The child-study movement and public school music education

1. THE CHILD-STUDY
MOVEMENT
Presentation by Naomi Fritz

2. Background
A. Late 19th through early 20 th century movement
B. “Child-Study leaders sought to reform the public school,
restructuring them to conform to new scientific findings and to
make them more child centered.”
C. Jean Jacques Rousseau 1762
http://www.iep.utm.edu/rousseau/

3. Rousseau
1. He challenged the idea that human nature is inherently evil and
that children are born in sin.
2. He suggested that individuals progress through natural stages of
development.
3. He recommended that education be organized according to the
child’s natural stages of development.
4. At Rousseau's time children were thought to be miniature adults
and capable of dealing with adult concepts. His ideas had little
influence on educational practice of his time.

4. Rousseau’s ideas were revived in the 19th century
1. Heinrich Pestalozzi and Johann Friedrich Herbart put into practice
the theories of Rousseau.
2. These practices called for structuring educational experiences
along the child’s natural lines of development.

5. Why did the child-study movement happen?
A. Charles Darwin published the Origin of Species in 1859 which for
him supported the theory of evolution.
1. The “evolutionary theory led to a theory of recapitulation that held that the
growth and development of individuals, civilizations, and entire cultures
corresponds generally to the evolutionary development of the human race.”
2. The recapitulation theory became an important tenet in the child-study
movement.

6. Wilhelm Wundt
1. He believed that human behavior could be studied on
an empirical basis. This means that he thought he
could study human behavior just by observing and
experimenting.
2. His ideas refuted faculty psychology which believed
that all people learn exactly the same way, some just
learn faster than others and that training one faculty
of the mind improves the mind’s ability to function
from that time on.
a) Faculty psychology was called “transfer training.”
For example; memorizing Latin was thought to help
in memorizing all other material.

7. The results and effects of Darwin and Wundt’s
studies
A. America’s school were criticized in the 1870s.
B. The number of states with compulsory education laws jumped
from 2 to 15

8. Attacks on Education
A. Charles W. Eliot, the president of Harvard University,
“charged that classes and schools were too large and that
young inexperienced female teachers employed at too low
of salaries tended to leave the profession after marriage.”
B. Anna Brackett was the first woman given the head position
in a normal school.
1) She criticized teachers for relying on the recitation method.
2) She blamed the recitation method for student’s inability to make good
judgments and to determine the significance of events.
C. Charles F. Adams was a member of a influential family.
1) He charged that memorization had become the goal of education.
2) He believed the true aim of education should be to prepare children to
educate themselves.

9. The effects of Eliot, Brackett, and Adams
A. Studies were done to improve teaching methods. These studies
attempted to establish norms for height, weight, head size, arm
length, and other characteristics.
B. Stanley Hall in 1880 was a prominent American psychologist.
1. He had four kindergarten teachers collect psychological data on a large
number of children. The teachers interviewed children with a set of
questions prepared by Hall.
2. He wanted to discover the extent of children’s knowledge.
3. He became the undisputed leader of the child-study movement.
Educational leaders began to insist that teachers view their students as
individuals, each with differing abilities, potential, and needs. Teachers
were first told to collect data and then to provide guidance and training
to help the child learn.

10. The child-study movement
A. The movement rapidly spread into many countries. New
foundations and publications were founded to learn more about
children.

11. Influence on Music
1. The influences were seen in some vocal series and music
appreciation textbooks of the day.
2. The effects were seen in the later generations of music
educators.

12. Hall’s three stages of child development
a) The first stage was ages 3 through 8. Rhythm studies were
emphasized during this stage because it was the basis of music. A
child’s feelings were said to be very important.
b) The second stage was ages 8 through 12. During this stage
children’s thoughts and morals were important. The growth of
arithmetic, language, and musical skills should be emphasized.
c) The third stage was considered the time for continued
development of character, emotions, and a variety of subjects.
Musical and other types of drills were de-emphasized so that
children could focus on other subjects.

13. 4. Vocal music series
As a result some vocal series tried to included folksongs to
teach social and cultural values. They encouraged rote singing.
5. Other Music arrangements
Tried to arrange music according to difficulty.
6. The music education profession
Did not participate in the research.

14. The child-study had four movements
A. Movement one led by E.H. Russell sought to have teachers,
parents, church workers, and other adults gather information
about large numbers of children, collate the facts, and then make
generalizations. The important thing was to get a large group of
information.
B. Group two led by Hall used standardized questionnaires. The
questionnaires were given to teachers and presented to children.
C. Group three led by Earl Barnes had children respond to questions
and stories by drawing pictures or writing stories themselves.
Responses were collected to provide information about
children’s lives.
D. Group four led by E. W. Scripture and Joseph Jastrow had
children come to psychological laboratories. There the children
were measured for things like age, height, weight, and ability.
From their research, came the development of normative charts.

15. E. Music research found in the four movements
• Musical learning was not of great interest to the four movements’
studies and the people who designed the experiments. However a
few musical findings were found.

16. Musical impact
A. One study asked for song preferences and reasons for the
preferences.
B. Another study found that 8% to 15% of students in the first two
weeks of school were able the sing with some accuracy the notes
in the diatonic scale. After two months 25% to 40% could sing the
diatonic scale. By fourth or fifth grade 90% to 95% of students
could sing the diatonic scale.
C. Music educators continued to not be inclined to measure
teaching effectiveness.

17. Musical impact continued
D. Non musicians who were child-study advocates were involved in
measuring the children’s perceptions of quarter tones, while others
observed babies’ reactions to someone playing the piano.
E. J.A. Gilbert measured the sensitivity of children of different ages to
changes in pitch. The experiments were called “Experiments on the
Musical Sensitiveness of School Children.”

18. Summary
A. The results of the child-study movement can been seen in certain
textbooks. It is through G. Stanley Hall’s research that music
education is impacted.
B. Music educators were either unaware of the work of others
related to their field, they were more interested in teaching
methods, or they were trying to find acceptance in the school
curriculum during this period of research. However music
educators were not involved in the child-study movement.
C. The child-study movement eventually yielded to the progressive
education movement.
D. The influence of research in music education was started during
the child-study era.

19. Bibliography
• Delaney, James J. Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy “ Jean-
Jacques Rousseau.” Niagara University. 2005
http://www.iep.utm.edu/rousseau/
• Humphreys, Jere T. Summer 1985. “The Child Study Movement? and
the Public School Music Education.” Journal of Research in Music
Education 33: 79.