Three leading European music universities (Liszt Academy from Hungary, Royal Conservatories of the Haag Holland and that of Scotland) form a strategic partnership with the objective of creating a new music teaching curriculum for primary school music teachers, as well as to elaborate a new didactics material with a modernised music repertory following the principles of the renowned Kodály pedagogy. The project intends to fill the need of new teaching ways in music, especially in the most susceptible age group of children (5-10 ys), who usually receive 1 music lesson/week from the general class teacher who have no skills and training to teach specialized subjects, and have a very vague music repertory (except some specialised music primary schools in Hungary). There is no modern curriculum or specific content for music education in primary schools yet. The current teaching methodology is based on the passive attitude of the pupils, focuses too much on theory rather than creating an atmosphere where the kids can actively be involved in music making, while having a “positive flow”. That’s why currently music lessons are among the most denied and disliked subjects. Why should anyone like or make music, is there any benefit? Why is it important to start music education in early childhood? The key is the proven benefits of music, the so called “musical transfer effect”. Those children who receive appropriate music education in their early ages will have more developed cognitive functions, linguistic, arithmetic skills, fine motoric capabilities, will possess a more open social attitude, more autonomous thus flexible personality compared to those children who received no music education. Therefore the stake is the quality of our future society. The innovation of our approach lies in the new approach of two new models which connect creative movements with singing and music listening, as well as applying elements of the pedagogy of Klara Kokas, a Kodaly alumna, who developed a new, children-focused holistic approach combining music listening with free movements. The two models truly reflect the findings of how active participation in music making, be it through instinctive movements, improvisation, etc. enhances the understanding, absorption of music. A recently finished pilot scientific study in Hungary serves as a starting point for the job of creating new didactics based on these models. In parallel the critical review of the current learning materials and music repertoires used in primary schools will be completed along with importing new pieces. The pieces have to serve the needs of the children of the digital era, to help their joyful involvement in music lessons, via using carefully selected, high-quality music listening materials of various genres with analysis, authentic folk pieces of the given countries, singing games and choreographies. This will be executed by experts and students of the 3 HEI partners, the first steps being done through Intensive Programmes in each seat. The materials (cca 900 items by the end) will be tested in a population of children of primary school age and their teachers coming from partner institutions who have been invited by the HEIs in each countries. These partners (HU: a primary school, NL: Vocaal Talent, SC: NYCoS) have children choirs as well as CPD programmes, so the testing procedure could be extended to practising teachers, too.A new IOS platform based app (KODA) developed specifically for music teachers with features like games for developing musical writing, reading skills, and a lesson-planner will be used. The third intellectual output is a special platform, the Kodály-hub which will be designed to meet the unique needs of music educators. All other intellectual outputs will be uploaded to the Kodály-hub throughout the project and will be made publicly available. This hub will act as a center for updated music education information, methodology, didactics, it will be open for new partners, countries to upload new contents, good practices upon a careful professional pre-check of the materials’ confirmity to the Kodályian principles. This hub will also be used as an effective dissemination tool, though other regular dissemination channels will be promoted as well. At the end of the 30-month project 3 consecutive multiplier events will be organised in all 3 countries where apart from educators, policy makers of schools educations will be invited.The sustainability will be secured by the future implementation of the Erasmus Mundus Joint Master Degree and by inviting more and more new educators, partners, countries to upload their materials to the Kodály-hub from all over the world. The major impact of the project is to bring up a new, fully competent well trained and musically inspired generation of music teachers, therefore children can receive regular and high quality music education as part of their primary school curriculum.
All partners in this project share a firm belief that “music should belong to everyone” - it is crucial that every child (not just the privileged few) should have access to music education from the early years. Why is it important to start music education in early childhood and why should it be for everyone? The key is the proven benefits of music, the so called “musical transfer effect”. If children receive high quality, meaningful music education from a young age it is very likely to have a positive effect in many areas including: Cognitive ability, literacy, numeracy, social and personal skills. It is our united belief, that in order to have high quality music education we first need well trained and highly skilled music teachers. Special emphasis must be placed on music education in the primary schools, particularly for 5 to 10 year-olds, who are in their most susceptible years. However, in the majority of non-specialist educational settings children of this age may only receive one music lesson per week, generally delivered by classroom teachers with no formal music training. As a result, frequently the teacher uses poor quality repertoire. What role should music conservatoires play in addressing these issues? Firstly conservatoires should play a more prominent role in the training of elementary music teachers and it is our firm belief that those experts in conservatoires should support and engage with the school music education system. Consequently, three leading European Higher Education Institutions of music (The Liszt Academy of Music Budapest - the leader of the consortium, the Royal Conservatoire of Scotland Glasgow and the Royal Conservatory of The Hague- all of whom are known globally) and their local partners from the field of Education and choral work (The Kós primary School from Hungary, and the National Youth Choirs of Scotland and Holland, resp.) have come together to collaborate in this project, with the following aims: - to raise awareness among professional musicians as well as the general public as to the need for quality music education in all schools - to provide guidance for music educators towards a creative music pedagogy inspired by the work of Zoltán Kodály and his Hungarian music pedagogical legacy. The Kodály-based musicianship training puts singing at the heart of the concept, being the most powerful and accessible tool to develop musicianship skills. Singing is free and can be adapted to all areas of teaching and learning music in all settings. The project “Kodály HUB: Sing, Learn, Share,” set 3 key objectives, all of which have been fully achieved and completed: · to create a new curriculum to be used in the teacher training programmes of HEIs. Though the newly formed curriculums are country specific, the core ideas are easily adaptable to other countries as well. · to renew the music repertoire for classroom use and to compile new methodology materials, focusing on how to teach music in a joyful, meaningful and relevant way. All new materials have already been published on the Kodály HUB. · to open an on-line knowledge centre (Kodály HUB - https://kodalyhub.com) for public viewing where a Songbook, a Community, a Calendar, (later a Forum) and further useful resources are available to assist teachers in their everyday work. We hope teachers will also feel encouraged to share their own music, ideas and experiences globally. During the 30-month period of the project we organised three learning weeks, where 10 pre-selected students of each HEI visited the other 2 countries. The purpose of the visit was two-fold: 1) to get a direct insight into the music pedagogy practices, the good examples, the challenges of the given country and 2) to work together (students and experts) on the creation of the HUB. These exchange visits were coupled with the challenging task of producing altogether 900 analysed songs representing each country’s musical heritage. These songs are already uploaded on the Kodály Hub with a range of age appropriate musical activities, an analysis of the song and, where relevant, an accompanying game or movement activity. Users may search the database using a number of essential search criteria. 4 transnational project meetings, 3 major and many more minor multiplier events were organised to promote the truly European values of the project which is to be shared and embedded worldwide. As a result, in 5 months we have reached more than 1500 registered users on the HUB from all over the world. By providing hands-on freely accessible resources to practitioners and by modernizing teacher training programmes, it is hoped that a new generation of teachers with improved musical and teaching skills will emerge. Subsequently, all children will experience joyful participation in music making, which will further enhance the transfer effect and consequently have a strong positive impact on our society worldwide.