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Rhythm & Meter - Difficult to Teach?

By Kevin Tuck, as part of an extended study in music education methodology during his Masters of Music degree in 1995

Rhythm is defined as "The subdivision of a span of time into perceptible sections; the grouping of musical sounds, principally by means of duration and stress."
Rhythm is put into 3 parts: 1) tempo beats, 2) meter beats and 3) melodic rhythm
Steady tempo beat is extremely important for students to be able to understand rhythm
Meter beats - "the division of the tempo beat into two or three"
Meter beats and tempo beats are essential to melodic rhythm and it is essential in the tonal aspects of music
Metric accent is maybe most important; helps musicians relate to time signatures and what they mean
Students learn better with aural and visual help rather than when taught with aural aids and mnemonics alone
Many rely on: "teaching rhythm first as sound, before any notation is introduced."
Lois Choksy recommends that teaching rhythm should be done by students imitating rhythm clapped or tapped by the teacher
Commonly used techniques for teaching rhythm: Counting aloud, Tapping the underlying beat, Using the metronome, Clapping or tapping the phrase rhythm, Ensemble experience, Conducting, Use of words and mnemonics

Responses to Rhythm Patterns When Presented to Children through Auditory, Visual, and Kinesthetic Modalities

By Diane Persellin, Journal of Research in Music Education 40.4 (1992): 306-315.

Tested on first, third and fifth graders
First, children took a pretest to get a control before applying the special teaching methods on rhythmic patterns
The test was a sheet of paper with various rhythms children had to clap to
Afterwards, children were either given a visual (notes) of the rhythm, playing (listened to rhythm) of the rhythm, tap on the forearm (kinesthetic) or a combination of each of them
This would show if they had improved on their rhythmic accuracy
The results were:

Effects of Traditional Methods of Rhythm-Reading Instruction

By Muriel Bebeau, Journal of Research in Music Education 30.2 (1982): 107-119. Print.

Analysis of rhythm-reading methods

Orff / Kodaly helps with learning rhythm for younger children
Traditional method teaches children a steady pulse
Simplified method teaches children how to say the note
Another simplified method teaches a speech cue method used in Kodaly which teaches younger children to pair the symbol with the notes

Method

In the speech cue treatment, the information given the children consisted of spoken cues and associated kinesthetic cues
Tested on third graders out of 78 students in 2 groups
From each group, 30 students were randomly chosen for comparison of gain scores
This class was selected because they had not had group instructions in the readin g of rhythmic patterns as a part of their school music program

Procedures

Children were permitted to select one of the several methods for playing the pretest
The children completed all pretests by clapping

Results

Most pupils in both groups had pretest scores of 0
There was no significant difference existing between the mean pretest scores for the groups

Effects of Rote Versus Note Presentations on Rhythm Learning and Retention

By Patricia Shehan, Journal of Research in Music Education 35.2 (1987): 117-126. Print.

In the word method, the students got mixed up with the words and syllables
In Orff's method, he used sentences to help remember rhythm

Recognition experienced teacher was involved

used flashcards, experimenter claps 1 of 3 cards and students have to guess which card is being demonstrated
pretest mean was highest in this category(8.02/20)
post-test mean gain was 2.76 ? (10.78/20)

Dictation experienced teacher was involved

students used popsicle stick kits consisting of 20 popsicle sticks,
students used the kits and made note configurations on special flashcards
the experimenter played rhythms on a bongo drum for the students to write with popsicle sticks
pretest mean was 0.3/20
post-test mean gain was 1.27 ? (1.3/20)

Performance experienced teacher was involved

measured students’ ability to correctly clap a measure of 4/4 or 6/8
student would clap the rhythm on the flashcard and would be marked right or wrong
pretest mean was 0.5/20
post-test mean gain was 3.03 ? (3.08/20)

Effects of Learning Modalities on Melodic and Rhythmic Retention and on Vocal Pitch-Matching by Preschool Children

by Diane Persellin, Perpetual and Motor Skills 78 (1994): 1231-1234. Print.

Tested children aged 4-5 on rhythm and pitch matching

The children were first given a pretest before having aids to set a control

Then, they were either given a visual, kinesthetic, auditory or multimodal aid to see how their results improved

The results were:

The article clearly says, "Teachers should be encouraged to consider learning styles when planning instruction. When teachers use only the kinesthetic learning modality to the exclusion of others, music learning may be impeded."

Supports our Rhythm Ramp invention because it is multimodal.

Advances in Music Reading Research

By Helga Gudmundsdottir, Music Education Research, 12.4 (2010): 331-338. Print

Introduction

Fluent music literacy is harder to learn
Many of the children have failed by the ways music teachers are taught and teaching children to read music
Sight singing and music reading abilities are about the same because they both require pitch and rhythm reading
Sight singing is not as efficient for fluency and is not as necessary as music reading

Music reading

Music reading involves 2 distinct skills: reading and mechanical skill
The staff reading notation is a multiple task
Music reading is a construct process in music
Studies on perception indicate that pitch information and timing information is coded separately
In music reading, it entails the separate process to read pitch and timing

Ability to read music

Most music readers acquired their skill early in life without too much struggle
In a study on music students taking graded exams, there were only low correlations found between performance ability and sight reading scores
The correlation was somewhat higher for students taking grade 4 than those taking grade 3 exams
Music reading skills do not necessarily develop in parallel with performance abilities
There is a considerable number of children between those 2 abilities

Difficulties in reading music

With other complex skills, music reading is not very hard to those who have mastered the skill as long as the reading material is within the scope of the music readers capacities
Music reading is an automatic process in trained musicians
Music students seem to reach the this level effortlessly should not be much of an interest to music educators

Symptoms of success in music reading

Expert music readers look ahead of the piece they are playing more often than less proficient readers

Music reading and pitch structure

Studies show that children learn better with tonal patterns than with traditional music notation
Learning the general structure was more effective instead of individual pitches

The Healing Power of Music

by William Forde Thompson and Gottfried Schlaug, Scientific American Mind, March/April 2015 33-40. Print

7 ways music benefits the brain:

Physical – encourages people to move to the beat
Emotional – induces emotional states by initiating changes in distribution of neurochemicals than can induce moods
Engaging – engrossing and rewarding causing patients to be motivated to participate with enthusiasm focus and dedication
Permits synchronization –helps listeners synchronize rhythm, by tapping along, and melody, by singing along, addressing problems of timing, initaiton and coordination in people with stroke, Parkinsons and other brain disorders
Social – musical activities can be collective experiences to help in recovery, rehabilitation and coping
Persuasive – music can make lyrics and films seem more compelling with leads to positive attitude in patients
Personal – personal nature of music can evoke memories and help individuals maintain a sense of identity

Everyone Can Gain from Making Music

by Julia Calderone, Scientific American Mind, March/April 2015 40-41. Print

Benefits

Music helps improve process speed, memory and attention
Older musicians tend to have stronger memory, more focused attention and faster brain processing
Music improves multitasking
Making music is beneficial because it requires integration of various senses

Music Education and the Brain: What Does It Take to Make a Change?

by Anita Collins, National Association For Music Education, Vol. 32(2) 4-10 2014 4-10. Print

There are differences in structure and function of brains of musicians as compared to non-musicians
Musicians have good memory
Musicians understand language well
Large number of benefits from music education including improvement in memory, language acquisition, executive function, and brain plasticity (brain's ability to CHANGE throughout life)

Conclusions:

Starting early and learning an instrument for at least two years results in positive changes in brain structure and function
The earlier children understand music, the more they benefit

Music and Cognitive Development: From Notes to Neural Networks

by Rebecca Ann Shore, NHSA DIALOG, 13(1) 53-65. Print

Complex music is the art form with the strongest evidence of cognitive improvement
Piano lessons increased intelligence quotient (IQ)
Listening to complex music helped rates negotiate mazes faster
Good to start music early – found that regions of the brain active in making music were larger in musicians who started their musical training before age 7, when grains were younger and more plastic
Music training helped improve skills in geometry
Kodaly music training made students ahead of peers in math
Playing piano helps spatial-temporal reasoning
The results reported in this article highlight the importance not only incorporating some type of organized music training into our educational environments but also incorporating it into the earliest possible environments

Developing Teachers for Early Childhood Programs

by Carol Scott-Kassner, Music Educators Journal, July 1999 19-25. Print

Emphasizes on the importance of teaching music to young children
Oprah Winfrey made a plea for parents to sing to their children
There are approximately 15 million children under the age of five in day-care and preschool settings in the U.S.A.
Close examination reveals that day-care and early childhood programs are often lacking in musical direction

Early Childhood Brian Development and Elementary Music Curricula: Are They in Tune?

by Larissa K. Scott, GMT, Fall 2004 20-27. Print

The informal education that occurs before formal education begins shapes children’s brains and affects the rest of their lives
The first four years of life are period of particularly rapid development of brain structure and function
Elementary music curricula are often based on the philosophies of musicians, such as Kodaly, Orff and Dalcroze, who worked frequently with children. These musicians saw a need for change in music education
During the first two to three years of elementary music instruction, children should be immersed in active music making

Older Adults Benefit from Music Training Early in Life: Biological Evidence for Long-Term Training-Driven Plasticity

by Travis White-Schwoch, Kali Woodruff Carr, Samira Anderson, Dana L. Strait and Nina Kraus, Journal of Neuroscience, November 6, 2013 17667-17674. Print

Aging results in pervasive declines in nervous system function
In the auditory system, these declines include neural timing delays in response to fast-changing speech elements –
These age-related declines are not inevitable
Older adults with a lifetime of music training do not exhibit neural timing delays
Evidence suggests that musicians have nervous systems distinct from non-musicians
Early music training sets the stage for subsequent interactions with sound
These experiences may interact over time to sustain sharpened neural processing in central auditory nuclei well into older age