Music with Parental Involvement is Better Music

Family playing instruments and singing 
together in living room.

Family involvement promotes social, academic, physical, and emotional growth in a child.  Family involvement also is one of the most important things to have in a music classroom. In an article posted by the National Association for Music Education, it says that family engagement with music is good for anytime or on-the-go learning and creating a community. By sharing the students ideas, songs, recordings, etc. with their parents that engaged the families more into actively participating and collaborating with the class and the music instructor. The family can also form better bond with listening to music they all like in the car, when they're cleaning the house, etc.

Fortunately, I have a lot of experience when it comes to my family being involved in what I am doing in music. At my high school, my choir put together a Choral Booster Club (CBC). This club elected a president, vice president, treasurer, and a secretary that were parents elected by parents to enhance our program. Doing this made our choir so much stronger, and allowed the parents to be more involved. One year my mom was the president so I was able to see first hand what she had to do. For our performances, the CBC would put together the tickets, snacks, etc. for the audience, and put together meals for us before our performances. I also have a musical family in general. My dad and his whole side of the family has sang and played instruments for as long as I can remember. Even though my mom's side of the family hasn't had that much musical background, they still sing and are involved at church. I wouldn't be the musician I am today without my family, and their involvement in my future career.

Can Music Help Students Mental Health?

Woman playing guitar to a man
laying down as music therapy 

Music is the art of arranging sounds in time through melody, harmony, rhythm, timbre, and lyrics. Music is also a form of self-expression, communication, and even can help people with their mental health. Music therapy is the clinical and evidence-based music intervention within a therapeutic setting. Research shows that the four major interventions of music therapy are lyric analysis, improvisation, active listening, and song writing. As said in the article, music allows a person to encourage expression, regulate their mood, reflect, and speak about topics that may be difficult to discuss in a less-threatening way. In this study, when a child was hesitant to meet with a therapist, they suddenly got excited when they found out it was a music therapy session. The music allowed the child to discuss self-worth, resilience, and strength. The child's social skills and cognitive development overall improved, and allowed him to engage with the therapist better! 

Personally, I haven't had an experience directly with music therapy, but I do know it is a great option for people to use! I use music as my source of communication, and as a creative outlet, so I guess you could say it is my therapy. I use multitudes of works and pieces to express the way I'm feeling, or to even communicate that feeling to someone else. Since I have ADHD, I especially love just relaxing piano music to calm myself down when I feel that I am scattered, so I make specific playlists for these things. Music also makes me think in a way that some other subjects can't. It combines reading, math, and history all into one thing. Personally, I don't think anything else on this earth can do that, and also be a creative outlet for people as well. 

Diversity in a Music Classroom

Diversity: the practice or quality of including or involving people from a range of different social and  ethnic backgrounds, etc.; the state of variety. Diversity, especially in a music classroom, is important because it emphasizes the learning of all music with no boundaries, and can create a safe space for all learners! In an article written by DeeAnn Gray, she states that "teaching culturally diverse music in a music class resulted in knowledge about welcoming the challenges posed by diversity to the benefit of both students and educators." The article talks about how Dee Ann teaches a middle school choir class in Hawaii, and came up with the acronym EMBRACE, and that each letter represents a strategy for encouraging and creating diversity in your classroom. The acronym stands for encouraging interaction, making listening a priority, being aware of cultural differences, respecting all students, addressing problems when they arise, creating community, and enjoying all your students! 

Diverse students singing in school program

In my personal opinion, diversity redefines music.

When children sing, dance, or listen to diverse or multicultural music; they gain knowledge, and find it fun and engaging. Personally, in a music class, I would strive for diversity in music. It makes children accept others, strengthens their listening skills, and promotes multimodal learning throughout the music. I never really had diverse music when I was in grades K-12. It was only in college that I truly started to listen to, and started to promote diverse music. Because of this, I have started listening to more genres of music, and teaching my friends and family more about them too! If the music is diverse, there aren't any limits. Music is one of the biggest forms of communication. Just look around in your classes, restaurants, etc. and you will most likely see someone listening to music. Diverse music is important because when words fail, music speaks- to everyone.