Journal Report The Effect of Listening To Classical Music On Students’ Performance, Motivation and Focus In Math Summarized by : Valentin Quanti S. MPd Batch

Purpose of the Study : 1. To see whether there is an influence/effect of students’ performance and motivation which is focused in Math with listening to classical music. 2. To improve students’ confidence in doing math test. The background of the study was led by some cases : 1. the number of students that didn’t enjoy math class/dislike math and thus led to their Math scores and performance of Math. 2. there was an issue of the connection between classical Music and performance of Math. 3. to improve the students performance and confidence due to the low FCAT scores

Objectives of The Study : To see whether there is influence between the students’ score by adding classical music in the classroom environment (while the students are having Math test).

Background of the study The literature review was logically organized, taken from some books: 1. The literature review was started by telling the information or issue about people’s anxiety of Math. People often disliked Math since they thought it was difficult. The focus on rote and memorization and repetition has bored and disappointed the people (Coping With Math, 1997, Theories Explaining Stress and Anxiety, 2004). 2. There is a need of relaxation and it can be found in music. The need is fulfilled in classical music such as Mozart’s. Since Mozart’s music is emotionally consistent and well organized. Thus it can improve people’s math test score.

Background of the study Primary percentage : 1. The examples of Critics on the research, asking “Why Mozart?” because they said that Mozart’s music is not overly emotional (What Is The Mozart Effect, 2002). Others also asked “Why Mozart music is claimed to be a music that makes health, if he himself was easily sick?” (Carol, 2002). 2. A study at University of Nebraska, Omaha, stated that statistically, music had no significant effect on the math scores (Manthei, 2004).

Background of the study The example of how the writer summarized the journal by the implication : 1. There are some theories about the effect of classical music to the improvement of students’ math scores (Music Therapy, 1998, Thomas, 1997, What Is The Mozart Effect?, 2002, Monks, 2000, Carroll, 2002) 2. Some issues to apply this circumstances in their classroom to test math and got a hypothesis result that several complex music with several moving lines in a pleasant key stimulates the neural pathways in the brain, so that it can help people to be more confident to solve problems as math, science, conceptualizing ideas (Monks, 2000).

Background of the study The examples of applying the hypothesis : There is a tend that people believe that classical music is able to increase their ability to solve math and scientific test result.

Hypothesis Hypothesis : 1. There is an effect of listening to classical music to students’ performance and motivation in Math. 2. The music can relaxes the students and soothe anxiety related to Math. 3. There will be more relaxed students and thus perform better on class assignments and tests units.

Methods 1. Population : three fifth grade classes in H. Pearson Elementary School. Based on the state of Florida, the school’s grade was F, D and D in the three previous school years. 2. There were three classes of fifth grade. The writer used two of the classes that had music playing during math seatwork, while another class had no music playing during that time. 3. Number of sampling : - (the writer did not mention it). 4. The writer used T Test to test the validity of the research. (a T Test is a test that is used to compare the control and experimental data). T Test is used to determine the difference in the test if the difference in the data was caused by chance. If the T score is less than 0.05, so the difference is considered significant, not by chance.

The reasons to choose the method : 1. Because of the result of the research examining the relationship between music and math. 2. The students’ score in math during three years period was F, D and D. The writer would like to improve it. The variable is appropriate since the nine questions are based on the questions that are searched by the educators.

Procedures 1. The sampling was done within three months. The planning was done some months before, in Fall It was also the planning of the project. Plan the literature review and the proposal. (The research was done within three months, started from January 2005 until March 2005), 2. Started to have the planning on motivation on two classes by giving Likert pre-test and had the tallies of the answers. It was done daily. (January 2005) 3. Assessed students’ motivation by using Likert. (Jan/Feb 2005) 4. Assessed students’ performance by using Likert. (Feb 2005) 5. Third math unit. Assessed the performance by using Likert scale. (Feb/March 2005) 6. Analyzed the test result, Likert surveys and focus tallies.

At the end of every unit, the researcher always gave the test and graded the average. Then, the researcher compared each class performance and motivation between units, comparing the mark of those who got music as the background of the study and those who had not. The data was collected and analyzed based on the validity, reliability and ethics. Thus it is easy to see the result and test the hypothesis.

Result The result was described in graphs/tables and can be easily read. The graphs were described by classifying it based on the performance, focus and motivation.

Discussion From table 1 (Performance Results), it is stated that no significant difference between the class that use music and those which do not. Table 2 (Motivation Results), it is still no significant difference between the class that use music and those which do not. It is even more likely to have the difficulty and interest of the subject matter than those which has not. In Table 3 (Motivation Table-Whole Likert), there is an increase in the motivation throughout the experiment, yet there is still no significant difference between music and non-music units in any of the three classes. In general, there is no significant difference between student responses to music and non music.

Discussion Overall, this research support the theory about the relationship between increasement of motivation, focus and confidence. This research discussed the theory of music and its relationship with the increasement of motivation, focus and confidence.

Discussion This research is meant to see whether there is a significant improvement on the students’ motivation, focus and performance. The literature review really supported the ideas of it. The respondences were those from grade 5 in H. Pearson Elementary School. Yet the writer did not mention the number of students in each class. This school had got F, D and D during the last three years throughout the state.

Discussion (Conclusion and Recommendation) 1. It is much better if the research is done by classifying the students’ interest through classical music (whether they like classical music or not, or maybe they like other music style) thus the comparison is clear and controlled clearly. 2. It is better if the research was done not only in a school. Thus people can see the difference/comparison among the students in a more various way. 3. Since the sampling was only done for some students, it doesn’t represent for all. And we cannot recommend it as for all. 4. For another comparison, it is also suggested to compare the result by listening to another music such as slow rock, rock, metal, et cetera. So we can see the differences.

Abstract There is an issue about the improvement of students’ math (especially in motivation, focus and performance) by listening to classical music in class. This research was meant to prove an issue that classical music can improve the students’ motivation, focus and performance. However, the sample result did not represent for all thus it cannot recommend the unproven issue.

Abstract Description of the procedure 1. The research was done by comparing three classes of math : two of them was done by giving classical music as the background music while they are having math class (learning process, individual, group work, etc). Another one of them had no music as the background of their study. 2. There is no explanation about the number of students in each class nor the total number of students that were being tested. Thus it cannot prove the issue.

Abstract 1. The research could not prove that classical music can effect the students’ motivation, performance and focus in math. 2. The researcher needs to give test to more students. Three classes of math (with no explanation of the number of student in each class) might not represent for the theory. 3. The researcher would like to do another research about it by using other music such as rock, slow rock, et cetera.