What is Music Exploration?
In September of 2024 I was invited to teach music at Innisfree Delnorte School, a school with no musical instruments except for an old piano in the back corner of a school gymnasium stage. This, with a lot of imagination and experimentation, was the birthplace of Music With Linda’s Music Exploration In the Classroom Program, a go with the flow and what you know music experience where the students guide their sound adventure with the curiosity inherent in our discoveries along the way.
The Music Exploration Program starts with silence. Listening deeply to the sounds that surround us and debating whether or not all sounds are musical becomes a natural intruduction to learning fundamental music skills. Is there a pitch to that furnace hum? Does the ticking clock have a steady beat? Can you sing like the robin we hear in the tree outside that window? Each new discovery leads to a spontaneous musical game or activty to develop musicality.
As our adventure exapands from music basics, students begin sharing what their favorite music styles are and which artists they admire. We talk about what music means to people and the role music plays in day to day life. It’s intriguing to discover that not everyone loves the same music as we do and that when we expand our musical knowlege by listening to the music others enjoy – everthing from Gregorian Chant to Techno Pop and Country – we open our minds and ears to new experiences.
Learning that music is organized sound that appeals to different people in different ways, we then began to make our own music. Rhythm and body beats, “found sound” (anything can be an instrument when you give it a beat) and singing together leads to creating our own collective compositions and presenting them at the end of the term.
PROGRAM PARTICULARS
- Offered to students in Kindergarten to Grade 5
- Once or Twice Weekly in 30 or 40-minute sessions (can be customized to a class schedule)
- Full Year, Half Term or a Set Number of Weeks
Research shows that at-least some musical education has a positive impact on social and cognitive development of children. And these effects are long lasting – better hearing, better motor skills, improved memory, better verbal and literacy skills.
Alan Harvey, Musician and Neuroscientist