Music helps pupils take note in maths
Children perform better at maths when music is a key part of their lessons, an analysis of decades of research on the topic has revealed. It combed through 55 studies around the world, involving almost 78,000 participants from nursery children to university students.
The research, lead by Dr Ayca Akin from Antalya Belek University in Turkey, concluded that using music in maths lessons increased motivation and eased anxiety about maths.
Ways of integrating music in to music lessons into maths lessons range from clapping to pieces with different rhythms when learning numbers and fractions, to using maths to design musical instruments.
Previous research indicated that children who are better at music also do better at maths, but whether teaching music to youngsters actually improves their maths has been less clear.
Three types of musical intervention were explored: typical music lesson in which children sing, listen to and compose music, lessons in which children learn to play instruments; and interventions in which music is integrated into maths lessons. Students took maths tests before and after taking part in the intervention and the change in their scores was compared with their peers who did not participate. The us of music, whether in separate lessons or as part of maths classes, was associated with greater improvement in maths over time, Akin said.
The integrated lessons had the biggest effect, with about 73 per cent of those in mixed lessons doing significantly better than the control group.
Around 69 per cent of children who learned how to play instruments and 58 per cent of those who had normal music lessons improved more than the pupils with no musical intervention.
The results indicate that music helps more with arithmetic than other types of maths and has a bigger impact on younger pupils and those learning more basic mathematical concepts.
Researchers say maths and music have much in common, such as the use of symbols and symmetry. Both subjects also require abstract thought and quantitative reasoning. Arithmetic may lend itself well to being taught through music as core concepts, such as fractions and ratios, are also fundamental to music. Musical notes of different lengths can be represented as fractions and added together to make several bars of music.
Akin concluded that while musical instruction overall has a small to moderate effect on achievement in maths, integrated lessons have a large impact. She added ” Encouraging mathematics and music teachers to plan lessons together could help ease students’ anxiety about mathematics, while also boosting achievement”.
Published by The Times
by Nicola Woolcock, Education Editor
