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The sounds of learning
UCLA receives grant to study the impact of music on children with autism
By
Mark Wheeler
| 7/20/2009 9:05:00 AM
In June 2009, newspapers reported that archaeologists in Germany had discovered a 35,000-year-old flute made of bird bone. It represented, one paper said, "the earliest known flowering of music-making in Stone Age culture." And we have been tapping our toes, humming along, singing and dancing ever since.

The power of music affects all of us and has long appealed to our emotions. It is for this reason that UCLA researchers are using music to help children with autism spectrum disorders (ASD), for whom understanding emotions is a very difficult task. This inability robs them of the chance to communicate effectively and make friends and can often lead to social isolation and loneliness.

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Specifically, the children are using a method of music education known as the Orff-Schulwerk approach. Developed by 20th-century German composer Carl Orff ("schulwerk" is German for schooling), it is a unique approach to music learning that is supported by movement and based on things that kids intuitively like to do, such as sing, chant rhymes, clap, dance and keep a beat or play a rhythm on anything near at hand.
Orff called this music and movement activity "elemental" — basic, unsophisticated and concerned with the fundamental building blocks of music.

The 12-week program uses elements from the Orff method — including games, instruments and teamwork — and combines them with musical games. The idea is to pair emotional musical excerpts with matching displays of social emotion (happy with happy, sad with sad, etc.) in a social, interactive setting.
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In fact, he said, participating in musical activities has the potential to scaffold and enhance all other learning and development, from timing and language to social skills.

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The goal of the research is to evaluate the effect of the music education program on outcomes in social communication and emotional functioning, as well as the children's musical development, according to Molnar-Szakacs.

"Hopefully this will be a fun, engaging and cost-effective therapeutic intervention to help children with ASD recognize and understand emotions in daily life interactions," he said. "An improved ability to recognize social emotions will allow these children to form more meaningful social relationships and hopefully greatly improve their quality of life."

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The NAMM Foundation is a nonprofit organization dedicated to advancing active participation in music-making across the lifespan by supporting scientific research, philanthropic giving and public service programs from the international music products industry.

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The UCLA Tennenbaum Center for the Biology of Creativity has as its mission the study of the molecular, cellular, systems and cognitive mechanisms that result in cognitive enhancements and explain unusual levels of performance in gifted individuals, including extraordinary creativity.
It is part of the Semel Institute for Neuroscience and Human Behavior, an interdisciplinary research and education institute devoted to the understanding of complex human behavior, including the genetic, biological, behavioral and sociocultural underpinnings of normal behavior, and the causes and consequences of neuropsychiatric disorders.

The sounds of learning / UCLA Newsroom