[00:00.100]From VOA Learning English,
[00:02.860]this is the Education Report.
[00:06.170]Many people believe that teaching children music
[00:10.300]makes them smarter, better able to learn new things.
[00:15.040]But the organizers of a new study say
[00:18.510]there's no scientific evidence that early musical training
[00:23.230]affects the intelligence of young people.
[00:26.490]An estimated 80 percent of American adults
[00:31.150]think music lessons improve children's ability to learn
[00:35.890]or their performance in school.
[00:38.390]They say that the satisfaction for learning to play a new song
[00:43.510]helps a child express creativity.
[00:46.920]Researchers at Harvard University, however,
[00:50.770]have found that there's one thing musical training does not do.
[00:55.670]They say it does not make children more intelligent.
[01:00.190]Samuel Mehr is a graduate student at Harvard's School of Education.
[01:06.300]He said it is wrong to think
[01:09.370]that learning to play a musical instrument
[01:11.870]improves a child's intellectual development.
[01:15.670]He says the evidence comes from studies
[01:19.320]that measured the mental ability
[01:21.430]of two groups of 4-year-olds and their parents.
[01:25.730]One group attended music class,
[01:28.830]the other went to a class that places importance
[01:33.230]on the visual arts -- arts that can be seen.
[01:37.200]"The evidence there is 'no.'
[01:38.500]We found no evidence for any advantage on any of these tests
[01:42.300]for the kids participating in these music classes," said Mehr.
[01:44.490]Samuel Mehr says researchers have carried out
[01:48.960]many studies in an effort to learn
[01:51.420]whether musical training can make children smarter.
[01:55.270]He says the results have been mixed.
[01:59.130]He says only one study seems to show
[02:03.860]a small percentage increase in IQ,
[02:07.820]intellectual scores among students after one year of music lessons.
[02:14.240]He does not believe that IQ
[02:16.790]is a good measure of a child's intelligence.
[02:20.840]He says researchers in his study compared
[02:25.530]how well children in the musical training group
[02:28.970]did on mental processing tasks or projects,
[02:33.580]then the results were compared to those of children
[02:37.880]who did not take lessons.
[02:40.160]There was no evidence that the musical training group
[02:44.720]did much better on the mental tasks than the other group.
[02:48.470]The researchers confirmed the results
[02:50.920]with a larger group of children and their parents.
[02:55.190]Mr Mehr says music lessons may not offer children a fast easy way
[03:01.280]to gain entry to the best schools later of their life.
[03:05.350]But he says the training is still important for cultural reasons.
[03:10.660]In his words, "We teach music because music is important for us."
[03:16.820]He notes that the works of writer William Shakespeare are not taught,
[03:22.020]so the children will do better in physics.
[03:25.230]He says Shakespeare is taught because it is important.
[03:29.580]"And I don't think music needs to be any different than that."
[03:32.790]A report on the benefits of musical training in children
[03:37.250]was published in the journal PLOS ONE.
[03:40.590]And that's the Education Report From VOA Learning English.