Guitar Hero World Tour and Music 112

Posted on February 19, 2009 
Filed Under Engagement Initiative

Staff from our Education Gaming Commons team have been working with Dr. Ann Clements and Dr. Tom Cody (School of Music) on a way to incorporate Guitar Hero World Tour into a section of Music 112 (Into Guitar Techniques). The result of this collaboration is a 3 week Guitar Hero project in which the class is divided into teams and tasked with using the in game music composer to play and record a simple song. Not only should the song be proof of some of the information learned in class, but it should also be structured in such a way that it can be used as an instructional tool for future students. In addition to their playable Guitar Hero song, each team will also be required to develop a learning plan on how, as a music teacher (a job many of them will go on to take), such a tool could be used in the classroom.

At the beginning of the project, a short survey was given to all students and each Guitar Hero class session (as well as optional, after class Guitar Hero tutorial sessions) are being recorded as a part of a research agenda associated with the project. Assuming all goes well, the hope is to develop the project into a larger part of the course in the Fall, as well as potentially expanding it into the more advanced guitar techniques courses. The head of the music composition program, Paul Barsom, has also expressed interest in possibly incorporating the music games into his class in the future.

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One Response to “Guitar Hero World Tour and Music 112”

  1. Guitars on March 24th, 2009 2:09 am

    This is really interesting that you can now use a game for playing guitar to teach others in music class without requiring real instruments. I plan to create my own guitar hero tracks of my album and put them on my band’s website for download.

    Interesting, awesome stuff!

    Aaron Kronis

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