Just A Song Sunday: Music for Incidental Learning

I have always been interested in the use of music for incidental learning. This is the concept that really pulled me into music therapy and is what has been behind my journey through product development and my thought processes for my adult life. I think that music has a powerful effect on learning and memory. In fact, I know that it does for me, and I know that it has for others as well.

So, what is incidental learning? 

For the easiest explanation, I always go to Wikipedia to start my search. (For all of the academicians out there, here's the Wikipedia disclosure!!) Wikipedia, however, should NEVER be part of your research references. For me, it is the first place that I go to get my additional research search strings. Once I get my search strings, I go over to Google Scholar to find my resources. I also refer to my university textbooks.

Incidental learning is also called implicit learning or informal learning - nice to know as I am looking around for more information.

ANYWAY, for me, the use of music in a learning environment has always allowed me to remember information that I just wouldn't remember otherwise.

My first experience when I figured out what was going on with all of this was in Ms. Chilson's fifth grade class. We had a science unit on the layers of a plant stem and our teacher challenged us to compose a science song. This is the song that we came up with - probably changed a bit when it comes to melody due to the number of years that have elapsed since that day, but I still have the information crammed into my head.

For my graduate education, I was trying to focus on this type of learning - music supported learning - for my Master's thesis. I spend quite a bit of time writing songs to express specific concepts and ideas for clients, and my sister (an amazing second grade teacher) uses music in her classroom (some of it mine) to help her students engage as well. I love the thought of multiple intelligences and have always found that my best learning experiences have been those of full-immersion - check out information about John Dewey and experiential education if you want to know more about this educational philosophy. I learned so much more when I was at camp than I did when I was sitting in a classroom, completing a worksheet. I learn more when everything has some logic to it, and for me, the logic comes in when I can see how concepts relate to real world.

Anyway - I was asked to give a presentation on one way that music could influence human behavior, so I chose incidental learning.

It included a lecture and then a demonstration. For this, I brought my television theme song CDs and a bag of candy. We played TV Name That Tune! My favorite memory of that game was the professor sitting on the edge of his desk chair, slapping the desk, and yelling out the names of television shows so he could get his candy! None of us had learned all those theme songs with any sort of purpose, but the music prompted that memory recall and allowed us to complete the game. It was fun.

For me, the use of music to assist those (like me) who learn through multi-modal methods is a no-brainer. Music is something that is naturally around us, so why not use it to increase learning?

Happy Sunday.


John Dewey. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Dewey
Learning. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Learning#Incidental_learning
Marsick, V. J. & Watkins, K. E. (2001). Informal and incidental learning. New Directions For Adult and Continuing Education, (89), 25-34.