Music Education: Giving Kids an Ear for Learning

"Mozart Effect" Still Unclear

According to recent research at Harvard University, however, the connection between Mozart and learning remains unclear. In fact, Harvard researchers concluded that while some studies show a strong link between learning music and completing certain kinds of tasks, there is danger in tying music education to academic performance.

"We can't risk narrowing the education of our students to that which can be measured by a math or reading test," warns Lois Hetland, one of the Harvard researchers.

Music and the Brain

Neurobiologist Gordon Shaw has spent years studying the effects of music on brain development and was a part of the initial scientific studies that linked listening to Mozart's music to short-term enhanced brain functioning in college students.

Shaw, president of the Music Intelligence Neural Development Institute (MIND), theorizes that babies are born with certain neural patterns in their brains and that certain types of music stimulate those innate connections, specifically those that control the ability to visualize items in space, known as spatial-temporal reasoning.

The practical applications of spatial-temporal reasoning include tasks such as advanced math, surgery, engineering, and architecture. Shaw and his colleagues view music as "a window to higher brain function."

They set out to prove it by teaching young children how to read and play piano keyboards, after which they saw continued increases in the children's temporal-spatial reasoning skills.

More Research Necessary

"I think it's a very interesting hypothesis, but I also think we have not seen enough data," says Gottfried Schlaug, MD, PhD, associate professor of neurology at Harvard Medical School. "I feel it's probably much more complicated and there are probably more advantages in other areas of the brain, not just those areas that have to do with visual-spatial encoding."

Schlaug wonders whether the academic improvement measured after children learned how to play a musical instrument is a result of the music itself or if it has more to do with learning discipline, concentration, and employing creative learning strategies.

Despite disagreement among experts over whether music's impact on learning is short-term or long-term or due to developmental or behavioral changes, Schlaug says that "everybody agrees that there are positive effects on cognitive development."

Experts also agree that children have a greater capacity for learning and benefiting from music education if they start before adolescence.

"There is good evidence that starting early allows you to perceive more, understand more, think more, and express more," says Hetland.

Music's Advantages

How can you help even the youngest children benefit from the advantages of music, both in learning and in life? Ardene Shafer, director of member action and special projects for the National Association for Music Education, offers these tips:

A Powerful Teaching Tool

Whether music enhances brain power, enriches academic curricula, influences behavior, or simply provides pleasure, its most indisputable effect is as personal as it is universal.

"I speak of my own experience," says Dr. Schlaug, who grew up playing the organ. "Learning a musical instrument teaches you a lot about yourself."