The effects of piano education on the general skill levels of 4th graders

This purpose of this study was to examine the effects of entry-level piano education onthe general skill levels of 4th graders. The study had a pre-test post-test control group designwith random assignment. A total of 24 fourth graders attending an elementary school in Erzincan city center participated in the study: 12 of them were assigned to the test group and 12 were assigned to the control group. Following a review of the literature, data were collected using the Student/Family Information Form, Basic Skills Test (7-11), the Performance Evaluation Form for Piano Lessons, and three separate interview forms. Students in the test group received piano lessons following Denes Agay's Learning to Play Piano-1, which is widely recommended in the literature, whereas students in the control group did not receive piano lessons. Lessons were conducted in the form of two 30-minute sessions per week, with groups of two students, and lasted for six months. The skill levels of the test and control groups were measured prior to and after the lessons, using the Basic Skills Test (7-11). At the end of the piano education, the class teachers' and parents' views on the general skill levels and general achievement levels of the students in the test group were collected. In the data analysis stage, the Wilcoxon test was used for intra-group comparisons, and the Mann-Whitney U test for inter-group comparisons. Spearman's correlation analysis was used to examine the relationships between the continuous variables in the study, and all findings were evaluated using 5% level of significance. It was found that both the mean post-test discrimination score and the mean post-test overall score of the test group students were higher compared with the scores received by the control group students. A strongly significant positive relationship was found between the improvements in the test group students' piano skills and the improvements in their quantitative skills. A strongly significant positive relationship was also found between the improvements in the general skill levels and the amount of time devoted to out-of-class piano practice. According to the class teachers and parents, the test group students achieved marked progress in terms of their discrimination skills and somewhat less, but nonetheless significant, progress in terms of their language, spatial, reasoning, quantitative and general skills.