Effects of rythm based music education program on flow experiences, music lesson success of students and their attitudes towards music lesson

The purpose of this research is to reveal the effects of rythm based music education program on flow experiences of students, their success in music lesson and their attitude towards music lesson. In the research, pre test-post test experiment pattern with control group was used. Accordingly, experiment and control groups of the research were formed by unbiased assignment method. The study group of the research consists of 3rd grade students of Emekevler Primary School in Kepez district of Antalya city in 2011-2012 academic year. The research was performed on 2 groups. As it was understood that the classes are equivalent by unbiased assignment method, class 3B was selected as experiment group (n=22) and class 3A was selected as control group. (n=23) The music lessons of both groups were conductd by the researcher. Primary education 3rd grade music lesson including rythm applications was applied to experiment group. The lesson applied to the control group was exactly compliant to the planning in primary education 3rd grade teacher?s manual book. Applications continued for 7 weeks. Music lesson attitude scale (Özmenteş, 2005) was applied to both groups at the beginning and end of the applications. Besides, in every session teachers were monitored by two observers regarding their success in music lesson. After every session students and teachers of the related classes wrote diaries about their experiences. Descriptive statistics and chi square test was used in the resolution of the quantitative data obtained from the research and content analysis technique was used for the resolution of qualitative data. According to the results obtained from the research; the flow experiences (t=,-52, p>.05) and attitudes (t=-1,350, p>.05) towards music lesson of students in experiment and control groups did not show significant difference. Acording to the data obtained by the examination of diaries written by teachers and students by content analysis, total frequency of expressions showing that flow was experienced is 422 in experiment group student diaries and 410 in control group student diaries. Total frequency of expressions showing that flow was experienced is 16 in experiment group teacher diaries and 14 in control group teacher diaries. In teacher diaries of both groups, there were no data expressing signs of boredom or oblivion. The total frequency of expressions indicating anxiety is 3 in experiment group teacher diaries and 1 in control group teacher diaries. Keywords: Music, Education, rythm, flow experiences