The Effects of Music on Brain-Based Learning
Brain-based learning represents a thorough approach to education using techniques that incorporate methods from neuroscience, focusing on how the brain learns at different developmental stages. Music can be highly effective at aiding learning and retention by using rhythm and melody to convey educational content, by energizing or calming the brain, and by constructing pathways ideal for the learning process to occur.
Greater Likelihood of Retention
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When text or content is set to catchy music, otherwise dry or academic subjects can come alive. Learning and singing a song that incorporates the multiplication tables, for instance, is far more effective than having students study them on a piece of paper. Historical facts and dates can be rendered engaging and memorable when set to a simple tune such as: “In fourteen-hundred ninety-two, Columbus sailed the ocean blue.” In that one brief phrase, students learn and remember a key date, name and historical circumstance. In whatever style–whether hymns in church music, lyrics in rap music or choral sections in symphonic music, to name just a few examples–the memorable nature of music makes it an ideal learning tool.
Increased Concentration
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Playing highly energetic
music during otherwise sleepy times of the day, be it a Mozart allegro or the latest uptempo pop song, has proven quite effective in helping to increase focus and concentration over extended periods. Conversely, listening to soothing music during stressful times can directly lower blood pressure, reduce tension and provide an atmosphere of calm that is ideal for concentrated learning to occur. As the English novelist George Eliot observed, “Music seems to infuse strength into my limbs and ideas into my brain. Life seems to go on without effort, when I am filled with music.”
Heightened Brain Activity
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When learning, the brain connections used consistently become stronger. Children growing up listening to music generally make lasting music-related pathways that can directly affect thought processes. Classical music, for example, tends to heighten spatial ability and reasoning, such as putting together a jigsaw puzzle or addressing the layout of a house. While this effect can be seen somewhat in other types of music, the more complex structure of classical music challenges the brain, which, in turn, forces heightened brain and neurological activity.
Read more: The Effects of Music on Brain-Based Learning | eHow.com http://www.ehow.com/list_6680604_effects-music-brain_based-learning.html#ixzz2Do1Dg52V
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Thanks for the link you posted on Dangerously Irrelevent. This was worth raenidg and now I have more raenidg to do. I think the issue with education is that it is not evaluating the evaluation system. As an Art Teacher my lessons are product based. I see students succeed in my class that never succeed in the core areas. They not only succeed but show levels of creativity that would amaze. If this could be used as a model for them in core areas I think we would see more successes.
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Your post brought back lots of mereimos for me. Listening to Herb Alpert and the Tiajuana Brass which was my mom’s fav when I was little, then graduating to my own music. I remember vividly the day Ipurchased my first album with my own money, Peter, Paul and Mary’s Ten Years Together which included Leavin’ on a Jet Plane, a song that my best friend, Leslie and I knew all the words to. I rode my bike to the record store, babysitting money in my pocket, and rode home in the rain, fearful that my first record album would be ruined by getting wet! I remember being on a family vacation in Florida and dreamily walking the beach with Davy Jones’ I Want to be Free playing in my mind. I was quite in love with Davy. Of course there was the day that I bought The Fifth Dimension’s Aquarius album and was overjoyed by learning that I shared a birthday with Marilyn McCoo. Talk about a brush with greatness! In high school my musical taste was influenced by my older brothers and I would come home on weekend nights after drinking Little Kings and kissing my boyfriend of the season and crank up CSNY’s Southern Man or something long by the Allman Brothers until my mom would knock on the door and tell me to turn it down. Frequently a song will remind me of a specific memory and I find that fun. I listen to most of my music while driving in the car now. Every morning I pick something from my iPod for my morning commute and settle into the mood of the artist, whether it is melancholy or zippy, it is my choice. Like Melissa, I listen to music at home when I am cooking or cleaning, but that’s about it. I can’t even read a book with music playing .maybe I have ADD, that is definitely a possibility. So anyway, thanks for the mereimos. That was fun!