Is it better to learn in the silence or while listening to music?

 In the European project SEEL (Sound in European E-learning) a team of experts from the educational department of the Faculty of Economy and Trade University in German Paderborn under the supervision of Prof. Marc Beutner, in cooperation with the teachers of the Higher school of Technical Ion And. C. Bratianu in Romania, Timisoara, and with the teachers from the primary school Chrudim, Dr. Jana Malíka has been working on the interesting research.

We are surrounded by recorded music and sounds in many everyday situations. The clink of the elevator, the clacking of the traffic lights, error message of our computer and many other sounds attracts our attention and directs our action. Music in the café, in a store, at the airport, but also in the film has its own purpose: to calm us down, to motivate, to draw attention to an important moment (in a movie) etc. The Staff of the project SEEL ask the question whether the wider and targeted use of sounds and music in the school-teaching could lead to its increase of efficiency.

In the initial phase of the project the German, Romanian and Czech party tried to find out whether, or how the sound is used in the teaching in the present. We have contacted tens of headmasters and teachers in each country. On the basis of this research it can be said that a targeted manner of working with sound and music in schools is occurred rarely, excepting specialised schools for pupils with disorders of vision.

Now the project team is working on a model of learning situations, which afterwards co-workers from Timisoara and Chrudim will be tested. The question is, whether pupils will achieve better results, if model learning situations are complemented with specifically designed sounds and music in the background or not.

At the same time members of the project team try to think through and articulate the principles, conditions and circumstances in which the use of sound in teaching may be of benefit to students, to create a database of freely usable sounds and music, etc.

The project was launched in September 2014 and will be ended in August 2016. The members of team are together in the electronic contact. In addition, held three meetings, one in each of the participating countries. More information about the project SEEL can be obtained on the web and social networks:

Web: http://seel.eduproject.eu/?lang=cz

Twitter: https://twitter.com/SEEL_Info

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/projectseel?_rdr

Project SEEL is co-financed by the programme of the European commission ERASMUS+.