Some Long-Range Effects of Programed Instruction in Music

Abstract

IN 1964 an ll-week study in the use of programed instruction to teach certain aspects of music was made in Northwestern University.1 Certain interesting observations were made at that time and future investigation was suggested. A follow-up study of the behavior of subjects who participated in the original study was undertaken in 1967 as a further investigation of the uses of programed instruction in teaching fundamentals of music theory. As a result of this followup it was observed that certain objectives in the teaching of music theory might well bear re-evaluation. One of the principal areas of interest was that of long-range retention. The results of the 1964 study indicated that some subjects actually perfouned better on an eight-week retention test than in immediate recall. The explanation was that perhaps the subjects were able to learn this material from further study after the original instruction period. As a three-year period had elapsed and contamination would most probably be equal, a test was devised to evaluate the performance of subjects after three years.2 Since the information was available, it was also of interest to investigate the correlation between time spent in learning and performance on an examination administered three years after the end of the instruction period. The general question asked was: Are there any observable long-range effects of programed instruction in the fundamentals of music theory on behavior of subjects. More specifically: 1. What is the effect of programed instruction on the ability of subjects to retain learned material in the fundamentals of music theory? 2. What is the effect of instruction by teacher-classroom methods on the ability of subjects to retain learned material in the fundamentals of music theory?