The effects of critical thinking education on performance in music education

It has been proved that critical thinking has many applications in many fields and that it has positive effects in education (Kökdemir, 2003). But it was seen that research in the field of music education in Turkey lacked the focus on critical thinking. Therefore, the aim of this study is to determine the effects of critical thinking on playing musical instruments. In light of this aim, the pretest-posttest design has been implemented in carrying out the study using control groups.The aforesaid research has been carried out with a total of 40 students (38 female, 2 male) that had studied at Gazi University, Department of Fine Arts Education, Music Education Program in the 2009-2010 academic year; the age of which differed between 19 and 23 (M = 20.85, SD = 1.08) and 26 of which played the flute while 14 of which played the piano. The Turkish versions of the Demographic Information Survey and California Critical Thinking Test have been applied to all forty students that have participated in the study.The data collected from the experimental and the control groups were analyzed through the Statistical Package for Social Sciences. After presenting the arithmetic means and the standard deviations of the data; variance evaluation analysis has been carried out to determine whether there is a difference between these results and the results gathered through the pre-, post-test design points. When we look at the results of the study; In light of these result it is seen that the critical thinking education has increased the critical thinking tendencies of the students and the performance points of the attendees.