ABSTRACT
Early childhood education has a strong tradition of valuing children’s play and developing pedagogies which support children’s learning in and through play. The importance of play was endorsed by educational philosophers and theorists as long ago as Froebel, as has been explained earlier in several chapters. They, in turn, have provided inspiration for more recent music pedagogies that foster children’s learning through musical play. These pedagogies are introduced and described. Some of the tensions between adult-directed and child-initiated approaches to music pedagogy are discussed.
