In-Depth Blog Post 5:

1. What kinds of learning opportunities does the mentor provide to expose you to new learning?

My mentor has been a very nurturing mentor, and helps me learn with experience and theory. For example, when she taught me how to construct chords and chord progressions, she not only teaches me how they work, but helps me learn with experience by listening to different pieces of music and identifying their chord progressions, and what sort of style they give.

2. What kinds of learning opportunities exist to reinforce new learning?

To reinforce information and knowledge that I have just gained, I usually practice using that knowledge and test my understanding of it, which serves two purposes: it makes sure that I understand the topic and reveals anything that I do not yet understand and helps cement the newfound knowledge in my brain so I retain the information for later use.

3. What kinds of opportunities exist that might accelerate learning?

There are many opportunities that can accelerate learning. One of the ones that I use frequently is watching videos related to what you want to learn. For example, I often watch videos related to music on websites/apps such as YouTube, which often include different music styles on different instruments that could give me inspiration for music of my own, and also increase my understanding of music.

4. When you get together what do you talk about?

My mentor and I usually exchange the usual niceties, such as how they are doing, and then share some exciting experiences we have done since we have last seen each other. We also talk about my progress in my music lessons with my musical instruments. Then, we will discuss my progress so I can make a plan for what I still need to do and learn. After that, we begin our learning for that session.

5. What is going particularly well in your mentoring relationship right now?

She seems to always be interested in whatever I have to say, and is a very kind and nurturing mentor. We always just talk about ourselves after we exchange our niceties, which allows us to know each other better and increase trust between us, making a more comfortable relationship for both of us. This makes every mentoring session more pleasant and allows me to learn more efficiently.

6. What are you learning about one another?

I am learning a lot about my mentor, such as what sort of music she prefers, her personality, and interests. I have learned a lot about her beliefs and how she came to be how she is today. She is very close to her two cats, and she really believes in creativity and expressing your emotions through art.

For the past 6 weeks, I have had 4 mentoring sessions. Each time, I learned something new, such as different way to add effects such as reverb, or quantization. However, the main topic of my learning was quantization. Quantization is a way to edit the sounds in a song. It is when you move around notes you have recorded. It is most useful for eliminating imperfections in recorded music that you have played yourself, as it is a very rare occurrence for a person to play music completely in time. However, quantizing will sometimes make your music sound less human in a way, and sound a bit robotic. Nevertheless, it is still an extremely useful tool that allows creators to remove their human errors in music they record, making it an essential skill to learn for modern music creation.