Assignment 7

Natalie Grote
1.There are many studies that have been done that show music will make students smarter. Some of the things that researcher have found is that it helps with language acquisition, reading readiness, and intellectual development. With all these different types of things the students will learn tools that they are going to use for the rest of their lives. In the article it shows from Hanshumker that it also helps “to enhance creativity: and to promote social development, personality adjustment, and self-worth. I believe that these are all very important things that students will need for the rest of their education and their lives to be successful. I believe that the author sees it to but at the same time I believe that he is trying to report the different facts by looking at the research that has been done on this subject. He goes and talks about in many view of eyes from the researcher to public to even the student throughout the whole article.

2. In the reading the author suggests four types of findings to support the belief that music has strong biological roots. The first one that was stated was that music has a strong biological component. The second one is the biological behaviors are universal. These means that across many different places music is all read the same so it is an easy way to communicate. The third one is biological behaviors are often revealed early in life. This just means that at a very early age everyone is mostly exposed to some types of music. It does not matter if it is the parent sing to them or hearing music played on the radio or on TV. The last and final one is the human brain is organized to process musical activities. This just means that there are parts of the brain that have information which makes it very easy for everyone to understand music.
3. One way that playing music helps the synapses grow stronger is by just playing music. They have found this out by just doing a brain scan while students were doing some musical activities. Which from this the students are increasing the brain’s capacity which will therefore strength the connections among neurons. The main things are that when we are performing in music we engage the systems to strength the synapses.
4. I believe that reading music will help students improve reading comprehension. There is so many things that they have found which will help students when they are reading music like visually recognizing words, learning correspondences with the sounds that come from the words and the way that we say the words because the problem that comes up is that we don’t always say the words right but in singing it helps us learn how to. Another thing that they have found is that good pitch helps in the phonemic stage of learning. This is seen over the years of school while the voices change and the students pitch will become stronger and better sounding. One thing that music helps other students with is giving them a way in which they are able to express themselves. To many students it is just them and the music which makes it a nice way to get out of the everyday life. This was very true for me to because when I was in high school and it came time for chorus all my worries go away for a while and I am able to relax before I am off to my next writing or reading class.