Transforming Music Education for the Next Generation: Planting ‘Four Cs’ Through Children’s Songs

Abstract

In early childhood programs, music is an important part of the curriculum that provides children with learning opportunities that can enhance cognitive and social-emotional development as well as esthetic appreciation. Important skills for twenty-first century learning can also be supported by music experiences in early childhood education including critical and creative thinking, collaboration, and communication (Four Cs). Early childhood musical activities that focus on these processes can be transformative processes for children’s learning across developmental and curriculum areas through experiences with various musical elements (e.g., rhythm, beat, tempo, melody, and lyrics). This paper analyses and applies ideas about these learning processes to the new standards for music education in the USA that were announced in 2014 by the National Association for Music Education. This paper explores how the new standards are less content based and, instead, emphasize performance through artistic processes of creating, performing, and responding. Children have strong desires for esthetic expression through music that can support critical and creative thinking, as well as in collaboration, and communication. Early childhood teachers need to reflect critically about how to transform music education in their classrooms to realize the benefits of children’s experiences with music.