Voar até ao comboio dos segredos: a construção de significados partilhados no desenvolvimento do pensamento musical em crianças do 1º ciclo do EB

Doutoramento em MúsicaO presente trabalho pretende ser uma contribuição para o estudo do desenvolvimento do pensamento musical em crianças do 1º Ciclo do Ensino Básico. Este tema foi analisado a partir dos processos através dos quais as crianças constroem significados quando estão envolvidas em atividades relacionadas com a composição musical. Esta análise foi produzida a partir de três eixos teóricos fundamentais: A corrente enativa do embodiment, a teoria das emoções e sentimentos de António Damásio, e a Psicologia Cultural. O projeto foi desenvolvido a partir de um estudo longitudinal em que a professora/investigadora, através de vários ciclos de investigação-ação acompanhou o percurso de 72 crianças entre o seu primeiro e terceiro ano de escolaridade, numa escola do 1º Ciclo do Norte de Portugal Os dados foram obtidos a partir da observação participante em sala de aula, notas de campo, gravações áudio e vídeo, conversas exploratórias e diálogos, um questionário/reflexão e self-reports. A análise e interpretação dos dados sugere que atividades relacionadas com a composição musical em pequenos e grandes grupos, quando abordada a partir de temas intimamente ligados aos mundos das crianças, se pode transformar numa plataforma de diálogo baseada em processos emocionais profundos onde as crianças encontram inúmeras oportunidades não só para desenvolver o seu pensamento musical, como também para reconstruir as suas identidades musicais, pessoais e sociais.This work is a contribution to the study of the development of children’s musical thinking in the context of primary school. This topic was analyzed taking into account the processes by which children create meaning when they are involved in activities related to music composition. This analysis was based upon three major theoretical axes: The enactive approach to embodiment, António Damásio’s theory of emotions and feelings and cultural psychology. The project was developed in a longitudinal design in which the teacher/ researcher, through an action research methodological approach, followed the musical development of 72 children between their first and third grade, in a primary school in the North of Portugal. Data was gathered from participant observation in the classroom, field notes, audio and video recordings, exploratory conversations and dialogues, a reflexive questionnaire and self-reports. Analysis and interpretation of data suggests that musical composition activities in small and large groups, when approached from the point of view of children’s’ worlds, can become a platform for dialogue based on deep emotional processes where children find several opportunities to develop not only their musical thinking, but also their personal, social and musical identities

The inclusion of the educator in preschool music lessons, as an influence on musical development

The current paper presents a study on the relationship between music learning development, and the inclusion of a general preschool educator in music lessons, by children aged between 3 and 5 years old. Three study groups (n=51) consisting of existing preschool classes were differentiated by their exposure to a series of ten music lessons with or without the assistance of their habitual educator. One group had both lessons and educator assisting, a second group had lessons but their educator wasn’t present. A third was used as a control group in order to define musical development that was only related with cognitive growth. Participant’s performance concerning reproduction of learned rhythm patterns, melodic patterns and a familiar song were audio recorded in two recordings: once before the ten given lessons and the other after them. These were evaluated by professional music judges that had to choose the best recording of each individual child, without knowing if they were evaluating either from the first or second moment of recording. The study concept was developed using existing research based on Vygotsky (1978) and Brofenberner’s (1979, 1989) theories of learning, and on the basis that effectiveness, emotions and feelings, have a prior role in knowledge construction (Damásio, 2001, Bowman, 2004, Johnson, 2006, 2007). The paper concludes that as the study group with lessons and educator assisting scored higher in the final musical test, this is presented as evidence to the notion that musical knowledge is a cognitive construction deeply embedded in the social and emotional webs created by the child