Different people learn in different ways, learning is a deeply personal aspect of an individual. Every person will have their own experiences and opinions on the education they’ve received and how they view learning. Yet standard book and lecture learning is still the main education type that older students’ experience, why is this the case?

The effectiveness of audio-learning has been studied and documented as effective in multiple types of learners, specifically the use of music to create songs and memorisation devices for younger students to learn new and important topics (Lo & Chi Fai li, 1998). Highlighting an educational gap for older learners, leading to asking whether audio is a versatile educational medium? And does it deserve to be utilised more within education for older students? How personal experiences shape an individual’s approach to education, how this might shape research, perhaps allowing for theoretical opinion-based research so everyone involved gets a say, creating a diverse chorus of voices in which data can be extrapolated and analysed. Assuming that speaking with students and educators’ forms a wide opinion base to answer these questions.

Music is a universal language, this can be seen throughout multitudes of human civilisations, this universal staple even crosses species (Treutler, 1898). Many animals create music, some for mating like short tail bats and humpback whales, others for communication for example birds or gibbons, some even for fun such as cockatoos and parrots (Read et al., 2006). Elephants and even sea lions have been shown to enjoy music and actively create music alongside humans (Jackson et al., 2024), learning the patterns and tempos from introduced foreign music (Cook et al., 2013). This makes it an obvious choice to use within education, as is seen throughout children’s shows like Miss Rachel, educational toys with jingles to keep attention, or even how learning the alphabet is set to a musical tune (Rorintulus & Wuntu, 2023).

Audio-learning is prioritised for young learners’, yet extremely limited for older learners. There almost seems to be a sliding scale, as a student’s age increases their access to auditory learning resources typically decreases. So, assuming audio-learning is so effective, why is it underutilised, and much less educational media created for older students? Is it a question on effectiveness or does the problem lie within the education system? Is it due to lack of funding, perhaps due to the main memorisation and regurgitate testing parameters, maybe utilising audio is unwanted or unnecessarily difficult for the educators involved.

In this session I will be covering the topic of audio-learning. Exploring what media makes up audio learning, how pattern recognition affects memory, debating if audio mixed with visual resources falls within the umbrella of audio-learning. Then diving into different types of audio-learning. Exploring which of these types are available to students and showcasing the disparity between early learning resources, when compared to older learners’ auditory resources. Touching on teaching styles linked to age ranges and how audio plays its role; with a focus on music patterns. Connecting to how music is mentally processed and how it affects the ability to retain information (Tisdell, 2019).

 

References

Cook, P. et al. (2013) ‘A california sea lion (zalophus californianus) can keep the beat: Motor entrainment to rhythmic auditory stimuli in a non vocal mimic.’, Journal of Comparative Psychology, 127(4), pp. 412–427. doi:10.1037/a0032345.

Jackson, M. et al. (2024) Play that trunky music: Development of an auditory enrichment device for elephants in zoos | proceedings of the International Conference on Animal-Computer Interaction, ACM Digital library. Available at: https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/3702336.3702343 (Accessed: 07 March 2026).

Lo, R. and Chi Fai li, H. (1998) ‘Songs enhance learner involvement’, in Forum: A Journal for the Teacher of English Outside the United States. Forum (3), pp. 8–11.

Rogers, L.J. and Kaplan, G. (2006) (PDF) elephants that paint, birds that make music: Do animals have an aesthetic sense?, The Dana Forum on Brain Science. Edited by C.A. Read. Available at: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/245030952_Elephants_that_paint_birds_that_make_music_Do_animals_have_an_aesthetic_sense (Accessed: 07 March 2026).

Rorintulus, O.A. and Wuntu, C.N. (2023) ‘Exploring the effectiveness of songs for learning improvement: A case of elementary level students’ English skills’, Edumaspul: Jurnal Pendidikan, 7(2), pp. 3336–3349. doi:10.33487/edumaspul.v7i2.6913.

Tisdell, C.C. (2019) ‘An arts-integrated approach to learning mathematics through music: A case study of the song “E is a magic number”’, International Journal of Innovation in Science and Mathematics Education, 27(7). doi:10.30722/ijisme.27.07.005.

Treutler, W.J. (1898) ‘Music in relation to man and animals’, Proceedings of the Musical Association, 25, pp. 71–91. doi:10.1093/jrma/25.1.71.