ABSTRACT
This chapter offers a rationale for teaching and learning improvisation and composition in schools, then focuses on means for implementing children’s musical creativity related to world music in the elementary school music room. Listening examples that can inspire and inform improvisation and composition are included. The chapter also provides descriptions of the ways that improvisation and composition are utilized in various musical cultures’ practices/traditions, as well as ways that teachers can engage students in creative activities that are related to the musical processes and products of music practices and traditions from different cultures. In addition, the chapter incorporates means for teachers and students to make decisions related to tradition, authenticity, and context. The chapter closes with an interview of an urban elementary music teacher and band director in Ohio who encourages his students to create music in many styles, sometimes using instruments that he has collected from all over the world.
