Rationale

While the current state and district adopted music curriculum has some listening incorporated, the overwhelming majority of it is instrumental. I believe that if we are going to adequately address the *National Standards for Music Education Standards, our students should also have opportunities to hear classically trained singing. I have known several classroom teachers and even some music teachers that have shied away from the idea of exposing children to classically trained singing. They are afraid that students will not like the music, or will not be able to relate to it. However, Peggy Krasin, Past Chair of the Wisconsin Music Educators Association Listening Project says, “We came to enjoy music through repeated exposure to it. We love what we know. If children are exposed to high quality compositions frequently and are given the opportunity to experience them in varied and interesting ways, they will come to understand, enjoy, and love them.” I believe that the opposite is also true, if some of our students do **not** hear this high quality music at school, they may never come to love it or even understand its significance and importance in our culture.


 * This project addresses standard 6: Listening to, analyzing, and describing music, standard 7: Evaluating music and music performances, standard 8: Understanding the relationship between music, the other arts, and disciplines outside the arts, and standard 9: Understanding music in relation to history and culture.