Exploring my research topic: music and the effects it has on academic learning: does it really help or not?

Part I: Exploration
1.Identify the issue or problem that you plan to focus on in your research project.

My choice of topic is music and the effect it has on children in school. Does it really help students or does it hurt them? Does music really help with learning?

2.What is your personal connection to and interest in this topic?

I am a musician and I did better in school when I was listening to music than when I was not listening. I want people who say music is a waste of time and that it doesn’t do any good to anyone to change how they think about this and help with the music program.

3.What opinions do you already hold about this topic?

I think music does help with knowledge. It helped me in math because I used the math in band because of the length of notes and the counting of the beats. It helped me with my basic math which helped me with the harder math as well.

4.What knowledge do you already have about this topic?

I know that scientists say that it does not improve academic learning, but I say differently. It is probably something they have not thought of yet.

5.What are your main questions about this topic? What are you most curious about?

I am really curious if this really is true. I want to find ou the real facts, and have scientific proof that it does or does not exist, that it does or does not help with academic learning.

6.Within what scholarly discipline (such as history, biology, psychology) do you expect to do most of your research? How does this discipline approach or study this topic?

Most of my research will mostly be psychological scientific studies. It makes it very hard because some studies may be false and inaccurate, and other may be complete hoaxes.

7.How could you research this topic outside the library (for example, through interviews and/or observations)?

I could probably ask some people that are musicians if they succeeded in school, if someone in middle school learns faster than everyone else because they play an instrument or listen to music while studying. I could also ask the teachers who is doing better in class, and see how far they are ahead based upon if they are the musician or not.

Part II: Focusing
Write an initial claim, or an open-ended question, to guide your research on this topic. Make it specific but exploratory. Remember that a good claim opens up an area of inquiry about a topic; a claim should invite evidence, support, and debate.

Does listening to music and/or playing a musical instrument help with academic achievement?