PLE 5 Chapter 6 Question 1 [Cognitive Learning]

What are the essential skills and/or learning outcomes you want your students to know and be able to do that relate to cognitive learning?


I think in my music classroom, there will be many skills involved that relate to cognitive learning. Much of cognitive learning is the process of information that the students are learning. This process can include learning by model, listening, and reading. Listening is an essential skill in the music classroom. This includes peer interaction by listening to different musical phrases, for concepts within the music and scores, and learning together how to actively make music. The teacher can help guide students by doing clap rhythms or singing for students to hear phrases in a variety of ways. 

I also believe the use of representations help students learn cognitively. In my classroom, maybe this could be finding a story to read along with the piece of music, or a historical background that paints a picture of what the music should sound like. After writing this post on my personal thoughts, I actually found a study online that investigated children's perception of melodic construction in hope of finding clues about their broader cognitive development in nonmusical domains. 

Here is a short excerpt from the study:



"Bamberger (1991, 1994) also advocates using children’s descriptions as crucial 
evidence for understanding a child’s musical development. In Bamberger’s (1991) 
experiments with Montessori bells, children are asked not only to build a melody, but also 
to make instructions for someone else to play the melody. This type of response is 
specifically designed to produce a broader scope of children’s cognitive abilities. 
Bamberger (1994) also draws on children’s verbal descriptions, drawings, and spatial 
ordering of the bells as possible ways to externally reveal the private and internal nature of 
inner hearing, approximating a more genuine understanding of musical development 
(Bamberger, 1991; Bamberger, 1994; Hargreaves, 1986)"

http://www-usr.rider.edu/~vrme/v17n1/visions/article3