Metaphorical perceptions of children in preschool education about the concept of music

The aim of this study is to determine children's perceptions of the concept of music in preschool education through metaphors. For this purpose, phenomenology design, one of the qualitative research methods, was preferred in the study.The study group of the research consisted of 335 children aged 60-72 months attending 15 preschool education institutions operating in Polatlı district of Ankara province in the autumn term of the 2022-2023 academic year. The data of the study were collected with a semi-structured interview form. The application of the data collection tool to the study group was carried out by the researcher personally. The analysis of the data obtained was analysed in four stages: The coding and sorting stage of the data, the stage of creating categories (themes), the stage of ensuring validity and reliability, and the reporting stage of the research by using content analysis, one of the qualitative data analysis techniques, within the framework of the determined method. In order to ensure the validity and reliability of the research, expert opinion was consulted and the reliability of the research was calculated as 95% using Miles and Huberman (1994) formula.In the light of the research findings, it was concluded that the children in the study group created 125 metaphors about their perceptions of the concept of "music". The metaphors in which children's perceptions of the concept of music were represented the most were "dance/dancing" (63), "song" (56), "singing" (18), "playing guitar/guitar" (17) and "piano/piano playing" (11). The determined metaphors were evaluated together with their justifications and 24 different codes were created, and the related codes were divided into 9 different conceptual categories. The conceptual categories obtained are listed as this order; music as singing/listening/loving (125), music as physical/kinesthetic (kinesthetic) (60), music as instrument love/instrument playing (39), music as word association/conceptual association expression (27), music as entertainment tool (26), music as activity tool (25), music as technological aspect (19), music as social interaction aspect (19) and music as psychological/emotional effect (19). It was observed that children expressed their perceptions about the concept of "music" by creating positive metaphors in general. Only 2 children in the study group expressed their perceptions about the concept of music as a disturbing sound, that is, with negative metaphors. In this context, it was concluded that children had positive thoughts about the concept of "music" and that they liked music. Keywords: Metaphor, Preschool education, Preschool music education, Music and metaphor, Song