Music Education in Schools

Primary school

There are two ways to study music: within regular classes (from the first to the eighth grade, one hour per week) and within extracurricular musical activities. The reform of the Croatian educational system, especially the introduction and implementation of the Croatian National Educational Standard, brought important innovations and modernisation into music teaching. The aim of music education in primary schools was then directed towards the development of general music culture, establishing and acquiring valuable standards for critical and aesthetic music evaluation.
According to the Teaching Plan and Programme from 2006, music culture lessons are pervaded by two fundamental principles: psychological, according to which pupils like music and want to take an active part in it, and cultural-aesthetic, which emphasises that lessons enable pupils to become competent users of music culture. Taking into consideration the child's development and the conception of music teaching from the psychological viewpoint, e.g. the child's need to play music actively - to sing, play instruments, dance, improvise and integrate gradually with the socio-cultural (cultural-aesthetic) principle, it is necessary for a society to form a cultural and an educated citizen with established cultural-aesthetic needs.
The new programme concentrates on pupils’ musical activity, not the teaching contents. The new programme enables pupils to take up music at school, to listen to it and get acquainted with it, to sing and play it. Pupils gain basic knowledge about musical components through their active participation in performing songs, interpretation and active listening to music. The approach of the new programme is developmental, and it influences acquisition of true, musical knowledge and formation of listening repertory and pupils' musical taste.
At primary schools, music culture lessons led by a music teacher start in the fourth grade. According to the Teaching Plan and Programme (2006) there are four teaching fields implemented in the fourth grade: singing, listening to music and exploring music, music performance, music literacy and music games. In the fifth and sixth grade the field of music games has been replaced by the field of free, improvised rhythm, movements in connection with music, dance and playing instruments, while other fields are repeated. In the seventh and eighth grade teaching fields are singing, listening to music and exploring music, with optional playing (the synthesizer), creativity and computer (MIDI equipment).
By the end of primary school, with carefully planned and quality music lessons, pupils can learn and get acquainted with a certain number of songs (artistic, traditional, popular), learn and recognise different music components and fundamental musical varieties, improve their knowledge on the Croatian and world's musical heritage, acquire main concepts about general music culture, and develop, improve and promote their music skills.
Experiences pupils gain during music lessons can contribute to their connection with music; they can sing or play in an amateur ensemble and attend concerts in their town and the surroundings.
Primary school comprises various music teaching fields. As already mentioned, listening to music and exploring music hold a central place in contemporary primary school education. The aim of listening to music is its exploring and development of musical taste, while the contents constitute a work of art. We nowadays believe that a person of culture is not the one who plays music greatly, but the one who knows and understands music.
Extracurricular activities are an integral part of the Croatian educational system. As a part of primary education, every pupil encounters a possibility to choose various extracurricular activities beside regular classes. Extracurricular activities develop pupils’ individual abilities, skills and achievements, as well as their creativity.
Primary school offers different extracurricular musical activities comprising of vocal-instrumental music playing, dancing and various types of musical creativity. The most frequent extracurricular musical activities are choral singing, solo singing, playing an instrument (individual and group playing), musical creativity, song composition, dancing, folklore and musical projects. In this way pupils spend their free time in a planned and organised manner. They participate in one or more activities, develop their skills, improve their knowledge, they are creative and innovative, they work individually or in groups, exchange their experiences and work on certain project and spend their free time in a quality and useful manner.