Five Remarkable Benefits of Music Education

As a music educator, there's little more thrilling than seeing that light bulb when a student finally "gets" it -- that chord change, that difficult time signature mastered as a result of their hard work. While our students reap both musical skill and personal pride from their efforts, the benefits of music education extend far beyond the stage and the orchestra pit.

The importance of the arts in education has long been emphasized by educators celebrating the value of a diverse, engaging curriculum, and in the past few decades, scientific studies have made great strides in backing up those claims. Research has associated childhood music education with improved cognitive skills, academic habits, and emotional wellness.

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• Boosts cognitive function : A study of the relationship between musical education and cognitive development found that 4-6 year old children who participated in 30 weeks of training scored higher than non-participants on a subsequent memory test. ^{[ 1 ]}
• Raises self esteem : After an assessment in which Montreal fourth-graders from lower-income families participated in three years of weekly piano lessons, those who participated scored higher in self esteem than non-participant peers. ^{[ 2 ]}
• Develops empathy : When a group of children with an average age of 12 were divided into two groups -- those with 6+ years of previous piano or violin training, and those without -- the children with instrumental training rated higher on the Epstein Empathy Scale than those without. ^{[ 3 ]}
• Improves math and history grades : A meta-analysis of studies correlating music education with academic achievement determined that participation in music education boosts English, math, history, and science grades, citing 14 studies linking music study with greater academic achievement. ^{[ 4 ]}
• Trains perseverance : In a study measuring the attention and perseverance of preschool students receiving Suzuki violin lessons compared to a control group, students with musical training spent significantly more time on a perseverance task than those without, correlating training with the development of perseverance and attention span. ^{[ 5 ]}

Even more remarkable ways that music education impacts young students can be found here: