Music appreciation is the basis of all music, and music education sets its goal at helping the students cultivate their musical mentality and personality by developing their appreciation skills through rich music experiences.
This study analyzed the ...
Music appreciation is the basis of all music, and music education sets its goal at helping the students cultivate their musical mentality and personality by developing their appreciation skills through rich music experiences.
This study analyzed the changing process of seven Music Curriculums and the contents about music appreciation with the appreciation pieces in elementary music textbooks. The curriculums were compared and analyzed according to if the appreciation pieces matched the curriculums, the percentage of the appreciation area, and the selection of diverse appreciation pieces. And based on the results and the Revised Seventh Curriculum announced in February, 2007, the investigator identified proper musical concepts for appreciation or instructional elements according to the contents system of the curriculum and suggested a selection of appreciation pieces.
A review of the Music Curriculums from the first version to the latest reveals that the first one was based on the subjects, the second on life, the third on academic aspects, and the fourth to the seventh on humans. With each change, the importance of appreciation increased, and so did the percentage of appreciation in the curriculum. The educational contents changed according to the goals pursued by each of the curriculums, but there was no balance among the pieces of the appreciation areas in terms of periods, composers, and diverse cultures. Despite the changes to the curriculums, the music textbooks merely repeated the old appreciation pieces.
A detailed look into the contents of the textbooks indicates that the biggest number of the appreciation pieces came from the Romantic and Classical Period. The most preferred composer was Mozart, and the most presented piece was "Surprise Symphony" by Haydn. And the diverse time periods and cultures reflected in the appreciation pieces were mostly Western.
Discovering that there was no balance in the ratio of Western and traditional Korean music, the time periods and composers, and diverse cultures in the music textbooks, I identified seven, eight, six, and five musical concepts from the third, fourth, fifth, and sixth grade music textbooks according to the Revised Seventh Curriculum of 2007 and picked a selection of appreciation pieces that could be used during appreciation classes. Special attention was paid to make sure that various pieces of traditional Korean music and Asia's diverse periods would be all included in that selection. And efforts were made to include many works written by modern composers, as well.