Music education at the primary level in Syria,before and during the current crisis

Research methodology

To provide a clear idea about the situation of music education at primary level in Syria before and during the current crisis, which began in 2011, first, I conducted historical research on the political and social background of the problem via document analysis. Due to insufficient written information and references on this topic. I then probed into different kinds of resources (e.g. YouTube) for the purpose of broadening the scope and accuracy of authentic information. It was therefore necessary to search the internet for videos from Youtube and Facebook, interviews, articles, and newspapers.

I then conducted interviews with Syrian music educators to understand prior and current teaching conditions and concerns. Because I could not visit Syria to do the research there, I contacted five music teachers who had studied in different Syrian musical institutions and currently work there. I found that interviewing three teachers was sufficient because their answers were similar. I therefore used responses from these three interviewees for this study. The three educators are from different generations, and they all have experience in teaching at the primary level. In addition, I added some of my own experiences in Syria as a student at government schools, as a student at a government-funded music institution, and as a teacher at the following music institutions: The Assad’s Youth Institute of Music, the Higher Institute of Music in Damascus, and the Faculty of Music at the University of Al-Baath.

Interviewing each teacher required up to three meetings, each of which took about 2 hr. We used Facebook messenger.

The main research question was: What is the current state of music education, in primary schools and music institutions in comparison to the state of music education, prior to the Syrian crisis in 2011? To answer this question, I created a set of interview questions, which included the following questions:

Via these sub-questions, I aimed to cover the development of the music education system during the past few decades especially after the crisis. In the process of the interviewing the teachers, I learned much from Thaera Hawijah, who has taught music in Syrian schools at the primary level for 31 years; in addition to having taught during the crisis.

A concise overview of the history of music education before the period of the modern Syrian state

There is ample evidence that music education has existed in Syria since the Sumerian era (الشريف, 2015). In fact, some of the oldest music education cuneiform tablets describe a music lesson in Babylonia in the period 1900–1700 BC (The Schoyen Collection, 2022, Cf. MS 2340). Music and music education have always been part of the culture of what we call now “Syria.” However, there was a period, mainly during the occupation of the Ottoman Empire, when music sciences were the music sciences were dormant.

The modern Syrian state was established following two main periods of occupation of the Levant region where modern Syria is located. The first is the Ottoman occupation which succeeded the Mamluks Period (Masters, 2013, pp. 69–72) and lasted for approximately four centuries between ca. 1516 and 1918.

The second occupation was by the French, who defeated the Ottomans in 1918 and, supported by the British, divided the Levant into many states through the Sykes–Picot Agreement (Tabler, 2016, pp.1–2). One of those states is modern Syria. The French ruled the country until 1946, the year of independence.

During the Ottoman occupation of the Levant, education and sciences at large music in particular were marginalized (Masters, 2013, p. 120). The more the Ottoman Empire expanded, the more it depended on extortion for financial and military support. Therefore, education was not important for areas far from the capital of the empire, Istanbul (الشعلة, 2019). In the 19th century, almost all schools in the Levant were categorized according to the different sects of each religion, so there were schools for Muslims and Christians. as well as for Jews. Each group based their music curriculum mainly on their own theology, sciences, literatures, and sacred music in addition to some traditional music (Masters, 2013, p. 196). The Levant Eastern Orthodox Christians were pioneers in bringing their Gregorian music into schools, in addition to some Western musical methods that fitted church teaching, like the scout religious music groups (زيتون, 2014).

Only a few schools were built by the Ottomans, for example the Al- Shaabanieh School in, 1674 (يوسف, 2011) and the Al-Ottoman School in 1730 (يوسف, 2010). However, other schools had been built before the 14th century like the Al-zujajieh School in 1142 (الحلبي, p. 84) and the Al-Ashrafieh School in (Ibid, p.70); both were built in Aleppo in the 12th century (ابن العجمي, 1996 , pp. 333–392). The Al-Halawiyah Madrasa was also built at that time and the Helena Cathedral (built in 313–324 A.C.) was converted into a school in 1124 (الحلبي, 1988 , p. 89). The main interest for the Ottoman Empire, at the turn of the 19th century, was to build a powerful army. Therefore, their priority was to open military preparatory schools in every provincial capital. (Provence, 2011, pp. 205–215).

Most of the Christian Syrians followed the Greek and Syriac Orthodox Church of Antioch. They had good contacts with the Ecumenical Patriarchates of Constantinople, Greece, and Russia and with the sacred music of those countries. Music was an essential subject at their schools. In 1851 to 1852, the priest and educator Joseph of Damascus (Joseph George Haddad Firzli) established a high school where teachers taught sacred Byzantine music. Approximately 360 students attended (زيتون, 2016). The Jews had a Talmud Torah in Damascus with about 450 students (Encyclopaedia Judaica, 2008), in addition to teaching pizmonims and other Jewish chants in Aleppo (Catton, n.d.). The three main religions in the Levant performed their music by using similar traditional maqamat and music instruments in accordance with the musical heritage to which they belonged. At the turn of the 19th century, there were only a few music pedagogues; one of them was Ali al- Darwish who studied at the Ashrafieh school. Later, in 1932 during the French occupation, he participated officially in the first Conference of Arabic Music (خرتش, 1988). Thomas (2007) suggests that:

The 1932 Conference of Arab music was a landmark event that has shaped music education, scholarship, and cultural policy in Arab countries since that time (p. 1).

The challenges in developing intercultural music curricula in post-independence period

During the French Occupation [1920–1946] Syrians united to fight against occupation. Their first revolt [1925–1927] brought with it revolutionary musicians who fired the spirit of people. Politicians acknowledged music’s role in uniting Syrians in their resistance to French occupation and music’s status improved. One devoted politician, Fakhri al-Baroudi, supported the establishment of the first Institute of Oriental Music in 1928, though it was later closed by the French commander. Nevertheless, al-Baroudi, after obtaining the approval of the French authority, re-established the Institute of Oriental Music in 1943. It was the first institute that belonged to the Ministry of Education. After 2 years it was closed again, only to be re-established later in 1947 (الشريف, 2011 , p. 13). It focused on the musical heritage revival of Al-Samah and al-Shekhanie dances, but not on music education (الشريف, 2015). In fact, there was a gap between French music culture on the one hand and Arab and Middle Eastern music cultures on the other, which made the mission of finding a unifying suitable music education curriculum impossible. All countries occupied by France at this time faced this same dilemma (الشريف, 2011 , p. 14). This problem still exists in Syria today. Music educators in Syria have not yet developed either new methods based on the European ones or methods based on local cultures. This situation lasted until the foundation of the High Institute of Music in Damascus in 1990, when many music teachers returned to Syria from the Republics of the Soviet Union. Music education before that time can be described as basic learning by listening. From 1990 music performing skills were developed, but not in primary schools.

I summarize the reasons behind the failure of finding suitable music education for the different regions in Syria as follows:

Interculturality as a problem in the music curricula in modern Syria

Until the early 1980s, there were no curricula for music education in Syrian schools. Music education was treated as unessential subject. Only one teacher guide was assigned for all primary grades. The teachers had to depend on their own efforts to be in touch with world experiences and to find external references, although most, almost all, of these references were not for children unless they could import scores or books from foreign countries, mainly Europe and North America, which was very difficult at that time (Aleas, 2013, p. 298).

Although the French/English occupation (1923–1946) was somehow more tolerant to music education, the situation did not become much better than it had been during the Ottoman occupation. However, the Syrian upper class became more favorably disposed toward Western and Middle Eastern cultures; thus, many music clubs and music schools were established (الشريف, 2013 , p. 14). Simultaneously, new musical forms had intruded into traditional music under the influence of Western music, like romantic and social monologs, dialogs and songs based on Western rhythms, as in the Tango, Bolero, Rumba, Waltz (الشريف, 2015). Unfortunately, the French occupation did not encourage research based on developing methodologies that could have led to better education based on more enlightened Arab culture. Instead, French occupiers imposed their the only alternative. This problem continued even after Syrian independence, due to a persistent fanaticism in education and culture that colors Syrian life until now. In short, it is a fact that all Syrian governments have not supported music education and, till now, music is not an important or fundamental subject in the curricula of primary education (الشريف, 2013 , pp. 39–45). In 2011, there was a plan to develop the music education curricula, but unfortunately, the plan did not see the light (NASR, 2011–2012).

Required qualifications for music teachers

Three main Syrian governmental institutions are responsible for offering the highest degrees in music education. All three institutions require applicants to hold a secondary school certificate (حمد, 2015).

Interviews with music teachers for primary education in Syria

Due to the lack of research and information about the education system in Syria, especially in music, and due to the difficulties in visiting Syria and conducting in-person interviews with the three teachers there, I was able to complete this research only because I used an online platform. The first teacher is Thaera Hawijah, who represens the the older generation as she is about 55 years old. She has taught music in primary government schools for 30 years. She obtained her elementary teaching certificate (أهلية تعليم اعدادي) in 1989 from the Institute for Teacher Training in Hama/Department of Music.

The second teacher I interviewed is Ritta Safieh, representing the younger generation, who graduated from the Institute for Teacher Training in 2007 and has a certificate enabling her to teach elementary classes. She decided to study further to obtain a Bachelor’s Degree in Music. She studied at the Faculty of Music Education in Al-Baath University, where she graduated in 2012 and started her career as a music educator at government schools. In addition, she taught cello at the Faculty of Music Education. Safieh claims that students who study at the institutes for teacher training have better education in pedagogy, because they have more opportunities to do internships and to observe other students doing their internships, in addition to visiting schools to discuss various issues regarding teaching music with practicing educators. The acceptance test and study program were somehow better during her study period than now:

After the start of the crisis in Syria, they started to accept students who have almost no knowledge of music. This means that the educational standard of students is seriously reduced. In addition, we could not do school visits and internships because of the unexpected bombardment of different areas in the country, besides the excessive feeling of insecurity.

Safieh adds:

The lecturers in both music education institutions have neither PhD degree nor experience in running research. Thus, they do their experiments directly with the students and they invent new methods. Because of that, they often change the study system at the faculty.

Agreeing with Safieh, Nasra the third teacher, observed that:

. . .the only benefit that I could have at the Faculty of Music was to learn basics of how to play the piano.

Rasil Nasra graduated from the Institute for Teacher Training in 2012 with an elementary teaching certificate. In 2016, after gaining her teaching certificate, Nasra worked in a kindergarten as a music teacher assistant. She stated:

I had not studied special methods to teach children. I had to develop suitable ones by my self. There are/ were no references or special courses about that. Later, I faced the same problem when I was teaching in a school for people with special needs.

She later decided to do a Bachelorès Degree in Music Education at the Faculty of Music Education in Al-Baath University. She is in her last semester.

Graduate students can work as teaching assistants at schools due to the need for teachers in their fields of study. They are paid per hour or earn credit hours. From time to time, the Ministry of Education announces a call for teacher positions. All graduates can apply for these. The Ministry appoints the successful participants to schools in different provinces as needed. The selected teachers might be appointed to schools in provinces very far from their cities, towns, or villages. However, they can obtain permission to move to the city where they wish to live, though this might take months or even years.

Since 2014, students who have graduated from the Faculty of Music Education at Al-Baath University and at the Higher Institute of Music-Damascus are able to enroll in a Master in Music Education at the Faculty of Education. ¹

Safieh explained the reason for quitting teaching at government schools and the Faculty of Music Education:

The salary was very poor at both institutions and there was a lack of safety. At that time [2013-2014]. Homs (where the Faculty of Music is located) was not a safe city. The governmental school where I was teaching is in a village near Homs. The people there are from the same religious sect as the President. They were fully armed. The children and their parents did not give any care to music. Many problems happened. It was not safe. We (teachers who are not originally from this village) were always afraid of the reaction of the students and their parents.

Safieh continued:

After I moved to my city (Salamiyah, about 30 miles from Homs). I felt safer but the teaching conditions in government schools were very poor because many families had fled from hot war zones in Syria to Salamiyah, which was safer. Because of this, there are more than 40 students in a classroom whereas prior to the crisis, there had been only about 30. It was not easy to run the class. In addition, teachers had to augment their low salaries by teaching music privately. Thus, government schools lost their educational mission. Now, there are two reasons for students to go to schools: not to be recorded as absent and for poor students because this is the only place to learn.

Hawijah had a different opinion. She commented:

It is a moral mission [that] encourages many teachers to continue teaching at schools although they earn little money, which is a hopeless situation. I taught only at government schools for 31 years and retired two years ago. The salary is one of the main reasons for my early retirement. ²

Teaching methods in the classroom

Previous to the crisis, music teachers usually had professional development opportunities, depending on if there had been changes to the curricula, which often occurred annually. The aim of professional development courses was to update the teaching methodology of the teachers. Usually, the duration of the teacher training course was 1 week. Each teacher prepared a presentation (a mock lecture) as part of their professional development . This strategy was changed after the crisis and minimized due to the situation in the country (Hawijah, 2021).

Hawijah shared an example of a teacher’s lesson plan:

The duration of the presentation is 45 min. The plan includes the following points:

Safieh and Nasra found that the teaching plan is just a formal issue to be handed in to the director of the school. Safieh said:

It is the same paper with some unclear keywords that the teacher should fill each time before his teaching class to show the benefits and goals of what he/she does: Patriotic, social, mental and psychological health, etc. In fact, I did it to satisfy the director of the school and the Education Directorate.

Experiences in the classroom

The teacher divides the lecture into three phases, each of which has goals, techniques, strategies, practical methods and different ways of performing (solo, duet, choir, group):

In addition to the previous points Hawijah teaches the student songs about the lack of oil, water, gas, electricity, etc (حويجة, 2020) in pleasant melodies and lyrics which make the children glad and happy while singing:

Sometimes in winter it can be very cold for the children to play music and to sing because of the lack of fuel. I try to warm them up with music, when the temperature in winter (in the class room) can normally be below 30ºF.

In an interview on the Syrian official TV station, the main author of the school music curricula, who is also the senior music superintendent in the Ministry of Education, mentioned that the goal of the curricula is to discharge emotions, to give emotional balance, and to rear children by keeping them away from the Syrian crisis. Hawijah did not agree fully with that, she claimed:

A music superintendent visited my class. The day coincided with a day for a certain occasion, so I performed that song about the bad economic situation with my students in the schoolyard. Students and teacher were there. The superintendent was upset, and he claimed that the children should stay far from politics and stress. I replied, explaining that children live the daily problems in the country. So, we cannot ask them simply to ignore these problems and to sing just for the beauty in an ugly life. It is their daily life, so let us make something funny in it. After he listened to my comment, he was glad and he awarded me an Appreciation Certificate (Hawijah, 2021).

Nasra explain her teaching routine:

Each group at the primary level has 45 mins of music instruction twice a week. First, I introduce the song that I am going teach to the students by reading the lyrics and clarifying the meaning it implies. Then, if there is electricity, the students do a one-minute warm up with me by singing the C Major scale. I use my keyboard. The students also learn something about music instruments, some musical games, history of music, and they can perform their music if they wish. At the end of my teaching hour, I summarize and assess. Despite the fact that there is a war and there has been a crisis at almost all levels of society, the students show interest for music class.

The music curricula during the Syrian crisis

After the Syrian crisis, music classrooms are in need of various musical instruments. Prior to the crisis, it was possible for the teacher to ask the directory of the school for instruments they required for their lectures or school concerts. This choice is no longer possible because of the economic crisis.

Ritta Safieh described the situation:

I stopped bringing my oriental-keyboard ³ to my classes because there is no electricity. Nowadays, I use recorded music on my mobile connected to a speaker to play Arab maqamat and music.

In addition to musical instruments, a music teacher should prepare different education explanation tools (nonverbal devices) for his lecture. The music curriculum has had no change since 2005. The last update was in 2020 after some basic criticism by experienced teachers, society, and even the political oppositions against the previous curricula. It was serious criticism that targeted poetry texts in the curricula that children were required to learn by heart. The parents did not protest against teaching methods but against the contents of the curricula.

The first objection was to poetry that, from their point of view, was superficial, without meaning, and written in artificial nonsense Arabic poetry. An example of what was denounced was:

The Elephant washes himself

Splat, Splat, Splat, splash, splash, splash

The second type of poetry to be excluded was the English Kookaburra Song written by Marion Sinclair. The lyrics of the song end with the following verse: Gay your life must be! (أيوب et al., p. 14), which was denounced as English poetry “calling for insane homosexuality.”

Critics accused the government of being careless about curricular content. The political opposition claimed that the government encouraged homosexuality. As a result, the curricula were changed due to those objections. For primary education there are two teacher guides. The first one covers elementary education from the first grade to the sixth; and the second covers what is called preparatory education, from the seventh grade to the ninth. Both teacher guide-books are authored by the same six authors (أّيوب, et al., 2018–2019) who have no research experience, nor qualifying study degrees, like a doctoral degree. Therefore, the guide-books lack the knowledge of the local spirit, the familiarity with the needs of the class, and the spirit of genuine research. The authors of the latest edition of the curriculum were named anonymously as “a group of experts” (فئة من المختصين, 2019−2020).

Hawijah claims that the content found in the curriculum is not sufficient, and therefore teachers search for additional materials from music found in daily life. Further to that, there is a lack of children’s music in the Arab World, so that teachers use pop songs which are not suitable for children in their lessons. In one of the videos the teacher was asking the students to follow her movement with the music of Umm Kulthum, laileh wa Laileh, composed by Baligh Hamdi, which is not suitable for a child to learn. Unfortunately, it is also difficult to find good specialized journalists who can discuss such cases in the education system (Lisan News, 2018).

Syria has various ethnic, religious, and geographic groups that shape a variety of local and traditional musics. For example, the music in the big cities like Damascus, Aleppo, and Homs is typically classical Arab traditional music, but the musics of the inner part of the Syrian desert, the Syrian coast, Kurdish areas, and the Bedouin desert differ considerably in each area, although many of them share similar music theories and some music instruments. However, music instructors in institutions from which music teachers graduate do not teach pre-service teachers how to deal with such problems, so teachers of music have to find solutions by themselves, like helping students to learn aurally regardless of scientific teaching methods. Nevertheless, the primary school curriculum includes the varieties of traditional music of different provinces in Syria, and teachers must teach them (الأسعد, 2011).

Nasra invented her methods during missile attacks on her city years ago. She explained:

In the beginning, the children in the classroom were very afraid of the sound of the missiles and the explosions. Therefore, I tried to make them face their fear by imitating the sound of the missile when it is in the air and then the explosion. They used crescendo and diminuendo to explain the sound. I made them think as if the missile attacks are part of the music class. Although it was not easy for me personally to work and to be calm in this condition, I gave my best not to show that on my face.

Discussion and findings

The historical review provides an interpretation of the current situation of music education in Syria before and during the crisis, showing the generally disadvantageous effects of the Ottoman and French occupations on Syrian music culture. The Ottomans priority was army and religion; the French occupation was against national cultural activities, while the interests of the dictatorships that followed were concerned with personal achievement. The attitude of the various local governments that, have ruled the country since has affected many aspects of music and music education. The interviews describe the situation resulting from the events of the last five decades. The teachers I interviewed (Hawijah, Safieh, and Nasra) assured me that the educational study of music at the Institute for Teacher Training is sufficient for teaching music at the primary level. Safieh confirmed that they were better than the four full years study at the Faculty of Music at the University of Al-Baath, which suffers from the absence of a teaching plan, experts, good curricula and research studies and is in chaos because of a lack of experts and the migration of good scholars (Croitoru, 2018). The teachers at the Faculty who graduated from the Higher Institute of Music in Damascus are able to teach both practical and theoretical subjects like instrument performance, harmony, music history, and instrumentation well. However, they are not able to handle teaching methodology and other teaching techniques, which a teacher needs in the classroom. Taking all of that into consideration, we can conclude that conducting, composition, and contemporary music studies not yet exist in Syrian music institutions.

Music education curricula in institutions and at schools have serious gaps in their content to support pre-service music educators in their future contexts, specifically (1) knowledge of Syria’s various ethnic groups and their musics, (2) pedagogies that the teachers can use in the different societies that form modern Syria, (3) performance of traditional and local music instruments, and (4) materials already used by other societies. Music teachers in the musical institutions also face difficulties in finding intercultural and transcultural pedagogical methods for school settings that align with the various Syrian traditional music cultures, which might give birth to new Syrian cultural creations.

I encountered many ethical and practical difficulties in conducting this research. In addition to a lack of research resources, there were many political questions and issues of safety for the interviewed teachers. The war and the economic siege against the Syrian regime have changed Syrians priorities, and education is now not one of them. Music life in general, and with it music education development, have faced horrific degeneration during the crisis. Furthermore, it was not possible to ask any direct political questions due to the situation. The questions were more go-between and far from being politically critical. Obviously, the Syrian regime uses music and music lyrics in the education system as a tool for supporting its propaganda and ideology in schools. Hawijah retired in the past year, Safich left governmental schools 2 years ago to teach music privately, and Nasra will soon start a new job at the theater school, which for her, is less stressful than teaching in primary school.

Conclusion

During the current difficult time in Syria, music education should play a main role in the rehabilitation of the children to cope with their problems. It is clear that the music education system has many problems not just in terms of school music curricula but also in the music pedagogy institutions. There are issues that should be resolved in the curricula, like developing suitable children’s songs, traditional musics, and educational methods for children. Furthermore, there are other issues that should be reconsidered like child psychology, politics, and poverty. These issues should be reformulated in the music pedagogy institutions. Researchers in these institutions should be capable of writing the music curricula for primary education, in the first place, and secondly the music teachers in these institutions should be able to teach and to train students, who dedicate themselves to a consciousness effort to heal children. There should therefore be more national and international efforts, which take into consideration the sensitive issues like religion, politics and society. This can be done only by collaboration among experts and researchers at conferences and workshops. It is also important that more scholars obtain higher qualifications and learn more about the newest methods in music education pedagogy, which do not exist in the current curricula. Microtonal maqam music and traditional local instruments are important themes which should be strongly present for the students, so that music teachers can learn how to use musical elements from the society where they educate. Finally, there should be governmental support for composers and poets to write suitable children’s music. International support for teachers, students, and music educational institutions is urgently required. Teachers should be supported financially, including training workshops, given the Syrian crises that have affected Syrian children almost as if they had been specially targeted.