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The Sherwood-Suzuki project

You might be interested to contribute to this project for a whole variety of reasons...

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  • Was Jane your teacher, lecturer or personal tutor?

  • Was Jane your colleague or friend?

  • Do you teach a bioscience subject in HE?

  • Are you a Suzuki music teacher?

  • Are you a Suzuki music student?

  • You're just interested!

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Please read more at the bottom of this page, and then please drop me a quick email if you'd like to be involved (to whatever extent). Thank you.

Can we build a new pedagogic framework for teaching and supporting bioscience university students that is based on the principles of a music education theory for children?

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Let's keep Dr Jane Sherwood's light shining and let's continue to be inspired by her work - please do join in and spread the love, inspiration and joy of teaching and learning.  

Students in a Science Class
Music Class

How did the Sherwood-Suzuki project start?

When you're not sure where to start, just start somewhere. When I lost my dearest friend Dr Jane Sherwood to breast cancer last year, I was absolutely devastated, and I still am. We lost our brightest star in many ways. Jane had taught Biomedical Science at DMU for almost 25 years. Besides being like a sister to me and somebody I will miss every day,  Jane was a phenomenal lecturer, an inspirational personal tutor and a truly wonderful colleague. Everybody - the whole community of staff and current and former students - wanted to make sure that we remember Jane and that we try to carry on her awesomeness in terms of how she taught and supported her students so magnificently. We already set up a graduation prize in Jane's name (read more here) which is absolutely amazing. This project is more about trying to unpick why Jane's unique approach to teaching and student support was so outstanding, and to see if we can turn this into some sort of easy-to-follow pedagogic framework that we can share with lecturers across and beyond our university. 

What is the Suzuki method of teaching and learning?

If you were taught Biomedical Science or Medical Science by Jane at DMU, you might not have known that Jane was also a world-class cello teacher. She was a "Suzuki" cello teacher, making her a member of a very special global community of music teachers and learners.

Shinichi Suzuki  (1898-1998) was a Japanese violinist and music teacher who developed a unique approach to teaching music, which (in a nutshell) works on the premise that (a) talent is acquired not inherited, meaning that anybody can learn to master a musical instrument given the right environment, and that (b) learning (an instrument) should also build a young person's character to give them a good heart. Thus, the Suzuki method is different from other teaching methodologies because it centres around a learning community. Parents and family are a key part of the music lessons, practice should be regular and fun, and the basics should always be revised. If you're interested to learn more, then there are lots of books and online articles you can read, but a quick look on Wikipedia is fairly informative.

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How did Jane apply these ideas to teaching and supporting bioscience students at university? Which of these principles is easy and which might be harder for lecturers to implement? Is music education really that different from science education? If you're interested, then read on...

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(Note: massive thanks to Jane's daughter and amazing musician Libby Sherwood for educating me further about the Suzuki method and for her help and encouragement with getting this project off the ground. Apologies to any Suzuki folks who could probably improve my explanation a great deal - I'm coming at this from a lay person's approach as I am not a music teacher)

So, what is the Sherwood-Suzuki method?

Well, the short answer is that it's going to be something very special because I'm hoping that we can build it together (we = anybody who would like to be involved; so, hopefully, a mix of music teachers, bioscience teachers, Jane's students and colleagues).

 

In a nutshell, the Sherwood-Suzuki method will be a new pedagogic framework to see if we can unpick and "formalise" the approach that I believe Jane used to teach bioscience so successfully - by putting some of the Suzuki principles at the heart, but tweaking them such that they'll work for adult learners of a science course.

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At the moment, I've put together this draft framework based on a star (a nod to Twinkle, Twinkle Little Star) with six points which I think/hope(?) embody the key principles of why Jane was such a phenomenal teacher... all of this is up for discussion and by the end of the first phase of the project this might look completely different. See what you think...

sherwood star.png

Could you help with this project?

I am very lucky and honoured to have been awarded one of the five inaugural Centre for Academic Innovation Sabbaticals from CAI at DMU to give me two dedicated weeks to work on this project, between June 29th - July 10th. So, for now, please drop me a quick email if you can help in any way. I would be particularly  interested to hear from anybody who was taught by Jane, anyone who taught with Jane, any Suzuki music teachers, and any bioscience lecturers at any university. If you're not sure what to say, just send the word "yes" and I'll get back in touch with you. If you find it easier to talk, please provide your phone number. Once I have a mailing list, then I'll try to put together some remote meetings with different groups of people, in a way that will work for you. If you'd prefer to talk 1:1 that's fine, please just let me know what's best.

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