The effect of "mastery learning" on students' attitudes and achievement in primary sixth-grade music lesson

Mastery Learning is an instruction/education model which was developed byBenjamin Bloom; dealing with student qualifications, education process, and learningoutputs which are being effective on the constitution of learning. Being based on thecollective education, according to this model, it is argued that "most students can learnall new behaviors which are intended to be learned by schools" (Bloom, 1995).In this research therefore, it is aimed to determine the effects of the `masterylearning?-whose influence on student success and attitude has been set forth in severalfields of subjects-on sixth grade primary school students? attitude and successes inmusic lesson within the general music education; and accordingly, it is intended to offersuggestions for the usage of this model in school music classes.The study was made in cooperation with two sixth grade classes havingeducation at schools located in West Blacksea Region in Turkey in 2010. Being anexperimental research, the study was carried out with pre-test, post-test control groupdesign. The experiment and control groups were identified with cognitive introductorybehaviors test. To collect the necessary data, music lesson attitude scale and musiclesson success scale were implemented on the experiment and control groups in thebeginning and at the end of the experimental process.Moreover, during the study, Independent Samples T-Test was utilized toanalyze the difference of the averages of the experiment and control groups whilePaired Samples T-Test was used to analyze the difference of pre-test and post-testaverages among the two groups, whether the difference is meaningful or not. And theinterrelation of the two groups? attitude and success points were reviewed according toPearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient.Consequently, a statistically significant relation has not been confirmedbetween the attitudes of these two groups attending the music lessons carried outaccording to mastery learning and present approaches. In addition to that, theexperiment group?s pre-test and post-test averages? difference is bigger than the controlgroup. Similarly, between the successes of the groups attending the music lessonscarried out according to mastery learning and present approaches, a statisticallysubstantial relation has not been designated. There is an important difference betweenthe intragroup pre-test and post-test point averages in both groups. However, thedifference of the experiment group?s pre-test and post-test point averages is muchgreater than the control group.According to the outcomes of the research, both in experiment and controlgroup, the success in music lesson and the attitudes towards music lesson do notdifferentiate substantially with respect to gender aspect. Besides, in both two groups, indistinctive respects, a kind of relation was observed at a minor level between attitudeand success; this relation does not statistically significant.Keywords: Music Education; Primary School Music Lesson; Mastery Learning;Attitude; Success