I remember music classes in
elementary school. This was back in the late 1970s and early 80s, so please
bear with my trip down memory lane. But music class at Ridge Hill School in
Hamden, Connecticut was quite an event, with the beloved Mr. L holding court over
our impressionable young minds, and ears. Children had trumpets, violins, and cellos
to play, and got to take them home in sleek black cases to practice after
school. No one wanted to play the tuba because it was so big to lug home, but the
cool kids played the drums, which they practiced on a drum pad at home after
dinner, giving their sonically-tortured parents an excuse to drink copious
amounts of Scotch every evening.
There was also a chorus at
school, where we sang cutting-edge new hits by Barry Manilow, Chris Cross, and
Neil Diamond. Mr. L first weeded me out as a soprano because my pre-pubescent
voice most resembled Rosie Perez sucking on a helium balloon, and then I was
dropped from the chorus all together – albeit gently – because well, basically,
I couldn’t sing.
So I was assigned a
different instrument: the recorder. For those of you who don’t know, the
recorder was a plastic flute-like instrument they gave the kids with absolutely
no musical talent because it made barely audible sounds like a whale mating
which could be drowned out by the real instruments. I was given a recorder
because it was harmless, and I couldn’t hurt myself with it – basically, the
equivalent of padded furniture in soothing colors.
I even practiced the
recorder once, tapping my Velcroed Zips sneakers and corduroy pant leg along to
some erroneous rhythm in my head. But I never dared take it home again because
the recorder was the antithesis of cool and I didn’t want to risk Fat Pete, the
neighborhood bully, see me carrying it because he’d throw me a beating.
But I digress. Those music
classes started my life-long love affair with music, but as someone who
appreciated and respected the end result, not played it. Still, I have to think
those music classes helped me later in life. For instance, the first live
concert I every attended was Barry Manilow on a class trip with Mr. L. And I
learned other valuable lessons, like you should quit something if you suck at
it – like I did with the recorder, and no matter how talentless you think you
are, there is still the triangle to play.
In all seriousness, music
classes are a vastly important part of the fabric of educating our youth. However,
these days, music, and arts programs are endangered species in our public
education system. Let me quantify that: the quality, access, and resources of
music programs are shriveling up at schools on the lower end of the income
scale, and that is further widening the achievement gap. In fact, since the
Great Recession, school districts in Florida, Kansas, Arizona, and other states
have gutted their music programs to the point they barely exist only on paper.
In 2009, California chose to dip into the education budget and “divert” $109
million from music programs for other uses, which caused music departments to
be eradicated in about half of the 100,000 state public schools. And currently
in New York, educators say that about 85% of public school students don’t
receive even adequate music instruction in school.
These de-fundings and
closures are shortsighted, and not just from the perspective that we should all
appreciate and encourage the arts. There are proven and tangible benefits to
having music programs and instruction in school. Here are a few of them:
Many studies have found that
studying a musical instrument helps children perform better in their academics,
work better in teams, increase critical thinking skills, stay in school, and
make better life choices later on.
Research shows that
secondary students who had music activities at school have lower lifetime use
tobacco, alcohol, and narcotics than those who didn’t.
Schools with music programs
graduate 90.2% of their pupils and have a 93.9% attendance rate. Meanwhile,
schools without music have only a 72.9% graduation rate and 84.9% attendance.
You may think those numbers
are due to correlation, not causation (like the better schools have music and
therefore the better numbers), but that’s not the only factor:
In
fact, no matter what socioeconomic status or school district a child belongs
to, it’s been proven that third graders who have music programs score higher on
reading and spelling tests.
Children who take music
classes have larger vocabularies, more advanced reading skills, and increased
language function than those who do not.
Young children with learning
disabilities like dyslexia or are Autistic benefit from music lessons as a
teaching tool.
A study at
Stanford University revealed that youngsters who took music show different
brain development, improved cognitive skills, and better memory than their
counterparts who didn’t.
In fact,
students who had music classes and appreciation in school scored an average of
63 points higher on their verbal SATs and 44 points better for math SATs.
A report by
the National Endowment for the Arts found that at-risk youth were particularly
helped by music programs, going on in life to register higher numbers of high
school graduates, those who went on to college and earned degrees, exercised
their right to vote, became civic advocates, did volunteer work, and became
working professionals in white collar careers.
There are also
benefits to emotional development, empathy, cultural sensitivity, higher self
esteem and cope better with anxiety and stress.
According to the Children’s
Music Workshop: “Recent studies have clearly indicated that musical training
physically develops the part of the left side of the brain known to be involved
with processing language, and can actually wire the brain’s circuits in
specific ways. Linking familiar songs to new information can also help imprint
information on young minds.”
