Another Perspective: Every Child a Singer

This article begins with a brief history of children's singing instruction in schools. When Kenneth Phillips began researching children's singing, he was surprised to learn that a strong program of child vocal pedagogy was in place in America's schools for about a hundred years--the 1830s to the 1930s. By the 1950s however, all that was done in music class was the singing of songs. He writes in this article that the results of this change in philosophy can be heard today among the majority of adults who cannot sing in tune. Even with the considerable amount of research on the child voice that has taken place in the last three decades, there remain far too many children in our schools who never learn to sing. Many vocal teachers have come through their college and university preservice curricula with little understanding of how to instruct children in singing skills. Many music teachers do not know how to get children to abandon chest voice singing and permit them to sing predominantly in this popular style. Phillips says that he believes every child can learn to be a singer, but that it cannot happen with out of date attitudes. He believes that singing is a learned behavior, and before teachers can teach singing, they must first learn techniques for how to teach this wonderful mode of expression.