Articles

Music

The CGS Music Program is designed to develop cultural literacy and cognitive skills. Music is integrated into the literature, history and science curriculum and is a component of many of our CGS classroom projects.

To promote their cultural literacy, the children learn songs from their specific topics and periods of study. To make their studies more personally relevant, our Music Instructor composes original material and enlists the students' collaboration in writing lyrics. For instance, the children wrote lyrics to and performed an original composition about ancient China and their study of the ocean was enlivened by their choreographed performance of an original song about the coral reef. We also use genuine period pieces to deepen and enrich the student's learning experience. For example, children listened to the music of Lully while sculpting clay figures of The Three Musketeers, and they learned and performed a 16th Century march in French to honor Henri IV. As the students progress, the integration of music into the curriculum deepens in scope to include critical listening and a survey of Music History.

Regarding cognitive development, neuroscience suggests that music can improve spatial-temporal reasoning. In particular, rhythm instruction may have the strongest impact on temporal and sequencing tasks. Accordingly, rhythm instruction, in increasing complexity, is an integral part of the CGS Music Program beginning in preschool and continuing though all the grades.