Increasing students' retention of science vocabulary using music

This study was to see if there will be an increase in the vocabulary retention of fifth grade students by using music in conjunction with hands-on instruction to reinforce meteorology vocabulary.

The subjects for this study were two fifth-grade classes of 17 students each. The academic levels of the students were heterogeneous, consisting of high, medium, low abilities, and special education. The same teacher instructed both groups. The site is an elementary school in a large, urban district in North Texas.

A multiple choice test was administered as a pre and post assessment. Even though results show no significant differences in mean scores for the groups, the scores of the treatment group showed less of a decrease than scores for the control group after one month.