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Teaching the Music of Language

Teaching the Music of Language is an arts integration program where students, PreK to Grade 5, use music to improve reading and writing skills. Marcia Daft created The Music of Language in collaboration with the Changing Education through the Arts (CETA) program at John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts. Integrating the fluency and expressiveness of music with the teaching of reading and writing provides teachers with innovative strategies for helping kids who struggle with language. Tapping into the rhythm, cadence, and inflection of language provides powerful support for beginning readers, emerging writers, and English Language Learners.

Teacher Training & Workshops

Explore Teaching the Music of Language professional development for educators

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TML Research Paper

This research paper documents the deep impact of music and drama on literacy

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Free Resources & Lesson Ideas for Language Arts

Explore Teaching the Music of Language activities and lessons for students grades Pre-K - 5

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Testimonials

Teaching music and reading are so closely related. This workshop validated what I already knew as a teacher, but didn’t exactly know how to put into action. Marcia’s skill-building activities for developing reading fluency are strategies that I can start using the first week of school. Marcia is such an excellent teacher and you leave each of her course sessions eager to go back and try these concepts and strategies with your students.

Billings, Montana, Reading Specialist

Understanding the relationships between steady beat, rhythm, and reading would help all preschool and elementary teachers. I loved exploring this connection in depth and believe that the TML rhythm and reading activities will help every child feel successful.

Elementary Reading Specialist, Greenville, South Carolina

I have been blown away by the effect that The Music of Language has had on my teaching. Other than re-reading the text, I never had any specific strategies for improving reading fluency. And other than providing good modeling, I never had any specific strategies for helping students read with greater expression. I was so inspired by Marcia's character poetry lesson when she came into my classroom just one time, that I continued to use her lesson format many times later that year to review and solidify concepts in all subject areas.

5th Grade Gifted and Talented teacher, Santa Rosa, California