THE EFFECTS OF TEACHING MUSIC SKILLS ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF READING SKILLS AMONG FIRST GRADERS: AN EXPERIMENTAL STUDY

• Main Author: LU, DAISY TAN
• Format: Dissertation
• Language: English
• Published: ProQuest Dissertations & Theses 01-01-1986
• Subjects: Literacy; Reading instruction
• ISBN: 9798206140378

The purpose of this study was to compare the reading performance of first-grade students trained in the Kodaly-Orff musical context with others given traditional reading instruction only. The study was influenced by the teaching model of using music skills, specifically, activities that stress auditory perception, auditory discrimination, auditory memory, motor development, coordination, visual perception, eye-hand coordination, spatial relationships, visual discrimination, visual memory and other related skills which are part of the process of learning to read both music and sentences. Chi-square analyses examined sex, ethnicity, lunch (socioeconomic) status, and music experience, with another major variable, reading pretest scores analyzed by T-tests, to ensure comparable non-significantly different groups. The Experimental subjects were taught reading in the context of Kodaly and Orff by this researcher for one and a half hours per week over a 3-month period within the total reading instruction time. The Control subjects received an equal amount of total reading instruction time in the traditional context. No significant differences were found between the posttest scores of both groups in total reading achievement, letter recognition, letter "sound" recognition, vocabulary and comprehension. Although the Experimental group did not show the superiority that had been predicted, both groups scored significantly higher in the posttest as analyzed by an analysis of covariance. While this was to be expected, given the fact that both groups received five months of reading instruction between pre- and posttests, there is the unsubstantiated possibility that some reading gain was attributable to the 30-minute daily music instruction each group received. This speculation did not, however, receive support from scientific analysis in this study; neither was the hypothesis supported by a further analysis of variance of reading CAT scores in 52 elementary schools. The speculated reasons are presented in the final chapter.