CHAPTER 3: REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE
3.10 The impact of musical rhymes based pedagogy on ECCE children language
could select two or more rhymes that enhance language learning and produce copies of the rhymes for the children to practice their reading ability with the correct pronunciation, intonation, and expression of words during reading. This readers’
theatre method creates an enjoyable environment for all the children to participate in the reading exercise. The educator could video record the exercise and allow the children to watch and assess their performance. In addition, the educator could divide the children into small groups, give them some rhymes to practise, and invite the groups to dramatise the rhymes for the class.
3.10 THE IMPACT OF MUSICAL RHYMES BASED PEDAGOGY ON
and firmer their development (Miendlarzewska & Trost, 2014; Moreno et al., 2011).
These authors further emphasised the significance of music on the language and verbal development of a child. Sayakhan and Bradley, 2019 as well as Fairchild and McFerran (2019) emphasised the importance of musical rhymes on children’s brain development, and found that children who are taught with music show sound verbal recall, an acceleration in language acquisition and pronunciation, and develop their reading aptitude. Thus, music can aid the teaching of language skills to children, irrespective of their socioeconomic background, disability, health status, or culture. Hence, this section will examine literature that speaks to the use of music in the cognitive, listening, reading social, and emotional language of a child.
There are numerous studies on the importance of music that confirm its positive impact on various skills. Pourkalhor and Tavakoli, (2017) states that effective speaking, listening, reading, and writing demand a great deal of responsiveness and high cognition. Sayakhan and Bradley, 2019; Miendlarzewska and Trost (2014) found that children taught using music have good verbal intelligence, pronunciation, and reading ability. Music performance requires the ability to differentiate sound from noise, the ability to discriminate between pitches, and an understanding of harmonious structure.
Research has revealed that when music is employed to engage children in teaching and learning, plasticity and functional changes occur in the brain (Oesch, 2019; Herrera et al., 2014). Fairchild and McFerran (2019) found that all musical activities stimulate the brain, leading to high cognition that aids and facilitates the development of communication skills. According to Trimble and Hesdorffer (2017) skills are easily acquired and developed when the whole brain is functional in the learning process.
Music develops higher-order thinking skills in children, thereby helping them to build self-esteem, which according to Fairchild and McFerran, (2019) is important for language skill acquisition. When children are exposed to a variety of percussion instruments in their early years, and have to learn to follow a beat, tempo, and rhythm, their general intelligence is enhanced (D'Souza & Wiseheart, 2018; Muthivhi & Kriger, 2019). Sohot, and Yunus, (2019) found that children who received musical training outperformed those who did not, as the musically trained children developed better cognition and verbal intelligence that further enhanced their vocabularies and communication skills. There is a link between cognitive development and language
development, especially in infancy and early childhood; thus, a child with high cognition will acquire a variety of skills more easily than a child with low cognition (Fairchild, & McFerran, 2019; MacWhinney, 2014). Hence, music can be used to accelerate and stir up children’s cognitive development to facilitate the development of communication skills. However, Andrews and Baker (2019) study on the effect of background music on cognitive performance in musicians and non-musicians found that there was no substantial difference in cognitive ability between the two groups, and suggested that any better performance by the musicians may have been due to extra learning or support provided to them.
3.10.2 The impact of musical rhymes on developing listening skills
Listening skills are fundamental for the development of other skills, and are a prerequisite for developing language and communication ability (Hugo & Horn, 2013).
Torppa and Huotilainen (2019) found that mastering the acoustics of musical sound is effective in aiding children to acquire speaking skills, as it aids the learning of phonemes, which are the aural building blocks of language and communication. The authors further showed that musical exercises are challenging tasks that demand active engagement with musical acoustic sounds and the ability to produce meaning from the different sounds, and added that this process is crucial for the effective development of communication, language, and vocal response. The development of well-organised sound-to-meaning involves attending to sensory details that include fine-grained properties of sound (pitch, timing, and timbre) as well as cognitive skills that are related to working (Poremba et al., 2013). A review of literature by Stone et al. (2013) showed that effective listening is considered a prerequisite for lifelong learning and for sustainable all-round development. Similarly, research on the influence of music on the development of children conducted by Torppa and Huotilainen (2019) found that listening to music assists children to acquire pitch discrimination that further enhances the development of language and communication skills.
Listiyaningsih (2017) and Quintin, (2019) recommended that early childhood curriculum designers emphasise aural and oral development by including music that speaks to listening activities, such as songs, rhymes, stories, and games. The authors
further stated that the ability of the children to acquire listening skills will accelerate their communication and language development. Similarly, Mobbs and Cuyul (2018) found that singing songs provides an opportunity for the repetition of words, and that accompanying listening activities with songs therefore supports the learning and developing of communication skills. They also found that using songs as an implementation strategy to teach listening skills assisted the children in learning the rhythm of language, enhanced their listening comprehension, and improved their acquisition of vocabulary and idiomatic terms.
However, Molai (2019) and Ardila (2013) asserted that the acquisition of effective listening skills could be hampered by certain factors. Kutlu and Aslanoğlu (2009) conducted research on the factors affecting listening skills by testing the listening comprehension of 265 Grade 5 pupils, and found that children’s engagement with other media while being spoken to had an adverse effect on their listening skills. Similarly, Ardila (2013) identified seven factors responsible for children’s poor listening skills:
children’s motivation, paralinguistic features, vocabulary, concentration, educator’s methodology, the use of material, and the children’s background.
Nevertheless, it is confirmed that using the appropriate songs to teach any subject, including communication skills, will aid children’s motivation to learn in the learning environment (Torppa, & Huotilainen, 2019)
3.10.3 The impact of musical rhymes on speech development
Khaghaninejad et al. (2016) declared that the use of music in the learning environment not only enhances cognitive and listening development in children, but also communication and speech ability. Research has shown that speech and music share a similar processing system. Musical activities that increase processing can therefore have a positive impact on the perception of language, which in turn positively influences speech ability. Thus, active involvement with music improves the brain’s early encoding of language skills (Sayakhan, & Bradley, 2019; Akhmadullina et al., 2016).
Escalda et al. (2011) conducted a critical review on the effects of music on the auditory processing aptitude and phonological awareness skills of 56 children aged five. They found that the children exposed to music performed considerably better in the acquisition of auditory ability and speech development than their counterparts without musical exposure. In a similar vein, in a study examining the effects of music on the development of children’s reading skills, Moritz et al. (2013) found that children with musical training had better speech development than children in a control group without very much music training. Several other researchers have carried out empirical studies on the relationship between musical activities and the development of communication skills (Flaugnacco et al., 2015), and have found that musical activities enhance and facilitate speech development in children.
Baigina, (2019) identified three significant features that show the similarity between music and communication: the affective filter, the monitor model, and natural input.
The theory of the affective filter proposes that effective and productive learning happens in an anxiety-free environment that is conducive to learning, and therefore views the emotional state of the children as the determining filter that may aid or prevent the acquisition of communication skills. Early childhood is a period during which the majority of children are in a restless, hyperactive, and inquisitive state. At the same time, they are often emotional and have difficulty adapting or relating freely with other children. Thus, Van Wijk, Huffmeijer, Bosdriesz, Bakermans-Kranenburg, Kolijn, van IJzendoorn and van den Bulk (2019) and Koelsch (2015) declared music to be therapeutic in calming children’s brains and emotions, thus making teaching and learning more interesting and enjoyable.
Although, the use of music may have a positive impact on children’s communication development, if songs are not carefully and wisely selected, they may stir up disagreement among the children, particularly if the songs contradict their cultural beliefs (Kuśnierek, 2016). Another challenge that could potentially hamper the use of music as a teaching strategy to teach communication is the educator’s lack of inadequate knowledge of music that is relevant and suitable for the content (Barrett, Flynn, Brown, & Welch, 2019). The social-constructivist learning environment demands that the ECCE educator have a good understanding of the content in order to guide the children in a systematically way to acquire the necessary skills (Ryan, 2020).
Thus, it is expected that ECCE educators have an in-depth knowledge of music before they adopt it as teaching strategy. However, research reveals that most ECCE educators are not skilled when it comes to the use of music as pedagogy (Henley, 2017; Welch &
Henley, 2014). Another challenge pointed out by Kalinde (2017) is the insufficient time allotted to music in the timetable. Kalinde stated that music is seen as an extension of physical education in ECCE centres in Zambia, hence the ECCE educators do not understand its importance as an implementation strategy for teaching and learning.