Music and Learning: Integrating Music in the Classroom

by Chris Boyd Brewer

The following article is reprinted from the book Music and Learning by Chris Brewer, 1995. This book
includes chapters on each method of integrating music in the curriculum. Music suggestions are
included.
RESONATING WITH OUR LEARNING
"Music is the electrical soil in which the spirit lives, thinks and invents." --Ludwig van Beethoven
We all know how greatly music affects our feelings and energy levels! Without even thinking about it,
we use music to create desired moods-- to make us happy, to enjoy movement and dance, to
energize, to bring back powerful memories, to help us relax and focus. Music is a powerful tool for our
personal expression within our daily lives-- it helps "set the scene" for many important experiences.
Throughout time, people have recognized and intentionally used the powerful effects of sound. In the
20th century the western scientific community has conducted research to validate and expand our
analytical knowledge of music. This research supports what we know from personal experience: Music
greatly affects and enhances our learning and living!
Research continues to be conducted to provide helpful guidelines for our intentional use of music,
especially in the classroom. This article, based on extensive research and experiences, will provide
you with successful and valuable guidelines for incorporating music into the teaching and learning
environment-- applicable to all ages and educational settings.
BRINGING EDUCATION TO LIFE WITH MUSIC
How is it that for most people music is a powerful part of their personal life and yet when we go to work
or school we turn it off? The intentional use of music in the classroom will set the scene and learning
atmosphere to enhance our teaching and learning activities. Plus, using music for learning makes the
process much more fun and interesting! Music, one of the joys of life, can be one of the joys of
learning as well. The following pages give you suggestions for when and how to use music during your
teaching or training. With these techniques, you, the teacher, can orchestrate a classroom
environment that is rich and resonant-- and provide learners with a symphony of learning opportunities
and a sound education!
Music helps us learn because it will--
establish a positive learning state
create a desired atmosphere
build a sense of anticipation
energize learning activities
change brain wave states
focus concentration
increase attention
improve memory
facilitate a multisensory learning experience
release tension
enhance imagination
align groups
develop rapport
provide inspiration and motivation
add an element of fun
accentuate theme-oriented units
WHAT ARE SPECIFIC WAYS MUSIC CAN BE USED IN THE CLASSROOM?
Here are three areas of teaching where integrating music can be highly effective. For each intent,
there is a rich repertoire of classroom techniques that can be used simply and easily by anyone-a brief
example is given in each. These techniques work for people of all ages and from many societies. The
very young, teens and adults will experience an increase in their effectiveness and joy of learning from
these uses of music.
LEARNING INFORMATION
Music can be used to help us remember learning experiences and information. In Active
Learning Experiences music creates a soundtrack for a learning activity. The soundtrack
increases interest and activates the information mentally, physically, or emotionally. Music can
also create a highly focused learning state in which vocabulary and reading material is
absorbed at a great rate. When information is put to rhythm and rhyme these musical
elements will provide a hook for recall. Here are three ways we can use music to help us learn
information:
o Active Learning Experiences
Music will activate students mentally, physically, and emotionally and create learning
states which enhance understanding of learning material. For example, play music
with an association for your topic in the background while reading a concise summary
of the important information. The more interesting and dramatic, the more easily the
information is remembered. In a social studies class, I have read Chief Joseph quotes
and a brief synopsis of his tribes' famous journey toward Canada while playing native
music in the background. This introduction to the "Last Free Days of the Nez Perce" is
powerful and memorable because the music helps students to appreciate the
experience and set the mood. To activate information physically, play upbeat music
during a related movement activity or role-play. For example, while learning about the
flow of electrons in electricity, I play Ray Lynch's Celestial Soda Pop while we create a
classroom flow of electricity. Some students are stationary neutrons and protons while
others are moving electrons. When we add "free electrons" like a battery would, the
electrons begin flowing and voila! we have an electrical current! Ray Lynchs' upbeat
music keeps us moving and makes the role play more fun.
o Focus and Alpha State Learning
Music stabilizes mental, physical and emotional rhythms to attain a state of deep
concentration and focus in which large amounts of content information can be
processed and learned. Baroque music, such as that composed by Bach, Handel or
Telemann, that is 50 to 80 beats per minute creates an atmosphere of focus that
leads students into deep concentration in the alpha brain wave state. Learning
vocabulary, memorizing facts or reading to this music is highly effective. On the other
hand, energizing Mozart music assists in holding attention during sleepy times of day
and helps students stay alert while reading or working on projects.
o Memorization
Songs, chants, poems, and raps will improve memory of content facts and details
through rhyme, rhythm, and melody. Teaching these to students or having them write
their own is a terrific memory tool!
ATTENTION, ATTITUDE AND ATMOSPHERE
(The Three A's) Preparing for a learning experience can make the difference between lessons
well-learned and just passing time. Certain music will create a positive learning atmosphere
and help students to feel welcome to participate in the learning experience. In this way it also
has great affect upon students' attitudes and motivation to learn. The rhythms and tempo of
musical sound can assist us in setting and maintaining our attention and focus by perking us
up when we are weary and helping us find peace and calm when we are over-energized in
some way. Here are two ways to use music for attitude, attention and atmosphere:
o Welcoming and Attention
Background music is used to provide a welcoming atmosphere and help prepare and
motivate students for learning tasks. Music can energize lagging attention levels or
soothe and calm when necessary. Simply playing music as students enter the
classroom or as they leave for recess or lunch totally changes the atmosphere.
Depending on the music, you can enliven, calm, establish a theme or even give
students content information with content-songs!
o Community Builders
Music provides a positive environment that enhances student interaction and helps
develop a sense of community and cooperation. Music is a powerful tool for
understanding other cultures and bonding with one another. Selecting and playing a
classroom theme song, developing a classroom "ritual"---such as a good-bye or hello
time that uses music, or other group activities with music are ways to build lasting
community experiences.
PERSONAL EXPRESSION
Music is the doorway to the inner realms and the use of music during creative and reflective
times facilitates personal expression in writing, art, movement, and a multitude of projects.
Creation of musical compositions offers a pathway to expressing personal feelings and beliefs
in the language of musical sound. Here are two ways music can help us express ourselves:
o Creativity and Reflection
Background music is used to stimulate internal processing, to facilitate creativity, and
encourage personal reflection. Playing reflective music, such as solo piano in either
classical or contemporary styles, as students are writing or journalling holds attention
for longer periods of time than without the music. In one study, students wrote twice
as much with music than without!

o Personal Expression through the Musical Intelligence
The creation of music expresses inner thoughts and feelings and develops the
musical intelligence through understanding of rhythm, pitch, and form. Writing songs
related to content allows students to express how they feel about issues brought up in
historic incidents, social studies topics or literature. Students can also create an
instrumental "soundtrack" with simple rhythm instruments that auditorily portrays a
particularly important scientific discovery, a poignant historical event, or the action
within a novel.




























4: The Functions of Music in Education
Elliot Eisner
Lee Jacks Professor of Education and Professor of Art, Stanford University
For those who work in the arts either as creators of an art or as teachers who try to foster the benefits
of art to those in schools, the trip has always been uphill. The arts have suffered from a stereotype that
regards them as more ornamental than essential, more emotional than reflective, closer to the rim of
educational purposes than to its core. Those concerned with the arts and who assign them an
important value in education are more often than not looking in from outside the window.
It is true, of course, that schools offer a modicum of arts activities to their students, but this offering is
seldom considered a central part of the school's program. There are, sometimes, protestations from
policymakers that arts are at the core of education, but the reality is that they are more often at the
margin.
Just how does one make a case for the arts in education? One might ask why one has to make a case
for a form of human practice that is as old as humans themselves. Nevertheless, cases do need to be
made and, even more, the politics of curricular choice need to be addressed if the arts are to secure
more than eloquent testimony.
There are, I think, a myriad of reasons why music of all the arts should have a central place in school
programs. I will, however, describe three reasons for music's important role in education. The first of
these pertains to what can be regarded as its cognitive contributions, the second to what music
enables one to express or know, and the third pertains to the kind of experience that music makes
possible.
Distinctions such as the type I have made are necessary to be able to speak about most anything. Yet,
in reality, to the extent to which we can know it, the distinctions meld and fuse, they melt and blend
into each other. I am painfully aware of that. Nevertheless, for purposes of clarification, I return to the
distinctions between what is mental, or cognitive, what resides in matters of meaning, and finally, in
what is experiential.
Experience in music as a performer, especially but not only, makes it possible for students to have
what might be called musical ideas. Musical ideas are notions expressed in music and organized in
ways that reflect the choices that the maker selects. Thinking musically means thinking within the
constraints and affordances of patterned sound and, more recently, in silences as well. The medium is
auditory and the practices that give it shape are cognitive. We learn to hear and to notice. We learn
how to organize sound so that what it expresses will not take the impress of literal or even
metaphorical description. In this process, we learn to think. The thinking that we learn to do is thinking
within music. As I indicated, music in its perception and especially in its creation, requires us to think
musically about what we attend to.
Insofar as music makes such demands on those who experience it, music is a vehicle for developing
the mind. But it is a way of developing the mind musically, not necessarily generally. There may be
transfer involved in some aspects of musical thought but that is not the hook on which I would hang
my hat. Intelligence in music is expressed musically. Music education is a way to foster such
intelligence.
With respect to matters of meaning, the role of music in enabling humans to express what cannot be
said is, and has been, exemplified throughout the ages. One has only to think about the uses of music
in the ceremonies that followed 9/11 to recognize that humans have a profoundly deep need to
embrace the arts, all of them, when they need to express what cannot be articulated in language.
Music is a way of sharing and indeed experiencing the deepest aspects of our interior landscape. They
give us access to forms of life that express what has been compressed into musical thought. Such
thinking shapes feeling and gives feeling a presence in the public world. If music did not achieve such
an outcome, I do not think its place in human history would have been so enduring. The irony, of
course, is that although music has been essential in our most important moments - - when we bury
and when we marry - - in the context of schools, it is taken for granted, very often as a kind of
divertimento. It is much more than that.
The third function of music pertains to the quality of life that music makes possible. Music, at rock
bottom, is a source of intrinsically valued experience. We go to the concert hall to be moved, to be
touched, to undergo forms of life that have their own, non-instrumental rewards. A life without such
experience is one which is flat, dry as toast, emotionally drained. Music, in short, is a way of reminding
us what it is to be alive.
The contributions, therefore, of music in the context of education is at once cognitive, meaningful, and
experiential. Music develops ways of thinking, it provides forms of significance that will take no other
form, and it yields forms of experience that are, at their best, deeply treasured. I believe that such
contributions represent profoundly significant justifications for the place of music in schools. Indeed,
such justifications when they are realized often pale what many other fields given more attention, more
time, and more significance have to offer. Perhaps one day not only music but all of the arts will be
recognized for their potentially important contributions for helping our children realize their humanity.

















Multiple Intelligences In The Classroom
Of the seven different ways we learn, schools focus on only two.
Add the other five, and you increase the chances of success
By Bruce Campbell
One of the articles in The Learning Revolution (IC#27)
Originally published in Winter 1991 on page 12
Copyright (c)1991, 1996 by Context Institute
The story of much recent innovation in education follows a familiar pattern: the theory
of an innovative thinker (in this case, Harvards Howard Gardner) gets applied by an
innovative practitioner (third grade teacher Bruce Campbell), who puts the flesh of
action on the bones of thinking. Along the way, theories get substantiated, the subjects
of the successful experiment benefit greatly and, as Bruce Campbell reports in this
self-interview, the experimenter is forever altered.
Bruce, together with his wife Linda MacRae-Campbell and Dee Dickinson (Dee and
Linda are guest editors for this issue), is currently co-authoring a book
titled LearningWorks: Teaching and Learning through the Multiple Intelligences.
Contact the Campbells at 19614 Soundview Drive, Stanwood, WA 98292, 206/652-
9502.
If we are to achieve a richer culture, rich in contrasting values, we must recognize the
whole gamut of human potentialities, and so weave a less arbitrary social fabric, one in
which each diverse human gift will find a fitting place.
- Margaret Mead
In recent years, new definitions of intelligence have gained acceptance and have
dramatically enhanced the appraisal of human competencies. Howard Gardner of
Harvard University in his book, Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences,
suggests that there are at least seven human intelligences, two of
which, verbal/linguisticintelligence and logical/mathematical intelligence, have
dominated the traditional pedagogy of western societies.
The five non-traditional intelligences, spatial, musical, kinesthetic,
interpersonal andintrapersonal, have generally been overlooked in education. However,
if we can develop ways to teach and learn by engaging all seven intelligences, we will
increase the possibilities for student success and create the opportunity to, in Margaret
Meads words, "weave a social fabric in which each diverse human gift will find a fitting
place."
How can the Multiple Intelligences be implemented in the classroom?
To implement Gardners theory in an educational setting, I organized my third grade
classroom in Marysville, Washington, into seven learning centers, each dedicated to one
of the seven intelligences. The students spend approximately two-thirds of each school
day moving through the centers 15 to 20 minutes at each center. Curriculum is
thematic, and the centers provide seven different ways for the students to learn the
subject matter.
Each day begins with a brief lecture and discussion explaining one aspect of the current
theme. For example, during a unit on outer space, the mornings lecture might focus on
spiral galaxies. In a unit about the arts of Africa, one lecture might describe the Adinkra
textile patterns of Ghana. After the morning lecture, a timer is set and students in
groups of three or four start work at their centers, eventually rotating through all seven.
What kinds of learning activities take place at each center?
All students learn each days lesson in seven ways. They build models, dance, make
collaborative decisions, create songs, solve deductive reasoning problems, read, write,
and illustrate all in one school day. Some more specific examples of activities at each
center follow:
In the Personal Work Center (Intrapersonal Intelligence), students explore the
present area of study through research, reflection, or individual projects.
In the Working Together Center (Interpersonal Intelligence), they develop
cooperative learning skills as they solve problems, answer questions, create
learning games, brainstorm ideas and discuss that days topic collaboratively.
In the Music Center (Musical Intelligence), students compose and sing songs
about the subject matter, make their own instruments, and learn in rhythmical
ways.
In the Art Center (Spatial Intelligence), they explore a subject area using diverse
art media, manipulables, puzzles, charts, and pictures.
In the Building Center (Kinesthetic Intelligence), they build models, dramatize
events, and dance, all in ways that relate to the content of that days subject matter.
In the Reading Center (Verbal/Linguistic Intelligence), students read, write, and
learn in many traditional modes. They analyze and organize information in written
form.
In the Math & Science Center (Logical/ Mathematical Intelligence), they work
with math games, manipulatives, mathematical concepts, science experiments,
deductive reasoning, and problem solving.
Following their work at the centers, a few minutes are set aside for groups and individual
students to share their work from the centers. Much of the remainder of the day is spent
with students working on independent projects, either individually or in small groups
where they apply the diverse skills developed at the centers. The daily work at the seven
centers profoundly influences their ability to make informative, entertaining, multimodal
presentations of their studies. Additionally, it is common for parents to comment on how
much more expressive their children have become at home.
What are some of the results of this program?
During the 1989-1990 school year, an action research project was conducted in my
classroom to assess the effects of this multimodal learning format. A daily teachers
journal was kept with specific entries recording the following:
general daily comments
a daily evaluation of how focused or "on-task" students were
an evaluation of the transitions between centers
an explanation of any discipline problems
a self-assessment how the teachers time was used
tracking of three individuals, previously identified as students with behavior
problems.
In addition, a Classroom Climate Survey was administered 12 times during the year, a
Student Assessment Inventory of work at the seven centers was administered nine times
during the year, and a Center Group Survey was administered eight times during the
year.
The research data revealed the following:
1. The students develop increased responsibility, self-direction and independence over
the course of the year. Although no attempt was made to compare this group of students
with those in other third grade classes, the self-direction and motivation of these
students was apparent to numerous classroom visitors. The students became skilled at
developing their own projects, gathering the necessary resources and materials, and
making well-planned presentations of all kinds.
2. Discipline problems were significantly reduced. Students previously identified as
having serious behavior problems showed rapid improvement during the first six weeks
of school. By mid-year, they were making important contributions to their groups. And
by years end, they had assumed positive leadership roles which had not formerly been
evident.
3. All students developed and applied new skills. In the fall, most students described only
one center as their "favorite" and as the one where they felt confident. (The distribution
among the seven centers was relatively even.) By mid-year, most identified three to four
favorite centers. By years end, every student identified at least six centers which were
favorites and at which they felt skilled. Moreover, they were all making multimodal
presentations of independent projects including songs, skits, visuals, poems, games,
surveys, puzzles, and group participation activities.
4. Cooperative learning skills improved in all students. Since so much of the center work
was collaborative, students became highly skilled at listening, helping each other, sharing
leadership in different activities, accommodating group changes, and introducing new
classmates to the program. They learned not only to respect each other, but also to
appreciate and call upon the unique gifts and abilities of their classmates.
5. Academic achievement improved. Standardized test scores were above state and
national averages in all areas. Retention was high on a classroom year-end test of all
areas studied during the year. Methods for recalling information were predominantly
musical, visual and kinesthetic, indicating the influence of working through the different
intelligences. Students who had previously been unsuccessful in school became high
achievers in new areas.
In summary, it is clear that students learning improved. Many students said they
enjoyed school for the first time. And as the school year progressed, new skills emerged:
some students discovered musical, artistic, literary, mathematical and other new-found
capacities and abilities. Others became skilled leaders. In addition, self-confidence and
motivation increased significantly. Finally, students developed responsibility, self-
reliance and independence as they took an active role in shaping their own learning
experiences.
What is the teachers role in a Multiple Intelligences program?
The teachers role also transforms in this type of program. I developed skills different
from those I would develop by standing in front of a class lecturing each day. I need to
observe my students from seven new perspectives. In planning the centers, I find I am
pushing my students from behind rather than pulling them from in front. Also I am
working withthem, rather than for them. I explore what they explore, discover what they
discover, and often learn what they learn. I find my satisfaction in their enthusiasm for
learning and independence, rather than in their test scores and ability to sit quietly. And
most importantly, because I am planning for such a diversity of activities, I have become
more creative and multimodal in my own thinking and my own learning. I can now
comfortably write and sing songs. I am learning to draw and paint. I see growth and
development within myself. I sometimes wonder who is changing the most, my students
or myself.
Why is a Multiple Intelligences model successful?
The reasons for the academic and behavioral success of the program appear to be
twofold. First, every student has an opportunity to specialize and excel in at least one
area. Usually, however, it is three or four. In the two years since this program was
initiated, I have not had one student who was unable to find an area of specialty and
success. Secondly, each student learns the subject matter in a variety of different ways,
thereby multiplying chances of successfully understanding and retaining that
information.
Many student needs are met through this program. Their intellectual needs are met by
constantly being challenged and frequently exercising their creativity. At the same time,
their emotional needs are met by working closely with others. They develop diverse
strengths, and they understand themselves better as individuals.
The emphasis in such a program is upon learning rather than teaching. The students
interests and developmental needs dictate the direction of the program. Such a model
adapts to students, rather than expecting students to adapt to it. From my own classroom
experiences, I believe that teaching and learning through the multiple intelligences helps
solve many common school problems and optimizes the learning experience for students
and teachers alike. Again following Margaret Mead, if we educate to engage the "whole
gamut of human potentialities" in the classroom, society will benefit by enabling "each
diverse human gift to find its fitting place."

Four Factors In Educational Reform
by Howard Gardner
Many of us interested in efforts at educational reform have focused on the learner or
student, be she a young child in preschool or an adult bent on acquiring a new skill. It is
clarifying to have such a focus and, indeed, any efforts at reform are doomed to fail
unless they concentrate on the properties and potentials of the individual learner. My
own work on multiple intelligences has partaken of this general focus; colleagues and I
have sought to foster a range of intellectual strengths in our students.
But after several years of active involvement in efforts at educational reform, I am
convinced that success depends upon the active involvement of at least four factors:
Assessment * Unless one is able to assess the learning that takes place in different
domains, and by different cognitive processes, even superior curricular innovations are
destined to remain unutilized. In this country, assessment drives instruction. We must
devise procedures and instruments which are "intelligence-fair" and which allow us to
look directly at the kinds of learning in which we are interested.
Curriculum * Far too much of what is taught today is included primarily for historical
reasons. Even teachers, not to mention students, often cannot explain why a certain topic
needs to be covered in school. We need to reconfigure curricula so that they focus on
skills, knowledge, and above all, understandings that are truly desirable in out country
today. And we need to adapt those curricula as much as possible to the particular
learning styles and strengths of students.
Teacher Education * While most teacher education institutions make an honest effort
to produce teaching candidates of high quality, these institutions have not been at the
forefront of efforts at educational improvement. Too often they are weighted down by
students of indifferent quality and by excessive and often counterproductive
requirements which surround training and certification. We need to attract stronger
individuals into teaching, improve conditions so that they will remain in teaching, and
use our master teachers to help train the next generation of students and teachers.
Community Participation * In the past, Americans have been content to place most
educational burdens on the schools. This is no longer a viable option. The increasing
cognitive demands of schooling, the severe problems in our society today, and the need
for support of students which extends well beyond the 9-3 period each day, all make it
essential that other individuals and institutions contribute to the educational process. In
addition to support from family members and other mentoring adults, such institutions
as business, the professions, and especially museums need to be involved much more
intimately in the educational process.
Too often, Americans have responded to educational needs only in times of crisis. This is
an unacceptable approach. Education works effectively only when responsibility is
assumed over the long run. We have made significant progress in this regard over the
past decade. There is reason to be optimistic for students of the future, as dedicated
individuals continue to collaborate in solving the challenging educational problems of
our time.

Dr. Howard Gardner is a Professor of Education and Co-chair of Project Zero at
Harvard University. He is the author of nine books, including Frames of Mind: The
Theory of Multiple Intelligences (1983), and To Open Minds: Chinese Clues to the
Dilemma of Comtemporary Education (1989).