Developing Musicianship through Improvisation: An Eclectic Teaching Module for Pre-school Children

Abstract

AbstractIn order to develop musicianship skill of pre-school students, the researcher as a teacher developedan eclectic teaching module that adheres to the philosophies found in Kodály, Dalcroze, and the Orffapproaches. Improvisation was used as a tool for developing musicianship. From this action research,students learned through active music making for twelve lessons. Each lesson contained the developmentof six skills, including keeping a steady beat, improvisation elements identification, rhythmic imitation,rhythmic improvisation, melodic imitation, and melodic improvisation. Every lesson, studentshad got a new pair of contrasting elements and used them with all those six skills. The contrastingmaterials included long/short sounds, high/low sounds (sol/mi), same/different patterns, sound and silentsigns, backward patterns, loud/soft sounds, louder/softer sounds, fast/slow speeds, faster/slowerspeeds, and staccato/legato signs. A rating scale with five-point continuous criteria was used for pretests,post-tests and improvisation assessments. Video recording was used to document all students’activities and make assessments of observed behaviours. Three teachers, who controlled all assessments,were observed for research reliability. The findings demonstrated that all ten students had improvementon all six objectives. The mean post-test scores were higher than the mean pre-test scores. The studentsdemonstrated the understanding and enhancing of musical foundation, which included two aspects ofimprovisation skill, rhythmic improvisation and melodic improvisation. The most improvement skillwas a keeping steady beat, followed by rhythmic improvisation, melodic improvisation, melodic imitation,rhythmic imitation, and improvisation materials identification.Keywords: Musicianship, Improvisation, Eclectic Teaching Module