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Skill Development in Rhythm Perception andPerformance: A Review of Literature

James L. Reifinger, Jr.Assistant professor in the music department at the University of Louisiana at Monroe.

E-mail: reifinger@ulm.edu

Music educators continually seek the mosteffective and efficient methods to teach

musical skills such as rhythm perception andperformance. Researchers have examined theemergence of rhythm perceptual and perfor-mance skills and have investigated specificaspects of these skills. Their findings may helpin crafting the most productive instructionalapproaches for various developmental stages.This article reviews studies on rhythm percep-tion and performance published primarilywithin the last 15 years and includes someimportant historical studies to provide a morecomplete description of current knowledge.

Organized developmentally, this reviewexamines the development of rhythmic skillsfirst in infants and preschoolers, then mostextensively in school-age children. Skill devel-opment in infants and preschoolers is consid-ered only briefly because the main interest formusic educators is school-aged children. Im-plications for instructional practices are con-sidered. Studies with adults are not includedunless they are relevant to rhythmic develop-ment in children.

Infants

PerceptionBecause human hearing usually begins

during the sixth month of prenatal life, musicperception occurs before birth. Fetuses beginresponding to sounds outside the womb asearly as their 24th week of development, andby the 28th week they present consistent re-sponses to sounds (Birnholz & Benacerraf,

1983). Newborns’ hearing thresholds are 15 to30 decibels higher than adults, but by 6 monthsof age, the threshold is only 10 to 15 decibelshigher (Olsho, Koch, Carter, Halpin, & Spet-ner, 1988). Two tones are perceived as notsounding simultaneously at thresholds of 11milliseconds apart for 6- to 12-month-old in-fants and at 5.6 milliseconds apart for 5-year-old children, compared to 5.2 millisecondsapart for adults (Trehub, Schneider, & Hen-derson, 1995). With simple three- and four-notepatterns, infants as young as 7 months can dis-criminate tempo and rhythm changes and candetect rhythm changes despite changes in fre-quency or tempo (Trehub & Thorpe, 1989).

PerformanceRecent research has investigated the

effects of early exposure to music on musicalperformance. A longitudinal investigation byTafuri and Villa (2002) uniquely involved boththe prenatal and postnatal stages. Fetuses inan experimental group experienced music 3 to4 months before birth, because their mothersreceived music lessons weekly and sang andlistened to music daily. Fetuses in a controlgroup did not receive any special prenatalmusic stimulation because their mothers didnot participate in any music lessons.

After birth, the infants’ vocalizationswere recorded at 2, 4, 6, and 8 months, andthe mothers notated in diaries additional in-formation about vocalizations and music re-sponses. The recordings of 18 infants in theexperimental group revealed a large percent-age of ascending and descending glissandos as

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well as distinguishable intervals. These infantsproduced rhythms of different durations two-thirds of the time at the age of 2 months andalmost 100% of the time as they got older.Recordings of 10 infants in the control grouprevealed no vocalizations from 7, only briefsounds from 1, and a few vocalizations from2. Additional studies conducted with infantsare needed and may be helpful in determiningwhen specific musical behaviors develop inthe earliest stages of life (Ilari, 2002).

In a landmark study involving 500 chil-dren, Moog (1976) observed that children’sfirst responses to music were through move-ment around the age of 6 months. Moog re-ported that movements often involved theentire body and were described as rhythmicalbecause of their repetitiveness, but did notsynchronize with the musical sounds. Afterage 1, movement responses decreased, butvariety increased. Around 18 months, 10% ofchildren began to match movements to themusic’s rhythm for short periods. Moog alsoobserved that shortly after children were ableto make movement responses to music, theybegan to make vocal responses, referred to asmusical babble. The first babbling songs lackedrhythmic structure. As these songs improved,range of pitch widened, but rhythm remainedlimited and simplistic. Durations were mainlya 1:2 ratio, with the shorter value used mostoften. Rarely were three or four different du-rations used. Rests frequently occurred be-tween phrases, but seemed to be of unspecificduration.

Between the age of 1 and 2 years, chil-dren began to imitate songs. Moog (1976)found that children first produced words, thenrhythm, and then pitch. About 16% of thechildren, however, began imitating rhythmand pitch without words and began includingwords between ages 2 and 3. By age 2½,about 22% of children “sang” just words andrhythm; but by age 3, 80% imitated words,rhythm, and pitch. About 50% of 3-year-oldsimitated entire songs. This would indicate

that, while the ability to sing and to moverhythmically to music begins to emerge beforethe age of 2 years, the ability to coordinatewords, rhythm, and pitch in singing doesn’tbegin to emerge until around the age of 2½years.

PreschoolersWith preschoolers, several researchers’

observations can be compared. Moog (1976)found that, between 3 and 5½ years of age,about 50% of children continued to makespontaneous movement responses to music,but the variety of movement decreased. Be-tween ages 4 and 6, movements increasinglymatched the rhythm of the music and coordi-nated with the music for longer periods.Dances and singing games replaced spontane-ous repetitive movements for the most part byage 6. Sims (1985) found that 3- to 5-year-olds’ rhythmic movement increased with age.Movements were rhythmical 22.49% of thetime with 3-year-olds, 61.97% with 4-year-olds, and 73.86% with 5-year-olds. Rhythmicmovements corresponded to the beat almostthree times as often with the 5-year-olds aswith the 3- and 4-year-olds, indicating thatmost children become competent in movingrhythmically to music between the third andfifth years of life.

One of the first rhythmic tasks childrenare taught is beat keeping, which is often prac-ticed by clapping, tapping, and marching.Rainbow (1981) assessed 3- and 4-year-oldchildren’s ability to keep a steady beat and toecho rhythmic patterns. To perform beats orrhythms, a vocal response mode was the easi-est for 3-year olds, 50% of whom could suc-cessfully perform the tasks. Only 10–14%were successful when clapping and tapping.Marching to the beat and echo-clapping arhythmic pattern without vocalization werethe most difficult tasks. Vocal responses wereperformed successfully by 70–90% of 4-year-olds. Only 40–60% of these children couldkeep a steady beat by clapping or using rhythm

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sticks, and 30–40% could echo rhythm pat-terns by clapping. Marching to the beat wasstill very difficult and was performed success-fully by only 18–20% of the 4-year-old children.While children need to practice gross-motorskills, the use of vocal responses may be themost effective way to ensure success whenbeat and rhythm performance skills are firstemerging.

Insight into possible cognitive and motorinfluences on beat-keeping skills in childrenmay be provided by a study with adults thatexamined various modes used to keep a steadybeat. Aschersleben and Prinz (1995) observedthat, when tapping a steady beat, there is atendency to tap 20–50 milliseconds early.Aschersleben and Prinz (1995) use the Paillard-Fraise Hypothesis (as cited in Aschersleben &Prinz, 1995) to account for this negative asyn-chrony. According to this hypothesis, thebrain synchronizes taps with clicks by super-imposing two types of sensory codes: the au-ditory code (click) and the kinesthetic code(tap). The processing time for these two codesdiffers; it takes longer for the sensory informa-tion to travel from the fingers to the brainwhen tapping than to travel from the ears tothe brain when listening to clicks. For synchroni-zation to occur in the brain, the tap has to beperformed before the click by the amount oftime by which the processing of the two codesdiffers. Also supported by this theory, a signif-icantly larger negative asynchrony occurredwhen using the foot than when using thehand. When considering the side of the bodyused or whether one or both limbs were used,no difference in performance was observed.

School-Age Children

BeatBeat-keeping ability differs by age and

experience level. Upitis (1987) found a signifi-cant difference in beat-keeping ability by agewith 7- to 12-year-olds. Children with somemusical training were significantly better at

beat keeping than untrained children. Drake,Jones, and Baruch (2000) examined beat per-formance with children ages 4, 6, 8, and 10,and with adults. Within each group, participantswere classified as nonmusicians or musiciansbased on whether or not they received musiclessons and played an instrument almost everyday. The participants were asked to tap regularlyat their most comfortable rate, which revealeda significant decrease in spontaneous-tappingrate with maturity. Musicians tapped at signifi-cantly slower rates than the nonmusicians. Fornonmusicians the rate of tapping per minutewas 156 for 4-year-olds, 155 for 6-year-olds,132 for 8-year-olds, 125 for 10-year-olds, and96 for adults. For musicians the rate of tap-ping was 116 for 6-year-olds, 107 for 8-year-olds, 98 for 10-year-olds, and 94 for adults.Forced rates of tapping were used to deter-mine minimum and maximum tapping speeds.Age was a significant factor; faster maximumspeeds could be produced with increased age.Musical training did not affect how fast partic-ipants could tap, but did have a significanteffect on how slowly they could tap; musicianswere able to tap more slowly.

Another performance task examined par-ticipants’ ability to tap in synchrony with sev-eral types of stimuli: Ravel’s Bolero; an iso-chronous sequence (a pattern using only onenote value); and a repeated 4-beat rhythmpattern of varying notes. Synchronizing abilityimproved significantly with age and was sig-nificantly better for musicians than for non-musicians. Age interacted significantly withstimulus type; younger children synchronizedwith the isochronous sequence better thanwith the rhythm pattern, whereas, by the timechildren were age 10, performance on bothstimuli was similar. It seems that the ability tosynchronize with rhythmic patterns emergeslater. In all groups, synchronizing was best withBolero. The researchers posit that children mayhave an implicit ability to synchronize withreal music. Synchronizing to patterns, whetherisochronous or rhythmic sequences, requires

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analytical skills to be applied outside the con-text of actual music—a feat that may be be-yond the capabilities of very young children.

Metric AccentsIncluding accents with rhythms can affect

children’s ability to perceive and performrhythms. To assess whether accents help,Gérard and Drake (1990) conducted a seriesof four experiments. In the first of the series,5- to 8-year-old children listened to pairs ofrhythm patterns and discriminated whetherthe two patterns were the same or different.Three pairs of patterns were used: (1) the firstpair used a slightly different rhythm but thesame accents as in the second pattern; (2) thesecond pair used identical rhythms in bothpatterns with accents in only one of thepatterns; (3) a third pair incorporated bothrhythm and accent differences found in thesecond pattern.

The pair with identical rhythms and ac-cent differences was not identified as differentby a significant number of students at anygrade level. It was unclear whether the chil-dren heard the accents but still considered therhythms as being the same. The pair with dif-ferent rhythms was identified as different by asignificant number of 6- and 8-year-olds. Thepair with different rhythms and with accentdifferences was identified as different by asignificant number of children at all age levels,which indicates that accents enhanced the chil-dren’s ability to discriminate. When one pat-tern in a pair was isochronous, correctly iden-tifying the patterns as different was easier, andthis capacity increased with age. Pairs of pat-terns using a dotted quarter note (representinga 1:3 ratio between the short and the longdurations) were the most difficult to recognizeas identical by all children.

A second experiment investigated theeffects of accents on 6- to 8-year-olds’ abilityto perform as well as discriminate accentedbeat patterns. The five beat-patterns used dif-fered only in the way accents were incorpo-

rated to produce the effect of the followingmeters: 2/4; 3/4; 4/4; 6/8; and a pattern de-void of accents. In a discrimination task usingall possible pairings, the children identified twopatterns as the same or different. In a produc-tion task, the children played each pattern sixtimes on a drum. Both tasks were conductedat different tempos: fast, medium, and slow.

The ability to discriminate accent differ-ences was high and improved significantlywith age; 69% of 6-year-olds, 78% of 7-year-olds, and 83% of 8-years-olds detected meterdifferences. Comparisons of accented patternsto the unaccented pattern was easier thancomparisons of two accented patterns, exceptwhen comparing binary with triple meter,which was the easiest. Discriminating differ-ences was easiest at a fast tempo. The datasuggested that the children heard 6/8 as triplemeter. The ability to correctly produce accentsincreased significantly with age: 31% of firstgraders, 43% of second graders, and 50% ofthird graders performed the accents correctly.Reproducing the pattern devoid of accents didnot differ significantly by age. Contrary to thediscrimination task, performance at the fasttempo was significantly poorer. The research-ers concluded that by age 6, children can dis-criminate different beat patterns created byaccents if their attention does not have tofocus on other aspects of rhythmic structure.It is not until age 7, however, that childrendevelop sufficient motor control to reproduceaccents in patterns.

To test this conclusion, investigators useda third experiment that examined the effectsof training on 5- and 6-year-olds’ ability to pro-duce accents in patterns. In general, giving chil-dren instruction to tap loud and soft notes on awoodblock resulted in all taps being louder. Lessthan half the children produced accent differ-ences and only a few could produce them cor-rectly. Some patterns had more than one noteon the accented beat, possibly making themmore difficult to perform because both accentand multiple notes had to be produced.

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A fourth experiment examined the 5- and6-year-old children’s ability to clap the beatwhile listening to Tchaikovsky’s “Dance ofthe Sugar-Plum Fairy.” Errors in synchroniza-tion most often occurred in places where themusic incorporated expressive dynamic varia-tions and where phrases began or ended. Itwas concluded that music’s expressive dynamicstructure may cause children to lose track ofmetric structure or may obscure accents.

Syncopation and AccelerationThe ability to synchronize to beats that

are steady, accelerating, and syncopated basedon age, gender, and phase (in-phase—tappingat the same time as metronome ticks; anti-phase—tapping between ticks) has been in-vestigated. Volman and Geuze (2000) hadchildren ages 7, 9, and 11 tap their index fin-gers while listening to a metronome. In steady-state trials, the tempo remained at M.M. = 60.In scaled-frequency trials, the first 12 beatswere at M.M. = 60; then the tempo graduallyincreased to M.M. = 180. In steady-state trialsa significant difference in performance oc-curred between all age groups; older studentstapped with less variability than younger stu-dents. In scaled-frequency trials, a significantdifference occurred between the 7- and the11-year-olds in ability to remain synchronized;older students were able to synchronize as thetempo increased. Performance by phase-typewas also significantly different; in-phase tap-ping was more accurate than anti-phase tapping.

Rhythmic Patterns

Rhythmic patterns are frequently used inrhythm instruction and assessment. Aspectsmaking patterns more complex, and thereforemore difficult to reproduce, were assessed byDrake and Gérard (1989). Children age 5 and7 heard a pattern twice and then reproduced iton a drum. Simple patterns used taps on thebeat, and subdivision, and multiples of thebeat.

Complex patterns included dotted notes

in addition to subdivision and multiples of thebeat. Arrhythmic patterns were also used, inwhich temporal intervals were shortened orlengthened so that rhythms did not conformto regular subdivisions. The children repro-duced simple rhythms significantly more accu-rately than they did complex rhythms. Rhyth-mic patterns were reproduced significantlymore accurately than arrhythmic patterns; thecloser the arrhythmic model resembled regularsubdivisions, the easier it was to reproduce.When performing arrhythmic patterns, chil-dren tended to distort them toward regularsubdivisions. Performance on simple rhythmicpatterns improved significantly by age. Patternlength, varying from three to seven elements,had little effect on performance. The numberof pulses in patterns, varying from three to six,did affect performance; more pulses resultedin poorer performance on both the rhythmicand the arrhythmic patterns.

The effect of the inclusion of accents inrhythm patterns on performance has beenexamined. Drake (1993) had 5- and 7-year-olds and adult nonmusicians and musiciansperform four-beat rhythm patterns. Patternsconsisted of binary or ternary subdivisions andsimple or complex rhythms. Simple patternsused two different note values in 1:2 (binary)or 1:3 (ternary) temporal ratios; complex pat-terns used three different note values, includ-ing 1:4 (binary) or 2:3 (ternary) temporal ra-tios. Also, all patterns were heard both withand without intensity accents.

Results indicated that 7-year-olds per-formed significantly better than 5-year-olds,but the adult nonmusicians were not statisti-cally different from the 7-year-olds, implyingthat acculturation alone does not improverhythm performance after the age of 7. Pre-senting patterns with accents resulted in sig-nificantly more accurate reproduction. Aninteraction between accent use and type ofsubdivision indicated that, when includingaccents, greater improvement occurred withternary subdivisions. An interaction between

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accent use and group indicated that, whenincluding accents, greater improvements oc-curred with 7-year-olds and adult nonmusicians.All groups produced patterns with symmetri-cal halves significantly more accurately. Binarypatterns with only two durational values wereeasiest to perform. Binary subdivision patternswere significantly easier to reproduce thanternary subdivision patterns. Simple patternswere significantly easier to reproduce thancomplex patterns. A significant interactionbetween subdivision type and pattern com-plexity indicated that differences by complexitywere greater with binary subdivision patterns.

Pattern Presentation and Response Modes

Rhythm patterns can be presented andperformed in various modes. The differentresponse modes of clapping, stepping, andchanting the neutral syllable loo with childrenin grades K, 1, 2, and 3 were examined(Schleuter & Schleuter, 1985). Rhythm pat-terns used subdivisions of duple or triple. Re-sults indicated that there was a significant in-teraction between response mode and gradelevel; for grade K, performance was signifi-cantly more accurate when chanting. Forgrades 1 and 2, performance was significantlymore accurate when chanting or clapping,with no significant difference between thesetwo modes. For grade 3, performance wassignificantly more accurate when clapping.These findings are consistent with the findingson preferred modes of beat-keeping with pre-school children (Moog, 1976; Rainbow, 1981).Responding by clapping improved signifi-cantly at each successive grade level. Chantingimproved significantly at each grade level ex-cept between grades 1 and 2. Stepping im-proved significantly at each grade level exceptbetween grades K and 1. It was reported thatgirls performed significantly better than boys.

The effect of presentation mode onpattern performance has been examined using four different modes to presentrhythms: (1) R—on a woodblock; (2)

RM—along with a melody sung on la; (3)RV—along with spoken words; or (4)RVM—along with sung words, integrating therhythmic, verbal, and melodic clues (Gérardand Auxiette, 1988). Five-year-olds heardpatterns in one of these modes and respondedby clapping. Half the children had engaged inweekly music classes and were thereforelabeled musicians. Performance differedsignificantly based on presentation condition;RVM presentations resulted in better perform-ance than just R presentations for musicians andnonmusicians. A significant interaction occurredbetween presentation condition and training;musicians performed better if patterns werepresented with a melody, but not if they werepresented with words. Nonmusicians performedbetter if patterns were presented with words,but not if they were presented with a melody.These results may indicate that the type ofsupport that is most helpful depends on achild’s level of experience. A multimodepresentation such as the RVM condition doesnot result in decreased performance and maybe a way of addressing different ability levelsin the classroom.

A follow-up experiment examined differ-ent response modes in addition to differentpresentation modes and further examined theeffect of words (Gérard & Auxiette, 1992).Five-year-old musicians and nonmusicianswere presented patterns in three modes: (1)tapped on a woodblock; (2) tapped along witha congruent sentence; (3) tapped along withan incongruent sentence created by changingwords in a congruent sentence. The responsemode was identical to the presentation mode.Results indicated no difference in perfor-mance accuracy between the musicians andthe nonmusicians in any mode. No differencein accuracy occurred between just tapping ortapping along with congruent sentences ineither group. Performance in both groupsdeteriorated significantly when using incon-gruent sentences. The musicians synchronizedwords with taps significantly more accurately

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than the nonmusicians when using congruentsentences, but not when using incongruentsentences. The poorer performance whenusing an incongruent sentence may haveoccurred because the children had to increasetheir concentration on performing the words,thereby reducing their ability to attend to therhythm.

To follow up, a second experiment exam-ined the synchronization of words to rhythm.All the children heard rhythm patterns pro-duced in three different modes: (1) electronicbeeps (produced by pressing a button); (2)chanted syllables ta and ti; and (3) electronicbeeps and chanted syllables together. Childrenreproduced the patterns in four trials using thesame response mode as the presentationmode. Musicians performed more accuratelywith the syllables, and nonmusicians per-formed more accurately with the beeps. Whenreproducing rhythms with beeps only,nonmusicians performed significantly betterthan musicians. The two groups did not differwhen using syllables, or when using bothbeeps and syllables. Both groups improved inperformance over the four trials in the beepcondition and the syllable condition. In thecombined beep-and-syllable condition, themusicians’ performance improved over re-peated trials, but the nonmusicians’ perfor-mance did not improve. The beep was producedfirst in most cases. Compared to nonmusicians,musicians produced the beep before the sylla-ble significantly more frequently, and theyanticipated the beeps more markedly by sepa-rating them from the syllables by a signifi-cantly longer time period.

The effect of a visual presentation modewith second- and sixth-grade students hasbeen examined (Shehan, 1987). Patterns werepresented in four modes: (1) produced on awoodblock; (2) chanted with syllables; (3) pro-duced on a woodblock and presented with thenotation, which was removed when the stu-dent performed; and (4) chanted with syllablesand presented with the notation. Participants

heard all four presentation modes but alwaysperformed the pattern on a woodblock. Thenumber of trials needed to perform the pat-tern correctly was recorded, with the maxi-mum set at 10. The mode of presentationsignificantly affected performance; withoutthe visual aid, more trials by students in bothgrades were needed to perform patterns accu-rately. With the modes that did not includethe visual, the use of the rhythm syllables re-sulted in a significantly better performance.The difference between the grades was alsosignificant; second graders required more thantwice as many trials to perform patterns accu-rately.

The effect of aural, visual, auditory, kines-thetic, and combinations of these presentationmodalities has also been examined. In thekinesthetic mode used by Persellin (1992),students silently felt the patterns via pats ontheir forearms. Because the multimodal pre-sentation did not result in significantly lowerscores, the researcher suggests that multimod-al presentations may be beneficial as a way ofaccommodating the variety of learning-stylepreferences of children in a classroom.

During pattern instruction, it may be ben-eficial to provide opportunities to respondindividually in addition to responding with thegroup. Levinowitz and Scheetz (1998) foundthat, following a 4-month instructional period,third graders who had been given solo responseopportunities during instruction were bettersight readers of new patterns than their peers,who had only responded as part of a group.

Rhythmic LiteracyInvented notation has been used as a

means of examining children’s cognitive un-derstanding of rhythm (Bamberger, 1980;Upitis, 1987; Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis, 1994).In studies using invented notation, partici-pants are often asked to make a drawing tohelp them remember what the pattern sound-ed like. Bamberger (1980) identified two dis-tinct types of drawings made by fourth-grade

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children: (1) figural—representations of soundsinto phrases or figures; and (2) metric—representations of the duration of sounds. Infigural drawings, groupings are determined bya change in pace between sounds; thus twoshort sounds followed by a long sound are allrepresented by the same symbol in one groupbecause the pace does not change until afterthe third sound. The time between the group-ings may not be represented, becoming in-stead a gap between figures. In metric draw-ings, which more closely resemble musicalnotation, the underlying metric—the beat—ismentally compared to, and coordinated with, arhythm to construct the drawing. Bambergerobserved that children and adults with musicaltraining tended to construct metric drawings,while those without training tended to con-struct figural drawings.

In another experiment involving 186 chil-dren ages 4 through 12, Bamberger (1980)asked children to add numbers to their draw-ings. The numbers resulted in some drawingsof a transitional type with graphics represent-ing durations and numbers representinggroupings. A developmental taxonomyemerged in which the drawings of the youn-gest children seemed to focus on the continu-ous motion of clapping. The drawings in thenext level of sophistication seemed to placemore attention on the separate and discreteclaps, thus allowing the identification ofgroupings or figures with sounds classifiedaccording to their function within the figure.When a child was able to move the focusaway from figural boundaries and superim-pose a metric onto the pattern, a metric draw-ing could be constructed.

Upitis (1987) taught 7- to 12-year-oldmusicians and nonmusicians to read andperform from both types of drawings. As aresult, they learned to draw both types, butfigural drawings remained the most commontype drawn and were the easiest for childrento read. Musicians were better able thannonmusicians to read both figural and metric

drawings. Children with greater aural andmotor skills in rhythm were better than theirless-skilled peers at reading the metric drawings.The children with musical training were alsosignificantly more likely to make a switchfrom figural drawing to metric drawing aftersome practice. Upitis noted that if rhythmswere difficult to encode metrically, childrenwere able to encode them figurally. It istherefore suggested that teachers not justemphasize metric aspects when teachingrhythm concepts. Children may understandmore readily the formal metric aspect bybuilding on their comprehension of figuralstructure.

Smith, Cuddy, and Upitis (1994) cautionthat figural understanding should not be con-sidered a lower level of rhythmic understand-ing that precedes metric understanding. Theyconclude that figural drawers possess metricskills and that rhythmic understanding in-volves both figural and metric components.They further suggest that possibly a prefer-ence for metric notation is imposed as a resultof musical training. The results of this studymay be difficult to interpret, however, becausefour classifications of drawings were identi-fied: metric, figural, counting, and ambiguous.Over half the children were identified as am-biguous drawers. This study corroboratedfindings of other studies: patterns in duplemeter were performed more accurately thanthose in triple; unsyncopated patterns wereperformed more accurately than syncopatedones; and patterns with two different dura-tions were performed more accurately thanthose with three or more durations.

Rhythm syllables can serve as an interme-diate step allowing the oral coding of soundsbefore trying to notate them, and providing anaid when trying to read and perform fromnotation. Colley (1987) examined the effectsof different syllable systems on second- andthird-grade children’s ability to read, write,and perform rhythm patterns. Three groupseach used different syllabic systems: (1)

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Kodály—ta, ti, etc., corresponding to notedurations; (2) Gordon—du, de, etc., corre-sponding to metrical placements of notes; and(3) Word—using novel words in which thesyllables and natural accents correspondedwith that of note groupings. The childrenwere assessed on three tasks: (1) a recognitiontask in which the children heard a patternplayed on a drum, and then selected the cor-rect notation from three choices; (2) a dicta-tion task in which the children heard a patternand then wrote it in traditional notation; and(3) a performance task in which the childrenclapped a pattern while reading it in traditionalnotation.

Results showed that, on the recognitiontask, both the Gordon and the Word groupsscored significantly better than the Kodálygroup, but the Gordon and the Word groupswere not significantly different from eachother. On the dictation task, the Word groupperformed significantly better than did eitherthe Gordon or the Kodály group, and theGordon group performed significantly betterthan the Kodály group did. On the perfor-mance task, the Word group performed signif-icantly better than the Gordon and the Kodálygroups, but there was no significant differencebetween the latter groups.

There are other factors that may have abearing on these results and should be consid-ered. The Kodály group scored significantlybelow the other groups on a pretest. Both theGordon and Kodály methodologies were fol-lowed only with regard to type of syllableused, not in accordance with prescribed pre-sentation rates or sequence of material.Gérard and Auxiette (1992) found that incon-gruent sentences significantly reduced rhythmpattern performance accuracy of 5-year-olds,while congruent sentences did not. A similareffect could be occurring in this study where,without long-term practice, the children mayexperience the nonsense syllables of Kodályand Gordon as more incongruous than thefamiliar words. Also, Gérard and Auxiette

(1988) found that additional supports helpchildren, but the type of support that is help-ful depends on the child’s level of experience.

SummaryThe ability to perceive and perform a

beat is the most fundamental rhythmic skill.This skill can emerge after the age of 1½ years(Moog, 1976), but most children becomecompetent between the ages of 3 and 5 (Sims,1985). Young children produce vocal re-sponses more easily than movement responses.As a result, 3-year-olds find it easiest to pro-duce a steady beat vocally rather than by clap-ping, tapping, or marching (Rainbow, 1981).By age 4, only 40–60% of children can keep asteady beat by clapping or tapping, and only18–20% can keep it by marching (Rainbow,1981). Synchronizing to the beat with the footis more difficult than with the hand, even foradults (Aschersleben & Prinz, 1995).

Younger children prefer faster temposthan adults do (Drake, Jones, & Baruch,2000), which needs to be kept in mind whenselecting music to use in instruction with chil-dren. Children and adults find it easiest to tapthe beat along with actual music that markshigher and lower hierarchical levels of metersimultaneously. Younger children find tappingthe beat along with an isochronous sequenceeasier than tapping the beat along with rhythmpatterns (Drake, Jones, & Baruch, 2000).Therefore, after children can keep a beat, firstalong with music, and then along with anisochronous sequence, they can be challengedto keep a beat while listening to rhythm pat-terns. The ability to perform a steady beatimproves with age and training (Drake, Jones,& Baruch, 2000; Upitis, 1987; Volman &Geuze, 2000). Older students can be chal-lenged to synchronize to faster tempos, toaccelerating tempos, and to offbeats (Volman& Geuze, 2000).

When learning rhythm patterns, 4-year-olds find it easiest to reproduce patterns vo-cally, and only 30–40% of 4-year-olds can

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echo patterns accurately by clapping (Rain-bow, 1981). Vocal response via chanting con-tinues to be the easiest response mode forkindergartners. In Grades 1 and 2, children areequally successful at echoing patterns bychanting or clapping. By Grade 3, clappingbecomes the easiest response mode. The step-ping of patterns begins to improve in Grade 1(Schleuter & Schleuter, 1985). Although theability to perform rhythm patterns can im-prove to a degree even without instructionbetween the ages of 5 and 7, improvement isnot believed to occur after age 7 without train-ing (Drake, 1993; Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis,1994). Opportunities for solo responding dur-ing instruction can improve performance(Levinowitz & Scheetz, 1998).

The level of difficulty in performingrhythm patterns varies based on pattern char-acteristics. Simple patterns with binary subdi-visions are easiest and can be learned by accul-turation (Drake, 1993). The more the noteswithin a pattern occur on the beat, the easierthat pattern is to perform (Drake & Gérard,1989). Binary subdivisions are easier than ter-nary (Drake, 1993). Duple-meter patterns areeasier to perform than triple-meter patterns(Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis, 1994; Upitis, 1987).Patterns that use 1:3 ratios are more difficultto discriminate (Gérard & Drake, 1990).Unsynco-pated patterns are easier to performthan syncopated patterns (Smith, Cuddy, &Upitis, 1994). Patterns that use two differentdurational values are easier to perform thanthose that use three or more durational values(Drake, 1993; Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis, 1994).Performance of patterns is affected more bythe number of pulses—i.e., the patternlength—than by the number of elements inthe pattern (Drake & Gérard, 1989). Same ordifferent discrimination of patterns is easier atfast and slow rather than medium tempos, butpattern performance is easier at moderate andslow tempos (Gérard & Drake, 1990).

Mode of pattern presentation affects per-formance: melodic cues along with rhythm

patterns help children who have had training;word cues along with rhythm patterns helpchildren without training (Gérard & Auxiette,1988, 1992). Multimodal presentations do notdecrease performance accuracy and may be aneffective way to address multiple learningstyles in a classroom (Gérard & Auxiette,1988; Persellin, 1992; Petzold, 1963). Usingsyllables along with the sound of the rhythmimproves the ability to memorize and performpatterns. Students as young as second gradelearn to accurately perform patterns morequickly when reading musical notation(Shehan, 1987).

Accents create metrical divisions thatallow rhythm patterns to be cognitively orga-nized in larger units. Including accents helpschildren as young as 5 to discriminate pat-terns. The ability to discriminate meter is highin first grade (69%) and improves with age(Gérard & Drake, 1990). The ability to dis-criminate meter, however, is greatest when noother aspect of the rhythmic structure dis-tracts attention (Gérard & Drake, 1990). Thiswould indicate that instruction in meter dis-crimination should begin before first grade.Music used in initial instruction should be asvoid of rhythmic complexity as possible. Us-ing musical examples of increasing rhythmiccomplexity can be a way of continuing tochallenge students.

Using accents when presenting patternsimproves children’s ability to perform them,especially when patterns use ternary subdivi-sions (Drake, 1993). Having children includeaccents when performing patterns, however,hinders performance (Gérard & Drake, 1990).Both rhythm production and accent produc-tion require considerable attention in youngchildren; they can concentrate on one or theother, but not on both. The ability to produceaccents improves with age (31% in first grade,43% in second, and 50% in third). Even withpractice, most 6-year-olds cannot produceaccents correctly. By age 7, children have suf-ficient motor control to produce accents.

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When modeling patterns for children, teachersshould include metric accents whenever possi-ble, but children shouldn’t be required to per-form accents until second grade.

Having students draw their own repre-sentations of rhythm patterns can provide awindow into their cognition (Bamberger,1980). Students who draw only figural-typerepresentations rather than metric-type repre-sentations of rhythm patterns may not be at-tending to the metric aspects. Teachers shouldnot focus exclusively on metric aspects ofrhythm (Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis, 1994; Upitis,1987). Some students may not yet have a met-ric understanding of rhythm internally, inwhich case they would not understand the useof formal metric representation such as nota-tion. Teaching students to read both types ofdrawings may help them to focus on differentaspects of the rhythm and may facilitate theperception of meter. It is possible that rhythmsof a higher difficulty level may be initially un-derstood on a figural level. Future researchersshould examine a possible relationship be-tween the type of visual representation thatchildren can understand and the aural aspects,such as accents and rhythmic complexity, thatthey are able to perceive.

Findings on gender differences haveyielded conflicting results. While one studyrevealed that girls performed rhythm patternsbetter than boys in Grades 1, 2, and 3(Schleuter & Schleuter, 1985), the results ofother studies have shown no gender differ-ences in rhythmic abilities (Petzold, 1963;Smith, Cuddy, & Upitis, 1994; Volman &Geuze, 2000).

Implications and ConclusionsIndividuals acquire and improve rhythmic

skills in three possible ways: (1) maturation;(2) acculturation; and (3) active learning. Withregard to maturation, it has been found thatmost musical skills stabilize during childhoodand do not continue to develop without further training. While beat and rhythm per-

formance may improve somewhat with thedevelopment of motor skills as a result ofmaturation, this improvement will be limitedwithout further training and practice. It is cru-cial that music education experiences fosterthe further development of rhythmic skills.These findings from research should be con-sidered in order to plan the most effectivelearning experiences.

With regard to acculturation, music edu-cators generally agree that it is important tobegin music education as early in a child’s lifeas possible. Many children, however, grow upin situations where opportunities to experi-ence music are limited. Studies documentingthe benefit of early musical experiences shouldencourage parents, caregivers, and educatorsto provide children with more opportunitiesfor musical experiences early in life. The influ-ence of particular types of musical contentindigenous to a specific culture or develop-mental stage also needs to be considered inrelation to rhythmic learning. Early exposureto the types of music found in certain cultures,such as polyrhythms and syncopations foundin traditional music of West Africa, for exam-ple, may give those children a greater predilec-tion for developing rhythmic ability. Earlyexposure to music intended for particular de-velopmental stages may impact a child’s abilityto interact more readily with musical sounds.To be most effective, rhythmic experiencesneed to be perceived by the listener as musicalevents rather than merely as intellectual ormotor exercises. Affective responses that ac-company such musical events are vital to thelearning process and may affect perceptionand performance abilities.

With regard to active learning, researchshould be used to inform teachers in theirefforts to structure musical learning activitiesthat have the greatest potential to develop andimprove rhythmic skills in children. Manyrecent findings on children’s perceptual andperformance abilities in rhythm, however,have not been applied in instructional settings.

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If educational practices in music are toimprove, ways of incorporating these findingsin instructional programs need to be devisedand assessed empirically. While some ap-proaches or strategies may be more difficult touse initially, their continued application withchildren may yield results that are more bene-ficial in the long term. Researchers might con-sider using longitudinal studies conducted inthe context of instruction, and which accu-rately adhere to the prescribed scope and se-quence of a specific methodology. Longitudi-nal studies in applied settings, integrating thefindings from basic research, may be impor-tant for designing the most effective rhythminstruction strategies to use with children.

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