Experiences during listening to music in school

ABSTRACT

Pupils’ experiences of four music pieces were compared regarding two didactical approaches to music listening in Croatian schools: the predominantly cognitively oriented standard (STA), and the experimental cognitive-emotional (CEA). The research comprised 557 pupils, 10 and 11 years old. After the initial listening to a music piece pupils mostly reported to like its musical components which reflects that listening to music in school is mainly directed toward music-theoretical components of the music. During the central listening pupils’ thoughts were mostly related to the music piece content (e.g. narratives related to the music) and to associations within and out of the music piece context. However, some differences between the two approaches emerged. Depending on the music piece, the more active pupils’ engagement in CEA encouraged reflections about content and/or expressing opinions about the broader context of the music piece.

KEYWORDS:

• Impressions about classical music pieces
• liking
• listening activities
• musical education
• general school

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1 The research was conducted as a part of the institutional project Cognitive and emotional aspect of music listening in the music-pedagogical context implemented by The Academy of Music in Pula. Project details are described in Vidulin, Plavšić, and Žauhar 2020.

2 Lesson plans are available in Vidulin, Plavšić, and Žauhar 2020, and here they are briefly described for a better comprehension.

3 In this paper a detailed analysis of answers to this question is presented, while a more general analysis is presented in Vidulin and Plavšić (2020a).

Additional information

Funding

The project was supported by the Juraj Dobrila University of Pula, The Academy of Music in Pula and the City of Pula.

Notes on contributors

Sabina Vidulin

Sabina Vidulin, PhD, is the Head of the Department of Music Pedagogy at the Academy of Music in Pula, Croatia. She is the founder of the International Symposium of Music Pedagogues and the International Forum of Music Pedagogy Students. She participated at many conferences in Europe and USA. Her research interests are oriented to didactics of music, music in school and music as extracurricular activity. She published as author and co-author five books, fifteen chapters in books, about seventy scientific papers, edited a songbook, seven symposia proceedings and two monographs. Vidulin was the national coordinator for the European Association for Music in Schools for ten years. Sabina Vidulin received the State Award Ivan Filipović and the award from the Croatian Society of Music and Dance Pedagogues.

Valnea Žauhar

Valnea Žauhar, PhD, is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Psychology, Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, University of Rijeka, Croatia. She teaches courses in experimental and cognitive psychology, as well as psychology of music. Her research interests are metacognition and higher cognitive processes, music cognition and music listening habits.

Marlena Plavšić

Marlena Plavšić, PhD, is Head of the Department of Teacher Education and Foreign Languages at the Faculty of Humanities in Pula, Croatia. She teaches various courses in psychology to future teachers of humanities and music. As a community psychologist she has continuously been involved in various public-civil initiatives and community projects. Her scientific interests comprise mostly education, human rights and development. She is an active member of the Global Network of Psychologists for Human Rights. She received the award Marulić: Fiat Psychologia from the Croatian Psychological Association.