ETEC 523 A1 - John Hamblett

UBC ETEC 523 Assignment A1 John Hamblett

what is yousician?

Analyzing the mobile music education app

yousician

RATIONALE and CONTEXT

Features include a wide variety of interactive video lessons, songs at varying difficulty levels, a built-in tuner, missions (technical exercises), and practice mode where students can pause, loop, speed up, and slow down songs.

Year 'Sunday Times' listed it on the "World's Best App List

2012

Instrument options to choose from

2010

Year the company was founded

what is yousician?

Yousician is a Finnish mobile music practice app. The initial download is free on mobile devices. No extra equipment is necessary, just your instrument, your mobile device, and you! Much like SmartMusic, it uses audio signalling processes to detect if the correct note was played at the correct time.

PERSONAL EXPERIENCE AND PROS

Example of Yousician used in a guitar class.

I chose Yousician because it ties directly back to my original guiding research question for this program: how can educational technology be used to help music education? This app is new to me, and I saw potential benefits in a variety of settings: supplemental material for private lessons, a starting point for self-directed learning, and potentially a curriculum supplement in music classrooms (in-person, hybrid, and also online). When trialling this app, my goal was to see how viable an option it is in the previous scenarios. To trial this, I used the app with the following instruments (listed in order of how often I used each): guitar, ukulele, piano, and voice. I had not yet had a chance to try bass with the app. Additionally, I taught ukulele with my intermediate students using the app.

rationale and context

After creating a login, and picking your music preferences, you can jump right in. The first lessons are extremely clear and well scaffolded. For example, for the singing stream, instead of singing a song right away, the app has you copy app's voice and work on scooping your voice up to match the pitch.

Ease of Starting

Yousician is very scaffolded and focuses on gamification (i.e., badges, points, streaks) to promote consistent practice and achieving a high level before moving on to the next task (à la Duolingo). Much like regular rehearsal practice, Yousician practice mode focuses on isolating a challenging spot, breaking it down to the issue (i.e., too fast), and then putting it back together in context. Furthermore, before you start, the app asks what songs and genres you would like to learn and offers accordingly. They continue to add to their song library and offer new courses like their Metallica fingerpicking course.

Scope, Sequence, and Engagement

Using loops in practice mode

LIMITATIONS AND PREMIUM VERSION

personal experience and pros

Although the program is well-sequenced, the leap from playing open strings to adding frets as a whole class is a sudden jump. Additionally, the sound registering on electric piano is not always great (especially if the piano is turned up too loud).

Gaps in Learning

EDUCATIONAL RESEARCH

The biggest obstacle for many will be cost. You can get started on the app and start to feel like you're really gaining momentum, right up until you're about to play your first full song. Unfortunately, all songs seemed to be inaccessible on the free version. It's an enticing marketing ploy to suck the players in and want more for the 7 day free trial. After the trial, the price changes to about $12.00 Canadian/month.

Premium Version

One potential drawback is having a whole class play at once with Yousician. As shown on a previous video example, the teacher had to place microphones around the room to pick up students' playing. What would happen if half the students play correctly, and half don't? So far in my experience the app has a done a good job picking up the correct sound and registering it if most of the class is playing the right note. I haven't needed to use a microphone, I've just used the built-in laptop microphone. A larger sample size will be needed to truly know.

Use with a Whole Class

limitations and premium version

CLOSING THOUGHTS

At the time of posting, There was only one peer-reviewed article pertaining to Yousician. It was posted in the journal Learning and Motivation titled: Music education: Which is more effective - Traditional learning or the introduction of more modern technologies to increase student motivation? The article uses the Yousician app and compares it to the control group, finding a 10.9% increased achievement compared to the control group (Wang, 2022). However, this article has since been retracted because of a fake peer review. All of this is to say that there is still limited research on the topic, and no confirming results regarding student achievement and motivation on Yousician.

Learning and Motivation

educational research

REFERENCES

While the academic research is still quite limited, based on my own personal experience and the experience of other users', both adults and younger students, Yousician can be a valuable resource. It can help motivate students, offer a wider musical library than YouTube and other online sources, and provide meaningful interactive feedback. The feedback can even be as specific as saying if your playing is late, early, which string you played instead of the correct one, and if one of the strings (and which string it is) was muted when you are playing a chord. Yousician can easily guide players from absolute beginner to a novice/intermediate stage with proper playing habits. It can also work as a whole class curriculum or supplemental tool (with a few gaps in the sequencing that will have to be addressed by the teacher). However, using the tool will allow the teacher to circulate and work more one-on-one with students as the program is playing. With all this said, there isn't a lot of content that can be accessed with the free or premium version of the app. It will need to be the premium plus to offer the best educational value. This financial drawback can be a deterrent for both students and teachers. All in all, it is a valuable contribution to the music educational technology sphere and can increase skills, motivation, and accessibility for students. Steps moving forward will be to see if the academic research will support Yousician, what new features and instruments it will support, if the song library continues to expand, and if prices will rise with the app.

Is Yousician a valauble resource?

practical applications and closing thoughts

Guitar Starz Club. (2020, August 28). Yousician in the music classroom. [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yqML14P53eA School of Rock. (n.d.) Reading guitar tabs for beginners. https://www.schoolofrock.com/resources/guitar/reading-guitar-tabs-for-beginners Wang, Y. (2022). Retraction notice to “Music education: Which is more effective – Traditional learning or the introduction of modern technologies to increase student motivation?” Learning and Motivation, 80. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.lmot.2022.101783 Yousician. (2020, October 2). Yousician how-to: Using loops in practice mode. [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iIO9zXVR-nc Yousician. (2021, October 12). Yousician app overview. [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EESFXkyn9Fs&t=96s Yousician. (n.d.) Yousician: Learn guitar, piano, ukulele with the songs you love. https://yousician.com

RATIONALE and CONTEXT

references