Effects of Musical Activities on Children in Japan with Diverse Cultural or Lingual Backgrounds: Enhancing Children’s Emotional Well-being

Recently, due to an increase in children from diverse cultural and lingual backgrounds in Japan, arts activities that help them to maintain stable emotions and strengthen their sense of self-esteem have become as important as linguistic education. This study aims to clarify the effects of musical activities on foreign children living in Japan. Nine children aged four to eight years attending extracurricular Japanese language classes participated in a music workshop. A questionnaire based on the mood checklist was administered before and after the workshop. The results showed that the positive mood state (pleasantness, relaxation) decreased slightly, and the negative mood state (anxiety) increased, despite eight out of nine children answering, “I really enjoyed myself.” On individual examination, one of the children showed an increase in the positive mood state and a decrease in the negative mood state. Six children registered positive mood changes or maintained the highest score for positive mood or the lowest score for negative mood. The two children did not exhibit any productivity. Based on the results of the mood checklist and the children’s individual situations, most of the children had some positive changes after the workshop. In conclusion, the results suggest that musical activities can positively affect children’s emotions, and percussion performance can contribute to an increased positive mood with a feeling of satisfaction.This research was supported by JSPS KAKENHI Grant Number JP19K0276

Using the larvae of caddisfly as a biomonitor to assess the spatialdistribution and effective half-life of radiocesium in riverine environmentsin Fukushima, Japan

The environmental monitoring survey using this organisms was called“Caddisfly Watch”and this activity hasinvolved both scientists and local people for collecting them.A simple method is needed for the continuous monitoring of radiocesium (137Cs) contamination in riverineenvironments after the 2011 accident at the Fukushima Dai-ichi Nuclear Power Plant (FDNPP) in Japan. In aprogram called“Caddisfly Watch”, we used larvae of the caddisflyStenopsyche marmorata(Trichoptera: Steno-psychidae) to monitor the spatial distribution and estimate effective half-life (Teff)of137Cs pollution in riverineenvironments. Caddisfly larvae showed that the highest concentration of137Cs among several aquatic organismsand no apparent variation between growth stage. In addition, caddisfly larvae reflected137Cs concentrations insuspended particulate matter in their gut, and that showed no seasonal variation, better reproducibility, andsignificant correlation with those in sediment. Results indicate that caddisfly larvae can be used as a biologicalsampler of suspended particulate matters. TheTeffvalues of137Cs concentrations in caddisfly larvae estimated bysingle component decay function model showed significantfit. TheTeffvalues in Kuma, Maeda, downstreamNiida, upstream Niida, Ohkawa, and Ukedo river showed 2.8, 5.7, 3.1, 6.7, 0.6, and 4.8 years (34, 68, 38, 80, 6.9,and 58 months), respectively. The results of declining trend in this study were similar to those in previous re-ported in Fukushima. Further continuous observations using this simple approach of“Caddisfly Watch”make itpossible to predict the future of the contamination with radioactive Cs in the river environment