An Innovative Model for Elementary Schools Which Combines Music Appreciation, Community Involvement and Individual Performing Skills

Project Based Learning (PBL) has been recognized as a powerful pedagogical strategy, helping to create meaningful learning and improve student achievements. A PBL teaching approach engages learners in inquiry with a project as its outcome.

Following the PBL approach, this paper presents a teaching program for elementary school students that aims at fostering their music appreciation and improving their musical skills. The outcome of the learning process is a community oriented music project.

The program was developed and implementation began in 2015, in Moledet Elementary School, Mevaseret Zion.

The program comprises four stages. In the third grade (age 9), music education includes class music lessons and playing the recorder. The students` inquiry is of two types: the first concerns the recorder and raises questions such as how it is built and what types of recorders are used in different cultures; the second focuses on the students` own musical experience based on their listening and playing music. They reflect on their experiences in a personal journal that accompanies them throughout their studies.

In the fourth grade, the children choose a wind instrument and relate the inquiry to this instrument. The children explore the role of this instrument in the context of different styles and cultures. In addition, they research practice strategies through interviews with professional musicians while recording their own practice strategies in their personal journals.

In the fifth grade, the children interview their relatives about their musical preferences and habits. They summarize the outcomes of these interviews in their journals. In addition, they are asked to produce a disc containing the family`s favorite pieces of music.

In the Sixth and last grade (age 12), as the students continue to improve their playing skills, they research the broader local community in order to find out ways in which music effects community life and how. Their final assignment is to identify music activity within the local community and to initiate a musical happening.

This program is in accordance with the new approach of the Department of Music Education in the Israeli Ministry of Education to promote PBL as a teaching and learning strategy. The program suggests ways and means of developing personal musical skills as well as encouraging social awareness. We believe that the graduates of this program can be the future Ambassadors of Music in Israel.