Music and Arts are probably the two most underrated subjects taught in schools, as they are categorized by many as mere hobbies; things that people who are only good at it would enjoy. Those who do not excel in these practices tend to just let the information pass into one ear and out of the other. The expectations they give the subject is very minimal, and there is the limitation they set in which they think they can provide only as much as the subject is not within their capabilities.
But there is actually a lot of benefits a student can get out of studying Music and Arts.
Music
According to pbs.org, a website started and filled with content by parents of studying children, Research has found that learning music facilitates learning other subjects and enhances skills that children inevitably use in other areas. It is included in the website a quotation by Mary Luehrisen, executive director of the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) Foundation, a not-for-profit association that promotes the benefits of making music: “a music-rich experience for children of singing, listening and moving is really bringing a very serious benefit to children as they progress into more formal learning,” says Mary Luehrisen, executive director of the National Association of Music Merchants (NAMM) Foundation, a not-for-profit association that promotes the benefits of making music.
In this website, the specific benefits are included and explained, such as: Language Development, Increased IQ, better brain functions, Spatial-Temporal Skills, better test results, and developing an inclination to music. Learning music is also beneficial to the concentration of the students, as well as their behaviour and comprehension through listening.
Pruett also claims that “… along with better performance results on concentration-based tasks, music training can help with basic memory recall. Formal training in music is also associated with other cognitive strengths such as verbal recall proficiency. People who have had formal musical training tend to be pretty good at remembering verbal information stored in memory.”
Arts
“If they’re worried about their test scores and want a way to get them higher, they need to give kids more arts, not less,” says Tom Horne, Arizona’s state superintendent of public instruction. “There’s lots of evidence that kids immersed in the arts do better on their academic tests.”
The importance of Arts education is also a crucial part of molding a child holistically. Educating in Arts solve problems. Edutopia.org states that, “years of research show that it’s closely linked to almost everything that we as a nation say we want for our children and demand from our schools: academic achievement, social and emotional development, civic engagement, and equitable opportunity.”
Arts should be taught in school for various reasons. In edutopia.org, they stated that arts is associated with cognitive abilities, gains in math, reading, critical thinking, and verbal skills. It also improve motivation, concentration, confidence, and teamwork.
Music and Arts in a Child’s Academics
Teaching music and arts in schools is not only for those who excel in these area, nor are they only hobbies. Many researchers have found that these practices may be linked in developing competencies for a child. Although these disciplines may be learned outside the four corners of a classroom, they are both essentials in the development of children, serving as reinforcement to academic subjects such as Science and Mathematics.
In order to deliver holistic learning, the ultimate aim of education, we need to consider every aspect of learning, and Music and Arts are what we exactly need.
Leave a comment