Instrumental education in Arts programme in Swedish upper secondary school and Arts school : How some music teachers assess musical learning in instrumental education

This study aims to investigate how teachers in instrumental teaching in different school forms work with assessment, planning and goals. Of interest are the prerequisites of the teaching, the teachers' musical and educational backgrounds and where the goals of the teaching come from and how they are designed. This has been investigated through qualitative semi-structured interviews to share the teachers' stories. In the analysis work, the collected empiricism is related to a socio-cultural perspective on learning. During the interviews, teachers emphasized the importance of the social relationship between teacher and student and that the goals arose in the discourse between them. This was the case regardless of school form. These agreed goals also form the basis for the teachers' continuous assessment work and planning. The results of the investigation show that the teachers interviewed decide the contents of the lessons based on discussions with the students, in order to work with student motivation in mind in practice and in planning. The contents of the education should aim to be of practical use and to be enjoyable for the students. Assessment of the student learning occurs in two aspects; formative and summative. These were applied by the teachers continuously in their daily assessment processes, in order to monitor not only how the students develop, but also in order to assess what should be involved next in the planning process. In addition, the results also showed that the teachers who shared students with colleagues discussed with these colleagues in order to give an accurate assessment of the students skills and learning, by minimizing the role played by the teacher and students social relationship