Musical creativity in Early Childhood Education: analysis of the activities of textbooks

Abstract

The main objective of this study is to know and analyse the creative musical activities contained in the educational projects of Early Childhood Education. The sample consisted of 2200 musical activities included in the Educational Projects (textbooks) for the 2nd cycle of Early Childhood Education most commonly used in schools of the Region of Murcia. For data collection, an ad hoc instrument was designed called the Protocol for the Systematic Analysis of Musical Activities in Early Childhood Education, which included the following sections: (I) data on the Educational Project; (II) activity identification data; (III) activity planning and contents; (IV) levels of musical creativity, established from an adaptation of the 4C creativity model by Kaufman, Beghetto and Watson (2016). The information obtained was subjected to descriptive and inferential analysis (Chi-square, Spearman's correlation, Cronbach's alpha, Mann-Whitney U and Kruskal-Wallis). The results revealed that only one out of five musical activities was creative. It should be noted as a positive that the most commercial textbooks were those that included the most creative activities, although it was also observed that these were less present in the most current projects, while the older ones incorporated more creative activities. In reference to the musical areas that work more on creativity, movement/dance and listening stood out as those that incorporated more creative proposals. Finally, taking into account the importance of the use of technological resources in educational projects to work on creativity, only 2% of the musical activities included this type of resource.