Music In Education is a logical outgrowth of the strong traditions and heritage of music education in America. Not just a keyboard program, it provides an innovative, comprehensive and contemporary focus to music teaching and learning in classroom general music, both now and for the future.

The Music In Education curriculum is sequential and comprehensive. Built upon and increasing hierarchy or musical concepts and experiences, the curriculum is designed to systematically provide students with musical knowledge that they can use to express their own creativity. Each component of the curriculum materials, teaching strategies, listening, and review and quiz, provides a structured and comprehensive musical experience that relates to the systematic acquisition of musical skills and concepts (rather than random usage).

The Music In Education curriculum is intended to be interactive with other methods or materials. While the sequential structure of a curriculum is critical in any academic study, a curriculum is essentially a framework on which to organize learning experiences. Music In Education curriculum materials support and encourage the integration of other methods and materials that will enhance student understanding and achievement.

The design of Music In Education curriculum components and instructional activities is intended to stimulate the development of personal musical skills through four distinct areas of experience: listening, discussing and describing, making, and creating.

The curriculum is organized into 80 modules, and the material found in each module reinforces these four experiential areas. Each series of learning strategies in a module focuses on the development and understanding of specific concepts, and the acquisition of musical skills, through the interaction of these four areas.

Because of the many differences in music program standards found in American schools, the curriculum is designed to extend maximum flexibility in use and integration into the music classroom. Class size, frequency of instruction, the school schedule, and student understanding and achievement are key determinants in the ability of a teacher to cover instructional content. Thus, the decision for instructional pacing for this program rests with the teacher.

Curriculum materials in the Music In Education program are non-graded; there are no recommendations as to the number of modules that should be accomplished in any given year, nor is there a recommendation as to the length of time that should be spent in accomplishing each module. Review and quiz activities are designed to allow the teacher to capture an overview of student understanding, thus determining onward movement in the curriculum by student understanding rather than student experiences.

Introductory modules provide experiences for early learners in kindergarten and first grade. Students in later grades may experience rapid progress in the initial modules because of their more advanced reading and motor skills.

Each module is designed to allow comprehensive student understanding of specific musical concepts. Students will sing, play, discuss and listen using the new concept, then use that concept in individual and group creative activities. Because the introduction of concepts is integrative and sequential, songs, activities and skills in succeeding modules reinforce and reapply the concepts introduced in previous modules.

Music In Education songs and listening selections have been chosen to provide traditional and contemporary musical examples for students. Multi-part song arrangements accommodate learners of all levels, regardless of their previous musical experience.