Abstract
As young children begin formal schooling, they encounter tight schedules and adult-imposed time pressures that often clash with the play-based freedom experienced at home and in preschools. This clash between clock time and event time can be a difficult adjustment. Common to all cultures is how music stretches our experience of time in vitally personal ways. This is especially so for children. Parents and teachers across cultures intuitively use music to help children transition between tasks and events. Children also create music to self-regulate. They hum, sing, tap rhythms, dance, and chant throughout their day. Based on data collected in kindergarten classrooms in Singapore, New York, and Darwin, Australia, this chapter explores how children across cultures create music to negotiate transitions and find balance against clock-time pressures.
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Zur, S.S. (2019). Children’s Use of Music in Understanding Time: Perspectives from Singapore, Australia, and the US. In: Twum-Danso Imoh, A., Bourdillon, M., Meichsner, S. (eds) Global Childhoods beyond the North-South Divide. Palgrave Studies on Children and Development. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-95543-8_8
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