Towards musical intelligence as component of educational psychology and art integrated learning:: Special on World Music Day

The Fête de la Musique or World Music Day, is an annual music celebration that takes place on 21 June to encourage love for music by residents by playing music in public spaces and parks along with organising free concerts

"The power and impact of music on humans cannot be measured. Music goes beyond mere words, reaching the depths of our souls with its emotive power. In a world where language can sometimes fall short in conveying our deepest emotions, music acts as a universal language that transcends barriers and connects people on a spiritual level. It taps into the raw, unspoken emotions of the human heart. It speaks directly to our souls, allowing us to feel and experience many emotions that sometimes words cannot fully express." states Sumit Paul in Speaking Tree Blog.

The musical intelligence is one of the multiple intelligences which has been proposed by Howard Gardner as a human ability to produce and appreciate rhythm, pitch and timbre or appreciation of the different forms of musical expressiveness through writing and rendering.

ABCs of developing musical intelligence during classroom instruction

ABC poems is a practical way of developing musical intelligence' Here is an ABC poem on musical intelligence

A: Abilities of the right hemisphere that are related to rhythmic and tonal qualities of words

B: Begin by fostering intelligence by converting content into poetic prose or through musicalization of text

C: Chanting with a rhythm is useful for initial awakening of musical intelligence

D: Describing academic subject matter through pattern poetry develops musical intelligence through writing and rendering

E: Emergence of musical intelligence happens right from babyhood babblings followed by imitating listened music

For early childhood education, ithe setting up of Music and Movement Area or Corner has been suggested with the the following provisions

- Recorded music and instruments that are reflective of children’s cultures.

- A variety of instruments made available for children’s use.

- Movement games that are characteristic of the culture that could be played with music.

- Musical instruments made with locally available materials, such as two coconut shells which can be used as cymbals, or a bottle containing rice grains can be used as percussion

According to the NCERT, Art Integrated Learning (AIL) is an inventive and constructivist learning pedagogy which is based on learning ‘through the arts’ and ‘with the arts’ by using different arts such as dance, drama, music, visual arts, etc.