Beth Sturgis

1
Learning Literacy Through Music

Music is an important part of almost every persons life. For children who are just
learning to read, it can be an important and helpful tool in many ways, and should be a part of all
early literacy programs. In every age range that Developmentally Appropriate Practice covers,
music is mentioned in the Examples to Consider section. For kindergarteners, they mention
that music should be integrated with other areas of the curriculum, such as literacy (Copple &
Bredekamp 2009, p. 246). Music helps children hear the sounds of the English language, develop
phonological and phonemic awareness, understand word patterns including rhyming and
alliteration, learn similar patterns of reading between music and print, expand their vocabulary,
learn sequences of stories, and discover interactions between music, books, and the classroom.
According to researcher Howard Gardner, children use different forms of intelligences to make
sense of the world around them, and the first to emerge is musical intelligence (as cited in HillClarke & Robinson, 2004, p. 91-92). Since music is so vital to how young children make sense
of the world, it should be weaved into early childhood curriculums to help with early literacy
skills.
An essential building block of learning to read is the ability to hear sounds, letters, and
words. Singing songs and listening to rhymes can tune childrens ears to hear the sounds of the
language they are learning, as well as similarities and differences in the sounds of words
(Neuman & Roskos, 2007). The ability to listen is critical in developing the ability to read, and it
is most intensely developed while listening to music. D. McDonald, a literacy and music
researcher, claims that developing auditory discrimination [is] critical to childrens reading
skills both in music and regular classrooms (as cited in Wiggins, 2007, p. 56). Songs can help
children learn words and letters, such as the alphabet set to the tune of Twinkle Twinkle Little

Star. An activity to help children visually connect the letters they are singing to printed letters is
by making a chart with all the letters on it and pointing to each letter as it is sung. This activity
would also let them see that lmnop is five letters, not just one. More activities include having the
teacher randomly pointing to letters on the chart and having the students say those letters, as well
as letter-matching activities using magnetic or plastic letters (Smith, 2000). Being able to hear
sounds and letters directly ties into two similar concepts that music helps children conquer:
phonological and phonemic awareness.
Phonological awareness is the ability to hear, recognize, and play with the sounds in our
language (Neuman & Roskos, 2007, p. 56). It is gaining the knowledge that sounds in English
are made up of many parts: they can be broken into sentences or words, they have syllables, and
they have rimes. Rimes are the ends of words that typically can be used for rhyming, such as /all/
in the word ball (Neuman & Roskos, 2007). Phonemic awareness is one part of phonological
awareness. It is the realization that sounds can be put together to form words, and alternatively, a
word can be broken down into different letter sounds. For example, the word dog can be broken
down into the sounds d/o/ g, and those same sounds can be combined to form the word dog
(Hansen, Bernstorf, & Stuber, 2004). Music helps children understand both of these concepts. In
music, children learn what is called pitch discrimination, which is the ability to hear differences
between different musical notes. This will help them differentiate between sounds that are
closely related while they are learning to read, which is a part of phonemic awareness (Miche,
2002). Hansen, Bernstorf, & Stuber (2004) state that the acquisition of language and reading
skills and the acquisition of music learning skills require virtually the same auditory and visual
processes (p. 43). They give an example where the children are singing a song and are asked
about different parts of words, such as What is the first sound in koolay? and What is kah

without the k? (Hansen et al., 2004, p. 44). These questions help children think about sounds
in words that will help them read, and they are doing it through music. Another activity to help
children develop phonemic awareness is to change the beginning consonant in several words of a
song. For example, they could change row, row, row your boat to fow, fow, fow your foat
(Bardige & Segal, 2005, p. 264). This would help them isolate the beginning sounds of the words
and understand that the words are made up of different sounds put together. Another song that
helps children develop these skills is Apples and Bananas. The children sing I like to eat, eat,
eat, apples and bananas, and then change the vowel sounds to new vowels, such as A- I like to
ate, ate, ate, ay-pples and ba-nay-nays, or E- I like to eat, eat, eat, ee-ples and bee-nee-nees
(Smith, 2000, p. 647). The song keeps going on until all vowels are substituted for the original
vowels. Many children sang this song as kids, and had no idea that they were really learning
reading skills as they did it- they were just having fun with music. Phonemic and phonological
awareness are critical skills for children to be able to read.
Phonological awareness can also be taught through rhyming and alliteration- rhyming
focuses on the ends of words, and alliteration focuses on the beginnings of words. Rhyming is all
about listening to sounds and figuring out which sounds sound the same. Words need to be taken
apart, and a child needs to separate the beginning sound from the rime. Songs can be very useful
for this, because often they have rhyming words at the end of each line. Hill-Clarke and
Robinson (2004) suggest the following song for children to listen in to rhyming words: (set to the
tune of Mary Had a Little Lamb): Which of these are rhyming words, rhyming words,
rhyming words? Which of these are rhyming words, ___, ___, and ___? (p. 93) The three
blanks would have two words that rhyme and one word that does not (such as ring, race, and
sing). The children specify which are rhyming words, and then the song is sung again using

three new words, two of which rhyme (Hill-Clarke & Robinson, 2004). Whereas rhyming
involves tuning in to the ends of words, alliteration requires children to listen to the beginning
sounds of words. Neuman & Roskos (2007) state that being able to distinguish the first sound in
a word is a big step towards reading and writing that word. In fact, typically when children are
first learning to write, they write down one letter for each word, and the letter they write almost
always represents the first sound of the word (p. 61). Children can learn about alliteration when
teachers stretch words out and really emphasize the first sound of the word, or say it separately
from the rest of the word. For example, bat would turn into b.at (Neuman & Roskos,
2007). Some songs involve alliteration, and when children learn them, they will be more likely to
understand the beginning sounds of words. When children learn about both rhyme and
alliteration, they can better understand the beginning and end sounds of words, which will help
them immensely in learning to read.
Music and reading both require similar skills. When teachers sing with children and show
them the music, they are modeling the left to right and top to bottom orientation that is used in
both reading and music. They also realize that the print they are seeing contains meaning (Fisher
& McDonald, 2001). The connection between songs and reading is reinforced when children
can see the words to the song in print (Bardige & Segal, 2005, p. 265). Children realize that
both books and songs have words with meaning. Hill-Clarke & Robinson (2004) state that the
coding systems for reading and music differ; however, the thinking process for deciphering each
coding system is similar (p. 94). To read music, children need to understand music notation and
recognize musical symbols; to read books, children need to understand how letters are written,
pronounced, and made into words. Both subjects require mastery of common skills: memory,

concentration, and comprehension of abstract ideas (Hill-Clarke & Robinson, 2004). If music is
used to teach reading, the parallel skills will help the children enormously.
When children read, they need to understand vast quantities of words. Songs help build a
vast store of vocabulary and background knowledge, which will help children recognize more
words when they are reading. Sometimes, children can decipher what a new word means from
the meaning of the song- and sometimes they dont even notice theyre singing unfamiliar words
(Miche, 2002). This is a great opportunity to go over new words in a song and add them to
childrens vocabularies. This way, if they see those words in the future while reading, they will
know what those words mean. It is suggested not to define all the new words in a song at once,
because this may confuse the children. Instead, the teacher should just pick a few to go over each
time the song is sung (Miche, 2002). Also, when a teacher reads a story involving words that
children have learned in song, he or she can connect those words back to the song, and discuss
their meaning again to further reinforce the words into the vocabulary of the children (Bardige &
Segal, 2005). When children sing, they encounter many new words that will help them when
they learn to read.
Another skill that is critical to successful reading is the ability to understand that a story
is made up of events in a sequence. Music contributes to this knowledge. Some songs
specifically address sequences. . . songs that students learn each have a story to tell (Fisher &
McDonald, 2001, p. 108). Many songs are cumulative, which helps with this skill. The song
There Was an Old Woman Who Swallowed a Fly was mentioned in several articles and books,
and it has a sequential order of events that familiarizes children with story structure (Bardige
& Segal, 2005, p. 266). Later, when children are reading books, they can think back to sequences
that they have learned in songs, and better understand the story.

Music can be used for many activities in the classroom to foster early literacy, including
sing-along books, a supplement to non-sing-along books, and word identification. A read-along
sing-along book is usually a song that has been published in book form, and has illustrations to
go along with the words and a recording of the original song (Miche, 2002). This would help
children make a great song-to-print connection. Also, non-sing-along books can be supplemented
with music for a music-enriched reading experience. Hill-Clarke & Robinson (2004) suggest
involving the children in creating a simple song or melody to accompany the main characters of
the book. . .have all children sing the song or melody the group created every time the storys
main character is mentioned (p. 92). Activities like this one help teachers to meet all students at
different reading levels, and will make the story more enjoyable for the children (Hill-Clarke &
Robinson, 2004). Another important concept for children to be able to read is word
identification- the ability to instantly recognize words on a page and read them. Music activities
can help with this. For example, if a song is sung about animals, children can hold up flashcards
with pictures and printed names of a certain animal when the word for that animal is sung
(Hansen et al., 2004). This will help them instantly identify that word when it is used in a book.
Many typical classroom activities that help foster literacy can be improved with the addition of
music.
Learning through music can build listening skills, enhance abstract thinking, improve
memory, and encourage the use of compound words, rhymes, and images (Hill-Clarke &
Robinson, 2004, p. 94). Music can help children learn to read in a multitude of ways. Research
was conducted with eighteen 4-5 year olds to test the relationship between reading and music.
Both their reading/letter sounding abilities and musical ability/pitch discrimination were tested. It
was shown that children who did well on the reading test also performed better on the musical

test (Wiggins, 2007). Music can build better listening skills, phonemic and phonological
awareness, rhyming and alliteration skills, help children discover similarities between reading
music and reading books, build a larger vocabulary, understand that stories follow sequences,
and connect songs to reading in the classroom. In addition to all of these benefits, music can also
help English language learners learn to read by singing songs both in English and in their
primary language (Wiggins, 2007). Music and early literacy have many connections, and any
child that is learning to read could benefit immeasurably from intertwining music into their
experience.

References
Bardige, B. & Segal, M., (2005). Building literacy with love: A guide for teachers and caregivers
of children from birth through age 5. Washington, D.C.: Zero to Three.
Copple, C., Bredekamp, S. (Eds.). (2009). Developmentally appropriate practice in early
childhood programs serving children from birth through age 8. Washington, D.C:
National Association for the Education of Young Children.
Fisher, D., & McDonald, N. (2001). The intersection between music and early literacy
instruction: Listening to literacy. Reading Improvement, 38(3), 106-15.
Hansen, D., Bernstorf, E. D., & Stuber, G. M. (2004). The music and literacy connection.
Reston, Va: MENC.
Hill-Clarke, K., & Robinson, N. R. (2004). It's as easy as A-B-C and do-re-mi: Music, rhythm,
and rhyme enhance children's literacy skills. Young Children, 59(5), 91-95.
Miche, M. (2002). Weaving music into young minds. Albany, NY: Delmar Thomson Learning.
Neuman, S. & Roskos, K., (2007). Nurturing knowledge: Building a foundation for school
success by linking early literacy to math, science, art, and social studies. New York:
Scholastic.
Smith, J. A. (2000). Singing and songwriting support early literacy instruction. Reading Teacher,
53(8), 646-649.
Wiggins, D. (2007). Pre-K music and the emergent reader: Promoting literacy in a musicenhanced environment. Early Childhood Education Journal, 35(1), 55-64.