Education for Improvising
with Conversation & Music,
for Seniors and K-12 Students

In early-August 2022, this page – written by Craig Rusbult (PhD in Education) during life on a road less traveled – had two proposals, to help people improve their improvising of conversation and music.  But now it's been replaced by another page that is one proposal, for only improvising music.  I made this change due to recognizing that conversation activities are very important personally (for seniors or K-12 students) and difficult to do consistently well, and I have low expertise in this area.  As explained in my current one-proposal page,

Why [did I change my proposal from music-and-conversation to only music]?  The change was due to a recognition that talking-activities should be done well – or not done at all – and doing them well would be difficult, plus my own justifiable humility in this area.   /   • All conversation activities should be done well because conversation is relationally important, so it's personally important;  it can be “high stakes” emotionally, for people of all ages.   • Due to the complexities of people and our conversations, doing conversation activities with consistently high quality — for most persons (who as a group have a wide variety of backgrounds, personalities, abilities) in a wide range of situations — would be difficult.   • And conversation education is an area where I have much less expertise, compared with music education where I feel more confident.    {e.g. one activity I describe might be high-stress, like a "speed dating" session for singles.}   /   For these reasons — because conversation activities would be personally important & would be difficult, and I have low expertise — I should approach conversation education cautiously, by humbly sharing ideas with others (who have more teaching expertise & experience) and mainly asking “what do YOU think?”, by contrast with my confident sharing-of-ideas in music education.

Below are some ideas – about possible conversation activities – that were in my original “two proposal” page, along with comments (added later) in green text.

Two Kinds of Improvising, for Two Stages of Life

What?  People are natural improvisers.  Everyone improvises with conversation, and some people do it with music.  By working cooperatively with other educators, I want to help people – especially seniors but also K-12 students, the old and young – improve their improvising skills with music and conversation.     { I still think both of these are useful, but now am thinking that I can have a more “direct” role with improvising music, and only an “indirect” role with improvising conversation. }

Why?  Because music & conversation are fun.  And according to scientific research,* people get major benefits (mental, emotional, physical) when they listen to music & make music.  And when they have good conversations, usually the benefits are even greater.    {* what we've learned about effects: summaries & links}   { The beneficial effects for young people & older people are similar, although not identical. }

What?  Now I'm proposing that when we're helping people improve their improvising, for music my ideas could be very useful, but for conversation the ideas of others will be more useful.  Why?  For most people, conversation is much more important than music, and that is a reason for me to be excited about helping people become more skillful in their conversational improvisation.  But it's also one of three reasons for caution – due to conversation's personal importance & its complexity, and my appropriate humility.  The complexity & importance are described in these pages (iou - later I'll select specific pages, but now will only link to a list of pages).

What?  In both stages of life, for people who are older & younger, some institutions (for example, senior living facilities & K-12 schools) already are doing some improvising activities for conversation and music.  I think a senior living facility typically should want to “do more” with both kinds of improvising.  But for a K-12 situation (in a classroom, school, district) educators must make tough decisions about how to invest their valuable resources (of time, people, money) by deciding whether they want to place more emphasis on helping students improve their skills with conversation, or music, or both, or neither.   /   a wide variety of contexts:  I'm saying "for example" because elderly people might be doing activities in a living facility or community center, at home, or elsewhere.  Similarly, young people can do activities in a variety of contexts, and so can people of other ages.  For simplicity, and because these are the main places where I want to promote improvising, in this page I'll focus on two contexts:  older people in a senior living facility, and younger people in a K-12 classroom.  More specifically, I'll begin by describing conversation activities for seniors that – using the metaphor of a bicycle wheel (with center-hub, spokes, rim) – supplement center-to-rim interactions (typical) with around-the-rim social interactions (better in many ways).  I've been thinking about how useful this kind of conversation-facilitating activity would be for seniors in living facilities, but it can be adapted for seniors in other situations, and for younger people in a K-12 classroom or elsewhere.

How?  Below are some strategies (proposed with appropriate humility) for helping people become better improvisers.  These general ideas will be customized by a teacher — e.g. for older people in a living facility or community center, or for younger people in a k-12 classroom — to fit their specific situation and goals.

Improvising Conversation

What?  education for improvising:   I define education broadly, as learning from life-experiences.  We can promote better education by helping people get more experiences, and learn more from their experiences with a growth mindset and in other ways.

Let's begin with one way to help seniors get more experience with conversations that – because we improvise during our conversing – will be improvised.    {and later we can do actions – to teach principles & facilitate activities – that will help them increase the improvisational nature of their conversations}

How?  by promoting experiences:   Imagine a bicycle wheel, with a center-hub, spokes, and rim.  This wheel is useful for analogy, to describe interpersonal interactions that are center-to-rim, and around-the-rim.  In senior living facilities, during most discussion activities a “sage on the stage” speaks, and residents listen.*  During these teaching activities the interactions are like wheel-spokes, with the staff's teacher (the center hub) mainly speaking to provide information, occasionally asking questions so residents (on the wheel-rim) can respond, but their actions are one-at-a-time, and typically only a few residents ever speak, only those who already feel comfortable with speaking.  {this tends to occur even when a teacher actively encourages participation by others}   /   When these activities – featuring the leader (at the hub) – are done well, they are valuable opportunities for learning.  They can be (and usually are) informative & enjoyable.  But a facility ALSO should have “guide on the side” conversation activities that stimulate conversations between residents (all around the wheel-rim);  if conversing occurs in multiple pairs, there is all-at-once talking or listening if all are conversing in multiple pairs.  Or in larger-group discussions around the rim, it's many-at-once listening plus one-at-a-time talking but eventually this will be done by all, so each person will be talking.    {another analogy uses ball-throwing to represent interactions during a group discussion;  in two minutes of this video from 13:39-15:29, the first two examples show a conversation that is hub-and-rim with only one spoke;  then you see a discussion that is “by the group” because around-the-rim conversation occurs, with the leader observing and helping the interactions only if it's needed.}    {* it's "most discussion activities" in my experience, as described later.}

Why?  to produce benefits:   These two-person interactions (or multi-person interactions in a discussion by the whole group) usually are very beneficial for residents, mentally & emotionally.  And the benefits will increase when staff encourages them to finish their interactions with an expectation that their during-activity conversations are “to be continued” with after-activity conversations.  These interaction-continuations are more likely to occur when a person discovers that their conversation partner is an interesting person, and talking with them is fun.  And the benefits will be multiplied when staff encourages them to actively seek interaction-beginnings in conversations with other residents. (and with staff)

How?  with multiple partners:   During a conversation session, each person can talk-and-listen with several partners.  One way to coordinate this is to give each person a number, and use a pre-planned way to assign partners, whether the number of people is 5, 17, 28, or more.  If there is an odd number, you can have a group-of-three (either with one only listening, or all listening-and-talking), or – if there is more than one staff person – have one become a partner, while the other(s) observes what is happening in all pairs, and provides assistance (by answering questions, providing suggestions or feedback,...) if they think this will be useful.  Each conversation can be timed, followed by an exchanging of partners (according to the pre-plan) so each person gets to converse with several partners in each session.

How?  by providing conversation-topics:   Lists of topics are available on the web.  The teacher(s) can think about the pros & cons of various topics, and make their own short list.  Then they decide the topics to use for each session, probably using the same topic for all exchange-partners during a session, but perhaps changing topics.  Near the end of a session they can describe the topic for the next session (and post it publicly) so people can think about the topic, so during the next session they can speak more intelligently and be more interesting as conversation partners.

How?  with knowledge about others:

intros and convos:  In two ways – with introductions and during conversations – residents can discover the ways in which other residents “are interesting people” and decide that “talking with them will be fun.”

doing introductions:  During part of a Conversation Session, the Activity Director (AD) can do “interviews” that help a few people (not all) explain “what they've done in life, what they have enjoyed doing and now enjoy,” sharing whatever they want.  By doing a few intro-interviews in each session, the whole intro-process (for all people) can be spread over many sessions.*  This spreading-out will reduce feelings of being overwhelmed with Too Much Information, which might occur if all intros were done in one session.  Because remembering details is difficult for all people, both young & old, the AD(s) can encourage listeners to take notes, and provide pads & pens during each session.  {and maybe AD can write summaries to be copied and handed out?}

using interviews:  Because most people, both old & young, are not comfortable with public speaking, the teacher(s) should help them talk, so instead of a speech it's an interview.  AD can talk with each person before their interview-introduction, thinking with empathy by asking themself “what will this person want others to know?” and “what knowledge will be most interesting for listeners?” and “what will help listeners become more interested in this person, and more likely to begin conversing with them?”  During this pre-intro gathering of information, the teacher & resident can discuss their balance-of-talking, to decide how much person-talking and teacher-talking will be best.  And of course the balance can change during the interview, with real-time improvised adjusting.

These interviews would be voluntary, with each person being able to “opt out” by just never doing it.

* After many sessions, when all have been introduced, interview-intros can continue onward with another cycle.  This cycling would produce benefits:  repetitions help the residents (and AD) remember, and reduce feelings of Too Much Information — because instead of thinking “ALL personal info must be in the first interview” the main-info can be in all interviews, along with non-essential details that can vary from one to another — and the repetition lets new residents (who recently began to live in the facility) be included so they also can get "knowledge about others", plus other benefits. 

iou - Below here the ideas are partially developed, in rough-draft form, with the gray box plus [['s (and green font) as reminders of the incomplete roughness.  But I think you will find the ideas interesting and useful.  Later I'll develop them more fully, and will write them more clearly.     { Until then the ideas will be reminders-for-me and “ideas to think about & self-develop” for you. }