A scientific study claims that children can progress in mathematics with this good habit.
Mathematics has traumatized many children at school. Learning this complex subject can prove to be a real headache for many schoolchildren, as well as for their parents. However, it remains essential and on the curriculum of all school textbooks. But what if there were solutions to make the study of mathematics gentler? A study published in June 2023 puts forward a surprising element: music would allow you to obtain better results in mathematics.
The study, published in the journal Educational Studies, looked at the results of 55 surveys of children of all grade levels. “These results, which mainly concern arithmetic, show that music has a greater impact in young children and in those learning basic concepts,” explains Ayça Akin, professor at Belek University in Antalya, Turkey, who conducted the study. When combined, music and mathematics can therefore enable students to achieve better results. The two disciplines indeed have many points in common.
“Mathematical concepts such as patterns, order, symmetry, numbers, ratios, fractions or division are crucial in music. Additionally, all musical notions such as tempo, rhythm, melodies and harmonization can be represented mathematically…”, adds the Turkish scientist. Another study, Canadian this time, published in 2019 and published in the American Psychological Association Journal of Educational Psychology, also argued that high school students who had taken music lessons had better grades in mathematics, as in other so-called academic subjects.
“On average, children who had learned to play a musical instrument for many years, and who played in a school band or orchestra, recorded the equivalent of one academic year ahead per compared to their peers in English, mathematics and science, as measured by their exam scores”, underlined the author of the study Peter Gouzouasis.
