments or instructional choices they make.
From there, I can inform myself on how to engage them in discourse that resists the reproduction of the
status quo and elicits thinking aligned with critical music pedagogy. To do this, I am reminded that
continuously slowing down is necessary to break down the sense of urgency (Jones & Okun, 2001) that I
once embodied in my work and daily interactions with others in my professional context. This does not
mean that my work as a music educator has lost any amount of rigor, however, it does mean that I am
trying to find opportunities to provide myself with time to reflect on my instructional choices and the
implications my planning has on students and other adults. For example, post-study, my participant and
I have become better at questioning how we interact with our elementary music team and their
resistance to change. Previously we would have shared frustrations with each other on their
instructional choices (such as resistance to teaching choral or instrumental ensembles) and sought to
just “tell them” how they should be teaching to align with our practice at the secondary level. Now, in
planning future collaborative performance experiences we remind ourselves to consider whose voices
we welcome into the space and whose voices we may be leaving out along with listening to what our
colleagues are telling us about their experience and perspective in the elementary setting. Rather than
getting frustrated with our elementary colleagues for not doing what we want, we question and find
ways to meet their needs to move them towards questioning how their choices affect music learning
opportunities for students and potential outcomes.

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Post-study interactions with my participant have reminded me of the benefits of our discourse
as she continues to seek out ways to build upon what we covered in our sessions. In passing she will
bring up moments where she has found herself thinking about positionality, her students’ positionality,
and ways she is practicing questioning her instructional choices. Additionally, she made the decision to
take her choral ensemble to an adjudicated festival in the spring which was something she was hesitant
to do based on the experience(s) she shared during her attempt at critical reflection in Cycle 2, Session 1
as shared in my findings section. I contend this decision was based on the outcome of engaging in
discourse while questioning her positionality and past experiences that prevented her from taking her
students to a festival because of her own fear of getting anything less than a “superior” rating. This
reminds me of the importance of normalizing towards practice (Horn & Little, 2009) and finding more
opportunities to continue engaging my colleague in critical discourse to shift our practices in productive
ways. Doing so is the only way that I can maintain alignment with the proposed intended outcome of
this study.
Moving Forward With “The Work”
Engaging in the work of transformational instructional change and adaptive leadership initially
caused imposter syndrome for me as a leader. I was extremely critical of my abilities and I doubted how
this work would play out in my musical context. During my in-the-field analysis I drew inspiration from
Mezirow (1991) who quoted Donald Schön in describing the act of reflection-in-action:
They [the musicians] can do this, first of all, because their collective effort at musical
intervention makes use of a schema—a metric, melodic, and harmonic schema familiar to all
participants—which gives a predictable order to the piece. In addition, each of the musicians has
at the ready a repertoire of musical figures which he can deliver at appropriate moments. As
musicians feel the direction of the music that is developing out of their interwoven

140
contributions, they make new sense of it and adjust their performance to the new sense they
have made. (p. 113)
As musicians we are inherently afraid of failing in the middle of a performance. But, sometimes
a mistake, or a few, on stage can develop our ability to react mid-performance so the show can
continue. The way in which we cover up a mistake, or recover from it, makes us stronger performers,
and sometimes results in an even better performance. This made me think about my work with my
participant. There were times where my questioning techniques did not always go well, or when my
participant would say something that caused a stalemate in my thinking. In the moment it was hard for
me to not dive into deficit thinking about my ability to facilitate learning, or to doubt the ways in which I
could quickly respond back using a critical lens. However, in stepping back and looking at the larger
picture, or getting on the balcony (Heifetz et al., 2009), I realized that making and acknowledging those
mistakes is what drove me to dive deeper into the literature to enlighten my own thinking and plan
future moves. Some mistakes evident in my analysis appeared in the form of not listening to what my
participant was sharing with me in some instances because I was too focused on the action plan, not
pushing back on my participant to truly enter a brave space, or not being fully present in leading a
session as I planned to be. Making mistakes is what made me a better leader in this study because the
nature of action research made me reconsider my actions, reflect on my practice, and intentionally
question my moves through critical reflection. Sharing those mistakes with my participant, my critical
peers, and my chair allowed me to shine a light on blind spots while facilitating my own learning to make
improvements as I continued engaging with those smaller moves. After all, music is all about making
mistakes, for those mistakes lead to new creations and inspire new genres of music!
As I move forward with this work, I think about my “at the ready” repertoire of theoretical
knowledge that will influence the way I interact with myself and with others. I have already had
opportunities to put myself to the test when pushing back on choices being made by administrators, or

141
other leaders, who have an influence on the arts in my district. In these situations, I remind myself to
think about the others in the room as learners and to consider what experiences they have, or don’t, to
help them question the assumptions they may have about how arts education should play out in
secondary education. For example, California’s recent passing of Proposition 28 has several
administrators unsure of how to spend money on the arts as they have not been in a position where
such a substantial surplus of funds has been available. By letting them enter my world as a music
teacher and exposing the learning gaps that exist in music education, I can position myself to push back
on the assumptions and deficit views administrators have of arts teachers so they may consider our
worldviews and trust our guidance in using this money to interrupt current practices and potentially
change the way we view arts education all together. This is an exciting opportunity to decentralize the
ways things have been done and to expose the cracks in learning opportunities and student experiences
that have historically existed due to lack of funding and attention to the arts.
With my secondary colleagues and peers, I have also been positioned in ways that allow me to
push back on our thinking about what music programs should look like. Our competitive human nature
almost always shows in interactions with each other. Many conversations usually start off with
comparative questions such as “What are your student numbers looking like this year?” or “What is the
balance between your female and male voices?” These types of questions lend themselves to the
reproduction of Western music practices where we continue adhering to the status quo by setting
ourselves up to meet and sustain the needs of the Western music canon, or making ourselves and
others feel bad when our practices do not align (Hess, 2017). To interrupt such thinking, I want to be
able to draw on my repertoire of authors and adult learning theories to pose questions back in a nondefensive, yet critical, manner. Questions such as “How are we meeting the needs of the student
population in our current classes?” or “What type of music can the students in front of me be exposed
to so they have a successful performance year?” can allow us to think about the infinite possibilities that

142
exist outside the realm of the “Western canon” as we use music education to create well rounded
humans.
For me, aside from building a conceptual framework where I drew on theoretical knowledge to
reason why certain actions took place in my study, the power of this work was evident in how action
research made me intentionally and systematically question the specific moves that shaped the
interactions I had with my participant. I have gained lots of theoretical knowledge in the doctoral
program that we as students are expected to take into our future practice to create change in the world.
Our work preaches the importance of intentionally using critical reflection to inform our andragogy and
adaptive leadership as instructional leaders who seek to establish learning conditions that promote
social justice in solidarity to break down historically entrenched inequities. Action research has allowed
me to hold up a mirror and put into practice what we are “preaching” as we develop our abilities to
become change agents who represent our own organizations, but also USC Rossier. I strongly believe
that continuing to share this work with others is the first step in cultivating relationships that promote
critical change in the world. After being able to present how the power of action research has influenced
my own practice at the 2nd Annual Rossier Research Conference and seeing how my participant
continues to talk about topics we have covered in our sessions, I have felt more dedicated to continue
finding ways to incorporate critical change into the field of music education. I am not certain where the
next phase of my work will take me, but I do know that these adult learning theories, learning
experiences, and professional relationships will influence how I work with myself and with others to lead
critical instructional change.

143
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Abstract (if available)

Abstract This action research study examines enacted andragogical and leadership moves aligned with critical pedagogy in music education that sought to elicit a developing critical consciousness in my teacher colleague, the main participant for this study. I facilitated critically reflective inquiry that spanned 12 weeks and leveraged critical discourse around instructional practices, race, positionality, and critical reflection to answer the following research question: How do I engage with a music teacher colleague, in my district, in critical discourse about our instructional practices to lead to critical consciousness? This study used a conceptual framework grounded in transformational learning theory and critical pedagogy which informed the development and implementation of weekly 1–1 sessions between my participant and me to engage in such discourse. The findings of this study argue how facilitating critical discourse through the use of probing questions, modeling, exploring our positionality, and employing the adaptive leadership move of regulating distress helped elicit a developing critical consciousness on the part of my participant. Since this action research study involved a focus on the self as a researcher throughout its design, I also describe missed opportunities and moments of growth in my leadership while engaging with my participant.

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University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses

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Asset Metadata

Creator Lara-Ledón, Jeffrey (author)

Core Title Critical pedagogy for music education: cultivating teachers’ critical consciousness through critically reflective inquiry

School Rossier School of Education

Degree Doctor of Education

Degree Program Educational Leadership

Degree Conferral Date 2024-05

Publication Date 05/22/2024

Defense Date 04/29/2024

Publisher Los Angeles, California (original), University of Southern California (original), University of Southern California. Libraries (digital)

Tag action research,andragogy,critical consciousness,critical pedagogy,Music Education,OAI-PMH Harvest

Format theses (aat)

Language English

Contributor Electronically uploaded by the author (provenance)

Advisor Samkian, Artineh (committee chair), Slayton, Julie (committee member), Stevens, Mary (committee member)

Creator Email j.ledon@icloud.com,ledon@usc.edu

Permanent Link (DOI) https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-oUC113953634

Unique identifier UC113953634

Identifier etd-LaraLednJe-12999.pdf (filename)

Legacy Identifier etd-LaraLednJe-12999

Document Type Dissertation

Format theses (aat)

Rights Lara-Ledón, Jeffrey

Internet Media Type application/pdf

Type texts

Source 20240522-usctheses-batch-1159 (batch), University of Southern California (contributing entity), University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses (collection)

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