Emotions play a pivotal role in music education, significantly enhancing teaching and learning by fostering engagement, retention, and comprehension (Xu & Jin, 2025). Emotional investment in music heightens cognitive processes, strengthens memory, and imbues music with personal significance, making it more relatable and memorable (Carr & Rickard, 2016; Gao et al., 2020; Ngo & Spreadborough, 2021). Positive emotional experiences inspire intrinsic motivation, encouraging exploration and excellence, whereas negative emotions, such as frustration or boredom, impede learning and reduce engagement (Woody, 2021). Despite this, there is a lack of systematic approaches to leveraging emotional resources in children’s musical education, particularly in fostering creativity.

 

Musical creativity, encompassing improvisation, composition, and self-expression, is deeply rooted in emotional communication and self-expression. Composers and improvisers draw inspiration from their emotional experiences, which guide the exploration of new ideas, sounds, and structures (Therrell, 2022; Winner, 2019). However, while existing research has extensively explored cognitive processes (Glăveanu, 2018), embodied cognition (Burnard & Köbli, 2024; Schiavio & Moran, 2020), and cultural contexts (Barrett et al., 2021; Zheng & Leung, 2021), the emotional dimensions of musical creativity in children remain underexplored. This gap is particularly evident in the Chinese general music curriculum, where creative practice is emphasized as a core competency but there are no practical pedagogical frameworks that integrate emotional engagement.

 

This study addressed this gap by examining the effects of a new framework we developed, called emotionally motivated music teaching (EMMT), on children’s creative practice abilities. Specifically, we investigated whether emotional elements in teaching enhance students’ creative expression, cultural awareness, and emotional intelligence. The research question guiding this study was as follows: What is the impact of EMMT on children’s creative practice abilities in music, specifically in terms of musical completeness, musical richness, musical personality, musical affectivity, and musical culturality?

We designed the EMMT framework by drawing on constructivist educational theories and psychological theoretical frameworks. EMMT is designed to integrate social-emotional learning principles into creative music practice, fostering emotional awareness, empathy, collaboration, and self-expression among students. EMMT emphasizes the interplay between emotional engagement and musical creativity, leveraging emotions as a catalyst for creative expression (see Figure 1).

Emotional Engagement and Flow. Emotions are central to the creative process in music education. Music inherently evokes emotions, intertwining psychological, cognitive, and emotional processes that drive creative expression (Verneert et al., 2024). The concept of flow (Csikszentmihalyi & Csikszentmihalyi, 1988) is integral to EMMT, as it highlights the intrinsic joy and deep immersion experienced during creative endeavors. EMMT helps students achieve a state of flow by engaging in activities that align with their emotional and cognitive states, fostering intrinsic motivation and a passion for making music.

 

Cultural Elements and Emotional Connection. Cultural contexts play a significant role in shaping emotional responses to music (Bavarava et al., 2024). EMMT incorporates cultural elements into teaching practice by encouraging students to explore music from diverse traditions and connect emotionally with its cultural significance. For example, students may listen to lullabies from different cultures, observe cultural practices, and incorporate these experiences into their compositions. This approach not only enriches students’ creative output but also deepens their cultural empathy and awareness.

 

Perceptual Development and Creative Practice. A critical component of EMMT is the development of students’ perceptual abilities, which directly influence their emotional identification and creative practice (Schiavio et al., 2022). Through listening and emulation activities, students learn to perceive emotions, musical styles, and cultural nuances, which serve as inspiration for improvisation and composition (Hickey, 2012). Teachers design lessons that prioritize these activities, helping students develop the aural skills essential for creative expression.

 

Observation and Authentic Inspiration. EMMT encourages students to draw inspiration from their surroundings and lived experiences. By observing life and nature, students perceive emotions and incorporate them into their musical expressions (John-Steiner, 2014). For instance, students may observe a mother putting a child to sleep before composing a lullaby, enriching their creative endeavors with authentic emotional experiences.

 

Conducive Learning Environment. Creating an inclusive and supportive classroom atmosphere is essential for fostering creativity (Richardson & Mishra, 2018). EMMT employs techniques such as positive reinforcement, personalized feedback, and collaborative projects to stimulate students’ emotional and creative growth (Gruenhagen, 2017). Teachers play a crucial role in designing open and inclusive environments that encourage risk taking and experimentation.

 

Assessment and Feedback. EMMT embeds formative assessment throughout the teaching process, providing timely guidance and feedback. Clear criteria for creativity encourage students to experiment, take risks, and engage in self-assessment (Bolden et al., 2020). Feedback sessions are designed to motivate students emotionally, fostering a sustainable interest in music making. We designed the EMMT framework according to the guiding questions and steps in Table 1.

The holistic approach of EMMT ensures that emotional engagement is systematically integrated into the music-learning process. Through guided listening sessions and projects inspired by natural sounds or cultural events, students not only enhance their creative skills but also deepen their emotional connection to their musical creations.

The study used a quasi-experimental design with two groups of fourth-grade students from an elementary school in Changsha, China. Students were randomly assigned to either an experimental group (EMMT) or a control group (standard music curriculum). Both groups completed a 12-lesson music program, with each lesson lasting 40 minutes. The topics, content, and objectives of the music programs taught in both groups were the same; what differed were the teaching methods and classroom tasks. The authors observed the implementation of the curriculum in both groups to monitor whether the teachers followed the lesson plans. Both groups completed the Assessing Children’s Creative Practice Ability in Music Scale (ACCPAM; Jiang et al., 2024) before and after the intervention to assess changes in creative practice ability. For the experimental group, EMMT incorporated structured activities aimed at eliciting emotional engagement through music. These activities included composing music to represent specific emotions, performing pieces with an expressive focus, and reflecting on the emotional content of both self-composed and existing music. The control group followed the curriculum based on an existing educational tradition emphasizing technical skills and music theory without explicit emotional engagement. To control for instructional variability, the same teacher, trained in both methods, delivered lessons to both groups.

 

Participants were randomly selected from two of the 10 fourth-grade classes at the elementary school; one class was the experimental group and the other was the control group. Prior to recruitment, the study received ethical approval from Zhengzhou Normal University (No. 20230713). Of 96 students we initially recruited, 10 were excluded from the final analysis due to either withdrawal from the study or incomplete participation in the ACCPAM tests. These exclusions were applied to ensure data integrity. Consequently, the final sample consisted of 86 students, with 44 in the experimental group and 42 in the control group. Participants’ ages ranged from 9 to 11 years, with an approximately even gender distribution in both groups (see Table 2).

The ACCPAM (Jiang et al., 2024) assesses five dimensions of musical creative practice: musical completeness, musical richness, musical personality, musical affectivity, and musical culturality. The scale includes tasks such as composing and performing music, allowing for a comprehensive evaluation of students’ creative abilities, and has shown good test–retest validity and independence of measurement variables after initial validation (Jiang et al., 2024).

Two professional music teachers independently scored the pretest and posttest ACCPAM scales, and interrater reliability was calculated to ensure consistency. We analyzed quantitative data using repeated-measures analyses of variance to examine both within-subject (time) and between-subject (group) effects, with a focus on interaction effects to determine whether the intervention had a differential impact over time. Given the significant time × group interaction effects, we conducted follow-up simple effects analyses to assess whether posttest differences between groups were significant while ensuring no baseline differences at pretest.

The significant time × group interaction effects observed in Table 3 (p < .05) suggested that the effectiveness of EMMT varied across time points, requiring further investigation of group differences at pretest and posttest. Therefore, we conducted a simple effects analysis to determine whether the groups differed at posttest while ensuring no significant baseline differences existed.

Table 4 presents the analysis of variance results for pretest and posttest comparisons between the experimental and control groups. The pretest comparisons showed no statistically significant differences across all five dimensions (p > .05), indicating comparable baseline performance between groups. However, at posttest, the experimental group significantly outperformed the control group across all five dimensions.

Thus, the EMMT intervention significantly impacted children’s musical creative abilities, as the experimental group demonstrated significantly greater postintervention improvements compared to the control group. Furthermore, although the overall between-subjects effects in Table 3 indicated nonsignificant group differences for musical richness (p = .051, η² = .044) and musical personality (p = .416, η² = .008), the posttest differences reported in Table 4 indicated that the intervention was beneficial, even though the overall between-group effect sizes remained modest.

The findings of this study provide evidence for the positive impact of EMMT on elementary students’ musical creative practices across all assessed dimensions. Significant improvements were observed in the experimental group compared to the control group, with notable interaction effects highlighting the differential effectiveness of EMMT across specific musical skills. The results align with key components of the EMMT conceptual framework, particularly the emphasis on emotional engagement and its role in fostering creativity. This highlights the potential of EMMT to complement traditional music education methods by integrating emotional engagement into pedagogical practices. For example, the use of guided listening and culturally inspired projects in the experimental group fostered deeper emotional connections with music, supporting Glăveanu’s (2018) and Webster’s (2002) theories on the interplay between emotional and creative skills. These findings also reflect Schiavio and Moran’s (2020) emphasis on embodied cognition, demonstrating how emotional and physical engagement can synergistically enhance creative outcomes.

In terms of practical implications, our findings suggest that music educators should consider integrating emotional factors into pedagogy in instructional design, encouraging students to incorporate life experiences into their musical perception and emotional resonance, thereby providing a means for them to acquire musical creative practice abilities. Teachers should also pay attention to multiple dimensions of students’ musical creative practice abilities and adjust their pedagogical approaches based on students’ actual conditions. The improvements we observed in all dimensions of the ACCPAM suggest that EMMT can support the development of emotional intelligence, cultural awareness, and artistic expression among students. However, we caution against overgeneralizing the transformative potential of this framework. Instead, EMMT should be viewed as a complementary approach that enhances specific aspects of creativity while requiring further refinement.

While offering valuable insights, this study has limitations. The reliance on quantitative assessments and expert ratings may overlook nuanced contextual information, and there may be benefits of incorporating self- and peer assessments. Additionally, the exclusive focus on fourth-grade students limits the generalizability of the findings. Moreover, external factors like socioeconomic status and parental support could influence the outcomes of EMMT. Future research could address these external factors, integrate qualitative evaluation methods, and expand the sample to include broader age groups for a more comprehensive understanding of the effects of EMMT.

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