CHAPTER 5: DATA PRESENTATION AND ANALYSIS
5.7 Theme five: barriers to ECCE educators’ use of musical rhymes
they all agreed that songs are very effective tools for helping children to develop language and communication skills quickly.
5.7 THEME FIVE: BARRIERS TO ECCE EDUCATORS’ USE OF
are taught using music. I wish the university knows the great importance of music and gives more training to preservice teachers. (Interview with PC on July 22, 2019)
Similarly, Participant D had received only partial training in using music as a pedagogical tool during her teacher training at UNISA. However, because she was musically gifted and self-motivated to learn, she made the effort to upgrade her skills on her own:
I attended UNISA and not much was done in music. We took a module just for a semester, and prior to that I had never received any musical training.
When I started this teaching career, especially in the ECCE section, it was not easy initially. I used my imagination, having understood children’s nature and characteristics, but if I had had a solid background in music it would have been better. However, I am musically inclined, I am gifted musically, and can compose simple music to guide children to learn whatever skills I want to teach, including teaching them how to listen and communicate in simple sentences correctly. However, I upgraded myself by listening to some children music CDs. (Interview with PD on July 15, 2019) Most of the study participants did not believe they had received enough training, or enough depth of training, in using music in children’s education. Participant F was an accountant by training; hence she had a limited ability to use music in the learning environment. She stuck to downloaded children’s music and relied on her informal knowledge and experience of children as a mother:
I was a trained accountant but felt called to work with children. I watch some good music for children on the Internet and select the relevant songs for whatever skills I want to teach. I use basic music for the children. I do not have the skill of using complex music to teach. How I wished the curriculum designers for teacher training knew the value of music in teaching children and gave it space in the curriculum. (Interview with PF on July 18, 2019) Participant A also expressed how receiving only partial music training was a constraint on her effective use of music in the ECCE learning environment:
I received training in music partially, and that made it difficult for me to use music to teach at the initial stage of my teaching. I only knew basic music. I could not use the different types of music to teach some complex content, but I have spent eight years in teaching. I have developed myself by going through the Internet to learn various types of music that I can use to teach children. I just take the content to be taught from the curriculum and pick a relevant song that I have downloaded from the Internet. We have a lot of music from the Internet, so I don’t get stuck with any content. I also take time to practise singing and even try to learn how to dance, to give of my best. I think every ECCE teacher should have knowledge of music so that we can be more effective in our teaching because music helps the children to learn better and more easily. (Interview with PA on July 15, 2019)
Many of the ECCE educators who participated in this study did not have enough musical training and did not know the rudiments of music; thus, it became difficult for them to use music effectively as a pedagogic tool. One of the participants categorically confessed that she does not have training in ECD or the Foundation Phase, but depends on her informal education from the church and the Internet. Some do not even know how to play an instrument, so they cannot use all the instruments meant to teach children, such as percussion instruments (triangles, cylinders, tambourines, bells, and so on). Most of the participants claimed that they relied on downloaded children’s music from the Internet.
5.7.2 Lack of musical resources to accompany the songs
This sub-theme discusses the issue of the lack of musical resources raised by the participants. They stated that using music as a pedagogical tool requires that there be at least simple percussion instruments to accompany the songs, especially for teaching the children sound, pitch, stress, and phonics in language. However, they complained of a lack of effective resources at the ECCE centres.
Participant F emphasised the lack of musical instruments:
The big challenge we have in this school is not just that we the teachers are not very sound in music but there are not enough musical instruments.
Teaching the children, the rudiments of learning language and communication skills demands a huge effort from the educators. As I earlier said, the major challenge of children is in the area of reading to comprehend, and music is helpful, but we need musical instruments. I wish the Department of Education would come to our aid and support the school with musical instruments. (Interview with PF on July 18, 2019)
Participant E raised a similar complaint. She believed that the provision of musical instruments to accompany the various songs she uses to teach her children would speed up their learning of any skills. In addition, accompanying songs with instruments makes the learning environment environment livelier and more participatory, thereby making teaching and learning easier to accomplish:
I have a good understanding of music and have been teaching with it. The only challenge I have is the shortage of musical resources. There are simple musical instruments that teachers are supposed to use to accompany the music, especially for teaching sound, stress, and other concepts, such as helping them with hand eye coordination and fine motor skill development, but these are not available. To achieve the aims and objectives of using songs to teach the children, there is a need for musical accompaniment. How I wish the Department of Education knew this was important and would support the ECCE centres by donating musical instruments. (Interview with PE on July 18, 2019)
Participant A also voiced the same complaint:
As I have earlier said, children are very receptive, and music suits their characteristics. For some of us without enough musical training, we download different music from the Internet to teach them, but we cannot download musical instruments from the Internet. There is a need for simple musical instruments, whether already made or improvised, to support them in learning communication skills, but we lack these instruments. (Interview with PA on July 15, 2019)
However, Participant B had improvised some simple percussion instruments for her class. She decried the fact that her colleagues did not have any musical instrument, and did not know how to improvise:
I have fewer challenges because I studied music and have knowledge of how to improvise simple percussion instruments, which I did for my class to use, such as the triangle, cylinder, tambourine, bell, clappers, drums, etc.
Additionally, I showed the children how to perform body percussion to accompany the songs. This includes clapping their hands and tapping their feet. But some of my colleagues do not have any instruments and do not even know how to play one instrument, so they cannot use all the instruments meant to teach children. The children are small and lack the ability to concentrate if we don’t add spice and make the teaching interesting. For instance, the teacher that taught this class before was not musically literate, and I must do a lot for the children to cope with what they are expected to learn. The knowledge and the use of musical instruments to accompany songs for children is very important. (Interview with PB on July 18, 2019) The participants complained about the lack of musical resources as one of the challenges hindering them from effectively using music to teach the ECCE children.
They all believed that musical instruments to accompany songs — especially simple percussion instruments such as improvised drums, tambourines, woodblocks, gongs, and maracas — are needed in the ECCE learning environment.
5.7.3 Non-inclusion of music in the NCF document and in the teacher-training programs
Under this sub-theme the participants mentioned another issue that constrained their use of music as a tool for teaching their ECCE children. They complained that the NCF document attached music only to the creative arts early learning and development areas, and hence there was no official curriculum time allotted to musical activities other than under creative arts.
Participant F felt that music must be considered in the NCF document as a subject on its own, rather than being integrated with creative arts. She believed that to effectively teach children aged three and four any skills, music is the best tool to use. She felt strongly that music is more relevant than any other subject for children of this age, and that more time needed to be allocated for it in the curriculum:
The big challenge is that as important as music is to the children, there is no music in the NCF document. So, there is a need for the curriculum designers to specifically consider music so that more time will be given to it. There is only creative arts, but we use music to teach different content such as numeracy, rhymes, language development, and other skills. I think music is more relevant than any other subject for these children at this age.
(Interview with PF on July 18, 2019)
Participant B believed that the reason why many ECCE educators did not use music in their learning environments was because they did not know how to, because music as a subject is not compulsory in teacher education. She suggested that the curriculum planners for teacher education should remedy this situation:
I want to suggest that teacher education be reviewed to add music as a compulsory module for ECD pre-service teachers. The teacher education curriculum designers should do something about this. Music must be included in the teacher training programs, so that pre-service teachers, especially in ECD/Foundation Phase, can be fully equipped with musical knowledge. Music really helps a lot, but some teachers do not have the knowledge of how to use music in their learning environment because it is not made compulsory in the teacher education curriculum. (Interview with PB on July 18, 2019)
Participant E below echoed much of what Participant B had to say:
I think the ECCE curriculum designers should consider adding music to the NCF curriculum as a content on its own and on teacher training programs, seeing the importance of music in children development, they feel ECCE is just for children to play. But we the ECCE teachers usually organise the
play, and spice it up with educative music and support the children to learn any skills. For the development of a total child, music is needed. To me traditional teaching is indoctrinating children with concepts, but using music helps the children to construct learning easily. (Interview with PE on July 18, 2019)
The participants’ responses showed that a single module in music education in the teacher-training curriculum is not enough to equip ECCE educators to use music to teach their children. They also suggested that music be made a compulsory subject in teacher education to adequately prepare the ECCE educators to use this important subject effectively to benefit the children. In addition, music is seen as a strong tool for aiding effective learning of ECCE children, and it therefore must be considered as a subject on its own in the NCF curriculum.