Reading Test 03

|Part 1|

Musical Instrument Classification

The instruments of the western orchestra are conventionally divided into four sections: woodwind, brass, percussion and strings. However, a much more comprehensive system for classifying musical instruments - ancient and modern, eastern and western, orchestral and folk - is also available.

This alternative system, based on the work of Erich von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs, provides for the classification of musical instruments of all shapes and sizes according to how their sounds are produced. It begins by dividing instruments into four broad groups - aerophones, chordophones, idiophones and membranophones.

The first group, aerophones, contains any instrument that makes a sound when the air within or around it is made to vibrate. Further classification within the group is made according to how the air is set into vibration. Simplest are the so-called free aerophones (roarers and buzzers), which consist of a flat disc twirled through the air on a string. More typically, aerophones have a hollow tube or vessel body into which air is introduced by blowing. Sub-groups include instruments with a blow hole (most flutes) or a whistle mouthpiece (whistles and whistle flutes), in which the air vibrates after being blown against a sharp edge. In instruments with a cup mouthpiece, such as trumpets and horns, it is the action of the player's lips that causes the air to vibrate. Vibrations within a tube may also be produced by a reed taken into the musician's mouth. Such reeds may be single (clarinets) or double (oboes). Instruments classified as free-reed aerophones, such as mouth organs and concertinas, have vibrating reeds within the body of the instrument. Organs and bagpipes are hybrid forms, each with pipes of different kinds.

The name chordophones is used for instruments with strings that produce a sound when caused to vibrate. Further classification is based on body shape and on how vibrations are induced. There are five basic types: bows, lyres, harps, lutes and zithers. The simplest musical bows have a single string attached to each end of a flexible stick; others have resonators to amplify the sound. Lyres, common in ancient times, have a four-sided frame consisting of a soundbox, two arms and a crossbar. The plucked strings run from the front of the soundbox to the crossbar. Harps are basically triangular in shape, with strings attached to a soundboard and the instrument's 'neck'.

Classified as lutes are all instruments with strings that run from the base of a resonating 'belly' up and along the full length of an attached neck. This sub-group is further divided into plucked lutes (round- or flat-backed), and bowed lutes (including folk fiddles and violins). The fifth type, zithers, have strings running the entire length of the body and are subdivided into simple zithers (stick, raft, tube or trough-shaped), long zithers (from the Far East), plucked zithers (such as the psaltery and harpsichord), and struck zithers (including the dulcimer and piano).

The third main group, idiophones, contains instruments made of naturally sonorous material, which are made to sound in various ways. They range in complexity from two sticks simply struck one against another, to tuned instruments like the orchestral glockenspiel. Idiophones are further classified according to the method of sound production into eight sub-groups: stamped, stamping, scraped, friction, shaken (bells and rattles), plucked (jew’s harps), concussion (when two sonorous parts are struck together, for example cymbals) and percussion (when a non-sonorous beater is used for striking). Percussion idiophones are further subdivided by shape into bars (metallophones, lithophones, xylophones), vessels (slit drums and steel drums), gongs and two types of bell (struck and clapper).

Hornbostel and Sachs termed their final broad group membranophones. In these instruments sound is produced by the vibration of a membrane or skin. Most drums fall into this category, being further classified by shape as frame, vessel and tubular drums, and by sounding method as friction drums. Tubular drums are further subdivided into long, footed, goblet, waisted, barrel, conical and cylindrical types. Much less important than drums are membranophones with an internal membrane vibrated by blowing, such as the kazoo.

The classification system of Hornbostel and Sachs, published in 1909, came before the burgeoning of electronic music in the second half of the twentieth century. The addition of a fifth group, to take in instruments that produce sound electronically (guitars, organs, synthesizers) would bring their system neatly up to date.

|Part 2|

Waterside: a study in suburban development

A Since the 1950s there has been an increasing trend for extended housing and commercial expansion to take the form of rapid suburban rather than urban development. There are several factors influencing the location and spread of such development, but an increase in economic activity is the trigger.

B The area to the west of Southampton Water, now known as Waterside, exemplifies several factors impacting on the shape and nature of recent development. Up until the early 1950s this area, occupying a narrow strip of predominantly rural land approximately twenty kilometres long by five kilometres wide between Southampton Water and the New Forest, was relatively sparsely populated. There were a number of small villages, including Hythe, Fawley, Holbury, Dibden and Marchwood; communications were poor, and farming and associated industries were the main sources of employment.

C The main town in the region, Southampton, was and still is one of the major UK ports. In the early part of the twentieth century, Southampton boomed as the growth in passenger numbers on transatlantic liners reached its peak. The main waterway leading to Southampton, Southampton Water, enjoys a long stretch of deep water channel suitable for large ocean-going vessels, and also benefits from an extended period of high tide because of its position in relation to the Isle of Wight. Existing settlement on the east side of the waterway made further expansion problematic, so a site was chosen on the west side to build a large oil refinery capable of handling the crude oil imported in the cargo holds of the enormous tankers then being built. The new refinery was built in the mid 1950s between Fawley and the coastal hamlet of Calshot.

D The effects on the Waterside area were dramatic. Firstly, a major road was built linking the new Fawley refinery to the road network around Southampton. Also, a number of ancillary chemicals and plastics industries developed, dependent on by-products of the refining process. Work opportunities expanded and the population began to grow rapidly as workers and their families moved into the area. House-building took off.

E The first areas to expand were around Fawley village, close to the refinery, and Hythe, the largest of the existing villages, with a ferry link to Southampton. However, although expansion in house-building was rapid, the development of a new commercial centre with a range of services and the provision of an expanded range of educational and health services or entertainment and sporting facilities did not initially take place. Partly, this was due to the proximity of Southampton, with its large range of facilities, now easily accessible through improved road links.

F But there was another constraint on growth: the limited availability of land. Bordered on the east by Southampton Water, on the south by the sea, and limited to the north by the large village of Totton, almost a suburb of Southampton, there was only one direction expansion could go - westwards.

G There were, however, limits here too. West of Southampton Water lies the New Forest, an area of ancient woodland and open heath, soon to be designated a National Park. Although it occupies a relatively small area, about 160 square kilometres, the New Forest is a complex and diverse ecosystem supporting a wide variety of plants and animals, many of which are found only in this area or are under threat in other parts of the country. There are stringent planning restrictions on all new building or construction of any kind. Moreover, these restrictions are supported by the local population living within the Forest, who are determined to preserve the unspoilt character of their villages and whose income is increasingly dependent on providing services for the growing tourist industry exploiting the Forest as a leisure resource. In short, development was channelled along a relatively narrow corridor parallel to Southampton Water. The space between existing villages was progressively filled with housing until they coalesced. Little farming land now exists between Dibden and Fawley; housing estates have taken almost all the land. The area around Marchwood, further from Fawley, remains more rural, but some development has taken place here too. Nor has any nucleated commercial centre emerged, though the existing village centres now have more shops, offices and a greater range of public facilities.

H There is little room for further residential expansion in Waterside except in the area around Dibden Bay. Pressure for new housing development is now less, economic expansion has slowed considerably, and residents in the area are keen to preserve the bay area as a green open space with pleasant waterside views. But there is now a threat from another quarter. While passenger numbers using Southampton have declined, freight container traffic has continued to expand. The port area of Southampton has reached capacity. So the port authority are looking with speculative eyes at the one as yet undeveloped shoreline of Southampton Water with relatively easy access to deep water for large container ships - Dibden Bay.

|Part 3|

Education and Learning Methods

One finds oneself rebelling against a very controlled approach to education with its restrictions of centralization and, at the same time, against the liberal chaos that can at times prevail. There is a constant struggle between both camps of the educational divide, a struggle which invariably creates a jumbled mixture of educational provision. This is not to say that what is provided is totally unacceptable. Far from it.

In the educational world, picking and choosing from different theories, eclecticism, as is no doubt the case in many other fields, is frowned upon by the theoretical purist, irrespective of which of the two above camps they belong to. The pragmatists, practical classroom teachers, know that they have to jump from one teaching method to another, trying out new ones and discarding the old. But they frequently return again to tried and trusted techniques, sometimes with a fresh insight. Experienced teachers know that essentially there is not just one method, but that people learn in many different ways.

Some learners use a single method, but the most sophisticated employ an array of different techniques, instinctively or subconsciously, picking and even adapting any approach to suit their needs, while the not-so effective learners stick to a limited repertoire or even one method. The practicalities of the real world demand, however, that students and trainers in every field be eclectic.

Having a larger repertoire of strategies for learning, the sophisticated student advances at an exponential rate, as the different strategies he or she uses cross-fertilize and help each other. It is dangerous to exclude one particular technique in teaching or to follow one orthodoxy, as the one-size-fits-all principle does not, from a common sense point of view, work. It may deprive a weaker student of the only tool he or she may be able to use and deny the more effective learner an extra mechanism.

Take rote-learning, a much maligned learning process. There are certain aspects of any subject area, whether it be language or the arts or science, where a student is required to learn huge amounts of facts. Facts may be learnt by experience, but developing memory skills gives students an advantage in this area. Antipathy to certain methods like memory-based learning has condemned many students to a second-rate education, compounded by the fact that their teachers have been damaged by similar attitudes. It has been said that students are damned by the limitations of their teachers, just as the teachers themselves were damned.

This is not to say that rote-learning is the best approach to learning, yet it has its place as part of a wider programme. Where rote-learning proves inadequate is that it is not suitable for every learner. Not everyone is blessed with a good memory and learners should not be humiliated by not being able to learn things by heart. Other strategies need then be harnessed to compensate for this.

Electronic-learning

The search for ever more different novel learning styles goes on. Electronic-learning, or e-learning, is now very much the flavour of the month. The upside is that students may access the training whenever they want and they can learn at their own pace unhindered by fellow students. Again, whilst it has its place, e-learning lacks some essential ingredients, like the motivation of human contact in the classroom. Training is, in fact, inherently flawed as it is impossible to devise an exhaustive programme to accommodate every individual. Learners have individual needs that may not be catered for by distance-learning delivered on the Internet. Frustrated by their lack of development, they will not develop to their full potential.

One solution has been to build into any e-learning programme an element of human contact with on-line help via e-mail, but increasingly, as video-conferencing facilities become more advanced, designers are able to incorporate real-time video links. While this is a considerable advance, it still falls far short of the human contact that learning requires. E-learning is here to stay, so what needs to be done is to give it a human face. Not, might I add, a computerized one, but a real one. Students should be able, if necessary, to access a tutor by telephone or, even better, face to face. Periodic tutorials could be built in to any programme. These can be individual, group and seminar or a mixture of all three.

Distance learning, such as e-learning, comes with an oft unheeded caveat. It is seen by the unwary as a cheap option and as a way of curbing costs. Set up on a wave of innovation and excitement, the initial wave of enthusiasm soon wanes. Few take on board the warning: any self-access material that needs to be developed requires huge amounts of input time. It has been estimated that, for every student hour, materials writers have to put in 70 hours of preparation. The materials producers get the blame for any shortcomings: frequently, the quality and volume of material. Once in place, the material requires constant updating and research: an added cost.