Education and human development

The GEDH (Education and Human Development Group) integrates a group of researchers with experience in teaching as well as in performance and artistic intervention in the community, sharing the ideal of human development and the promotion of social well-being mediated by music.

An eclectic perspective is adopted in terms of research methodology. The LAMCI – Laboratory of Music and Communication in Childhood, created in 2009 following a long work of dissemination and training in the area of Psychology and Musical Pedagogy, offers logistical conditions that make it possible to study behaviors of musical interaction similar to those that can be seen in situations of naturalistic observation.

The group follows a distinctive philosophy, characterized by the adoption of working formulas that articulate Research, Training, Creation and Intervention.

With a strong artistic intervention, some of the works of this group have been recognized internationally for the originality and leadership in the conception of educational practices directed to infancy and early childhood.

Purposes

* Reflect on processes of teaching and learning, cognition and musical enjoyment in an interdisciplinary and comprehensive perspective.

* Investigate processes of communication and musical development since early childhood

* Create methodologies and projects of musical intervention in the community, adapted to populations with specific needs in different educational, social and therapeutic contexts.

* Stimulate the implementation of Edwin Gordon’s musical learning theory in the context of generic and vocational music teaching.

* Promote the field of artistic studies in the infancy by adopting formulas of work that reconcile research, training, artistic creation and intervention in the community.

* Increase the production of works and the formation of human resources within the areas of Music Psychology, Musical Pedagogy and Expressive Therapies.

* Increase the production of works and the formation of human resources within the areas of Music Psychology, Musical Pedagogy and Expressive Therapies.



If you wish to learn more about the activities of this group click here.

Team

Coordinator

Ana Isabel Pereira

Vice-Coordinator

Paulo Ferreira Rodrigues

Integrated Researchers

Ana Isabel Marques; Carlos Damas; Celina Arroz; Cristina Faria; Eduardo Lopes; Francisco Cardoso; Helena Rodrigues; João Nogueira; João Reigado; Maria Eduarda Carvalho; Nancy Lee Harper

Researchers in Training

Cristiane Souza; Jorge Graça; Luísa Tender; Mariana Vences; Nuno Arrais

Collaborators

Abel Arez; Adriana Aguiar; Ana Isabel Ferreira; Ana Paula Almeida; António Ligeiro; António Rocha; António Amaral Rodrigues; Ariana Perazzo; Carlos Antunes; Carolina Sá; Cláudia Galante; Cristina Brito da Cruz; Daniela Morais; Edison Verbisck; Fernanda Lopes; Helena Caspurro; Leonardo de Carvalho; Maria José Barriga; Nancy Lee Harper; Ricardo Martins; Susana Cabral; Teresa Marinho

Services provided to the community

Música de Colo – On Saturday mornings at LAMCI, there are music sessions for parents and babies. A space to INVESTIGATE-FORM-CREATE-INTERVENE

Financed Projects

2015-2018 GermInArte – Artistic Transformation for Social and Human Development since early Childhood

Partnership: LAMCI-CESEM and Theatrical Music Company

Funding Institution: Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation

Coordination: Helena Rodrigues; Executive Coordination: Paulo Ferreira Rodrigues; Art Direction: Paulo Maria Rodrigues

Description: GermInArte has the purpose of qualifying human and professional resources for early childhood, designing and implementing artistic and musical training modalities.

More information on www.musicateatral.com/germinarte


2010 – 2014 Opus Tutti – Artistic practices in the creation of social and educational roots

Partnership: LAMCI-CESEM and Companhia de Música Teatral (CMT)

Funding Institution: Calouste Gulbenkian Foundation

Coordination: Helena Rodrigues; Art Direction: Paulo Maria Rodrigues

Description: Opus Tutti aimed at the conception of good practices of intervention in the community addressed to childhood and early childhood. It integrated actions aimed at different target audiences. Created models and materials of work directed to the infancy, in an intervention transversal to several educative and social agents; offered several opportunities for artistic enjoyment and social interaction, developed models of “immersive” and “implosive” training in the artistic area; conducted pilot experiments at “Centro Intantil Roseiral”, intervening at the level of cultural and educational practices of families and professionals; Initiated tasks on the description of the behavior of babies and the caregiver-baby dyad, in situations of exposure to artistic performances.

More information on: http://www.opustutti.com/


2011-2012 Artistic Creation for Infancy: from the observation of its impact to the construction of new scientific paradigms in early infancy

Partnership: LAMCI-CESEM and Companhia de Música Teatral (CMT)

Funding Institution: VLAC – Vlaams Academish Centrum, Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Science and the Arts.

Coordination: Gerrit Loots (Vrije University) e Helena Rodrigues (FCSH-UNL). Investigadora participante: Martine Van Puyvelde

Description: The project intends that two teams with different backgrounds gather their perspectives to come out with new ideas on infants’ observation attending to artistic creation and on the transference of knowledge to the therapy domain. It includes a pilot study into infant behavioral responses towards artistic performances and a pilot project with mothers with postnatal depression. Bringing together perspectives and techniques from therapy, music education and artistic creation, Helena Rodrigues and Martine Van Puyvelde designed and implemented 10 sessions (5 mother-infant sessions and 5 sessions for mothers only) throughout 5 weeks in a musical/therapeutic intervention at the Zoertsel psychiatric hospital with infants and their mothers with postnatal depression.


2007-2011 Musical Development in Infancy and Early Childhood – PTDC/EAT/68361/2006

Funding Institution: Fundação para a Ciência e Tecnologia

Coordination: Helena Rodrigues

Colaborators: Institute for Music in Human and Social Development (University of Edinburh) and Companhia de Música Teatral (CMT)

Descrição: This project seeks to contribute to the greater understanding of musical development in infancy and early childhood, dealing with specific problems concerning musical behaviour in childhood. The planned research includes: 1- Studies concerning the vocalisation of infants when encountering music and language; 2- Studies concerning text and melody in musical perception and learning; 3- Studies in the area of movement and rhythmic development; 4- Studies concerning the use of metaphorical language as a means of teaching expressivity in music performance.