The purpose of this study is to analyze the children's song lyrics listed in the teacher's guides for the ages 0 to 2 infant care program of the standard childcare curriculum and the ages 3 to 5 Nuri curriculum. For this, 137 children's songs with she...
The purpose of this study is to analyze the children's song lyrics listed in the teacher's guides for the ages 0 to 2 infant care program of the standard childcare curriculum and the ages 3 to 5 Nuri curriculum. For this, 137 children's songs with sheet music included in the teacher's guides for the infant care program and the Nuri curriculum were selected and precedent studies that analyzed the lyrics and literatures were reviewed. Based on the review, the following research problems were defined, analyses were conducted and frequencies and percentages were calculated in parallel with a contents review.
In this study, the research problems were defined as follows:
1. what is the distribution of life themes on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
2. What are the subjects by types of play on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
3. What are the common literary rhetorics on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
4. What is the level of difficulty of the vocabulary on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
5. What are the characteristics of the linguistic actions on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
6. How are the verses composed Of the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
7. What is the classification by lyric writer and composer on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum,?
8. What is the status of prejudiced elements on the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum?
The findings of this study can be summarized as follows:
First, the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum did not have a even distribution and showed a variance between the life themes regardless of the age the songs were for.
Second, of the children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, the three most common subjects by types of play were nature, object and people, which are part of object play. In motion play, motion was most commonly used while the proportion of language play was relatively very low.
Third, in terms of the literary rhetorics used in children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, the most common were in the order of repetition, rhyming couplet, mimetic words and onomatopoeic words.
Fourth, in terms of the level of difficulty of the vocabulary used in children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, difficulty level Ⅱ and difficulty level Ⅲ were most common and level Ⅴ was most uncommon. With the increase in age, the words tended to become more difficult but overall the level of difficulty seemed appropriate.
Fifth, in terms of the linguistic action used in children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, enumeration was most frequently used, followed by requesting form, questioning, answering, explaining, commanding, greeting and admiring.
Sixth, in terms of the verses in children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, short one verse songs were most common, followed by two, three, four and other verses. With younger age, the songs were shorter and tended to become longer with higher age.
Seventh, in terms of the lyric writer, the most common were in the order of other (meaning the lyric writer wrote only one song), writer unknown, Kim Jin-young, Bang Eun-young, Yang I-seul, Kim Ji-hae and changed lyrics. Composers were most frequent in the order of other (meaning a composer wrote only one song), foreign song, composer unknown, Kim Jin-young, Bang Eun-young, Yang I-seul, Kim Ji-Hae and traditional Korean children's song. Also, as it was common for one person to compose and write the lyrics of all the songs listed under one life theme, the songs tended to be concentrated to specific lyric writers and composers.
Eighth, in terms of prejudiced elements in children's song lyrics listed in the standard childcare curriculum and the Nuri curriculum, of the total 141 songs, excluding "Dokdo, Beautiful Island of Korea", which was listed twice in the teacher's guide for the age 5 Nuri curriculum, 16 out of the 140 songs contained a prejudiced element in the lyrics.
These findings can be used as preliminary materials in selecting children's songs for the national curriculum when it is revised in the future. Also, it can be useful information for schools when selecting children's songs as part of their education plans or for teachers and music specialists interested in writing beautiful lyrics suitable for infants and young children