I wrote about this in 2019 but it’s as relevant as ever today. As the seasons change here in New England your favorite music in the classroom will be coming on. You know that song, “Putt, Putt, Putt, Clack, Clack Clack” created by the school heater. Once that song starts, you’ll get that warm burst of air in the classroom and if you were lucky, you would only hear that song once a day. In my case the song was one that came on almost hourly…my room never did hold temperatures well. This is not music to anyone’s ears (unless you’re cold and then, yeah it is).  For my students, and probably yours, that song would make it extremely hard to concentrate in the room. I’d always have a big sigh that I would make, then raise my voice 20 decibels to be heard above the racket. The other thing I would do, if it wasn’t direct instruction time, was play music in my classroom. The music, of course, would lessen the other sounds that could be heard.

For many of us, we love listening to music and its ability to block out distracting noises. So often, you’ll find me listening to music in my cubicle, in my car or while I am making dinner. Music creates an enjoyable white noise that filters out whatever is going on around me. For most of us, we can have trouble concentrating if it’s too quiet or loud.  Music creates a neutral hum over all of it.

If you were to go and look up the benefits of playing music in the classroom, you’d find study after study affirming how well it works. You can see just a small portion of these articles and studies listed at the end of this post. As you read through the studies, you will see how music can affect the mood of your students, enhance their memory and create a safe and welcoming environment for them.

Recently, when I was home with my kids, I could hear them reciting their memorization work through song. Check out this one that my 2^nd grader was singing to himself for history. CC Cycle 2 Week 4 History

Another very popular song that we all remember is the ABC song…. yup it was through song that you learned this song and next time won’t you sing with me. Sesame Street: ABCs En Español (with Gina Rodriguez)

Side note: Gina Rodriguez is the perfect Carmen Sandiego!

One of the most prevalent uses of music in the classroom in the last number of years comes from Flocabulary. Many schools bought Flocabulary this year to add onto their Nearpod accounts. Check out a couple of their tracks click here, or here. If you clicked on the last link, you would have heard this amazing song about the French Revolution. 

Classroom Background Music

When I taught 5^th grade, I would always have music on while the students were either independently working or working in teams. Using background music would help the students stay focused by limiting the noise from the other groups.

In the classroom, I experimented a lot with which types of music I would play. Early on, I learned an important rule, listen to the music that the students request. Let’s just say I was thankful I wasn’t being observed at the time or else I might have some explaining to do.  Another thing I learned quickly is that students have strong opinions on what is and is not acceptable for music and have no filter when they don’t like a song or style. I heard on more than one occasion things like “your music sucks” and “no one wants to listen to that”.  This led me to move towards music that didn’t have lyrics. This was something that at first frustrated the students but as time went on, they would move on from it. I think what helped was that I used instrumental music that would cover popular songs.

By playing music, I saw students with fewer behavioral problems, better focused, retaining information from the topic we were working on, and an overall positive learning environment.

While doing research for this post, I learned about a teacher who would play music for specific actions in the classroom. A cleanup song for example, signaled to the students that it was time to wrap up the current activity and clean up. To test this idea out, my wife and I started playing a particular song by Phil Wickham at home to let the kids know that it is time to clean up and get ready for dinner. I was amazed that after a few days our kids became accustomed to hearing that song and subconsciously they started to clean. This led me to come up with a few ideas that could be incorporated into the classroom. Great examples of music for specific tasks:

• Brainstorming music only used during time to brainstorm ideas
• Music for creating the scene of a story or to add suspense to the lesson
• During pair-work / group-work activities (to enhance interaction)
• During individual creative writing (to facilitate creativity and ensure the students are not disturbed by external noise)
• During preparation/presentation of projects (to add an element of formality and sustain attention)
• To create a positive scene for learning new content
• To activate the new material in the brain and trigger motor learning
• During skimming and scanning of a new text (to create an atmosphere of deep concentration and extend learning time)
• To increase and sustain the learners’ attention
• To create a welcoming atmosphere (on the students’ entering a learning setting)

Music

As someone who loves music and has favorite genres, I found that if the music I used had lyrics they would inevitably end up in the students’ work subconsciously. This is why I tended to opt for instrumental music. No lyrics freed students up to focus on their work. Artists like the Vitamin String Quartet, The Piano Guys and David Garrett are just a couple of examples of where artists take current songs and cover them using just strings or piano (or both). I also love movie scores, so in my list, there were many scores from movies. I also worked in classical pieces from Beethoven, Brahms and Chopin, to help round out the listening experience.

If you are interested in hearing what that would sound like, check out this Spotify playlist that I built for teaching. The playlist is 1900+ songs and just over 119 hours (about 5 days). My advice is to just use the random button when you start the playlist and you’ll never run out of music for days.

Research and Side Note:

If you are looking to delve deeper into this idea and study, here are a few starting points:

• Music Background in the Classroom: Its Role in the Development of Social-emotional Competence in Preschool Children
• Background music in the classroom?
• Using Background Music in the Classroom to Effectively Enhance Concentration Within the Learning Environment
• The Effects of Background Music in the Classroom on the Productivity, Motivation, and Behavior of Fourth Grade Students.
• The Effect of Background Music in the Classroom
• THE EFFECTS OF BACKGROUND MUSIC IN THE CLASSROOM ON  THE PRODUCTIVITY, MOTIVATION, AND BEHAVIOR OF FOURTH GRADE STUDENT
• How can integrating music into your classroom benefit student learning and development?

Something to keep in mind. If you don’t pay for a premium Spotify account, there will be commercials. Be prepared for those breaks, like with Pandora or any other streaming service for music, as you have no control over those commercials.  

Let us know what you think by leaving us a comment below!