Aural preparation is operationally defined as hearing, performing, decoding, and creating rhythms or pitches aurally prior to the introduction of music notation. The purpose of this study was to explore the effect of aural preparation on second grade students' music literacy rhythm skills (i.e. reading, performing, and dictation). The research…

This study considers the way children listen to classical music composed for them and the effect of age on their spontaneous invented notations and verbal responses. The musical selection is a piano piece for children by Claude Debussy:"'Jimbo's Lullaby" from "Children's Corner". Two hundred and nine children 4-9.5-years-old…

The methods of the Dalcroze approach to music education--eurhythmics, solfege, and improvisation--have had a profound influence on modern music education. In particular, the overt training in kinesthetic abilities, and the assertion that the relationship between music and movement is an intimate one, is at the heart of Dalcroze's approach to…

This case study consisted of an examination of the perspectives of students, teachers, and administrators at the Shuangling Primary School, a rural Chinese school in Shaanxi Province, as they relate to themes of China's most recent curricular reform efforts. The intent was to understand these perspectives and determine how to best assist teachers…

Background: The Slovenian music education curriculum for the first years of elementary school emphasises the following musical activities in the classroom: singing, playing instruments, listening to music, movement to music and musical creativity. In the field of musical creativity, there are two activities where students can be original and…

Facing the ambiguous status of in-school music literacy, this follow-up eight-year study aims to touch on the effects of traditional staff notation (SN) learning on student's intuitive symbolizing behavior and musical perception. Subjects were 47 second-graders attending a religious Jewish school in Israel. One "pre-literate" meeting, in…