Using Popular Music to aid Teaching and Learning in the Classroom: Teaching and Learning Social Studies in Jamaica

Proceedings of The 4th Global Conference on Education and Teaching

Year: 2023

DOI:

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Using Popular Music to aid Teaching and Learning in the Classroom: Teaching and Learning Social Studies in Jamaica

Elaine Audrey Saunches and Karen Casilda Levy

ABSTRACT: 

It is purported that music as a pedagogical tool can motivate students to learn and have fun learning.  This paper explores the use of Jamaican popular music to teach high school students, and motivate students to learn, the subject of Social Studies.   A qualitative study was done for this aspect of the research.  With the relevant permissions, twelve (12) class sessions were held and pre-selected popular songs were used in various ways to teach the content of social studies in the classroom.  The method facilitated active participation of students in the classroom and reactions were observed. Post teaching interviews were conducted to establish the opinions of the participants on the use of this method to aid learning and teaching.  The results indicate that this work may be added to the body of theoretic knowledge that already exists and can help to foster replications for teachers in other subject areas. In particular, literature discussing the use of music and songs to teach content in the classroom is under documented and under-represented in the Caribbean and therefore this work can advance the literature in this area.

keywords: Jamaican popular music, Teaching methodology, Violence in songs