Keywords

1 Introduction

1.1 Background

Music therapy is the therapy which uses music intentionally for the recovery of mental and physical disorders, the improvement of functions and the quality of life, and the modification of behavior. In Japan, about 50% subjects of the therapy are people with intellectual disabilities. Playing a musical instrument is one of the forms of music therapy for them [1]. When playing a musical instrument, we need to read musical scores. However, there are few support tools for people who can’t read musical scores, relying on the ingenuity of individual instructors.

1.2 About Figurenotes

Figurenotes is an intuitive music notation system developed for people who have difficulty reading musical score such as people with intellectual disabilities. In figurenotes system, pitch names are represented by colors, and octaves are represented by shapes. In other words, in this system, musical notes are represented by a mark with a color and a shape (see Fig. 1) [2].

Fig. 1.
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Figurenotes system [2]

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Several studies have reported that figurenotes system makes learning of music easier, makes cognitive ability and skill to grasp the whole developed, and the delight and the sense of accomplishment by the progress of performances cause the confidence, the intention, and the concentration for people with intellectual disabilities [3].

Watanabe developed the application which you play the piano using figurenotes system after learning the rhythm, and verified it for people with intellectual disabilities [4]. As a result, she has demonstrated that it is difficult for people with intellectual disabilities to match a musical note and a mark on keyboard because of the large number of musical notes on a music score.

1.3 Purpose

The purpose of this study is a development of the musical instrument playing application using figurenotes system with five steps starting with a simple matching learning, and evaluation of learning effect using the application.

2 The Developed Application

In this study, the musical instrument playing application using figurenotes system with five steps starting from a simple matching learning was developed. This application is for iPad. As you can see Fig. 2, the first two steps are learning to match of color and shape on the musical note. Next two steps are steps learning rhythm. Final step is a step playing the actual song. If you clear a step, you can learn in the next step. Whenever you start using this application, the step is reset to first step for the establishment of the understanding of figurenotes system.

Fig. 2.
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The constitution of the developed application

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For example, Fig. 3 shows the learning screen in first step. In the learning screen, a musical note, a keyboard, a sentence instructing an operation, and the button which playbacks the video explaining how to use this application are displayed. A sentence instructing an operation and the button which plays the video explaining how to use this application is mainly for people who don’t know how to use this application and can’t understand a sentence. Also, when you touched a wrong key, in other words, you failed to match a musical note and a mark on keyboard, the correct key becomes yellow for leading to touch the correct key.

Fig. 3.
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The learning screen in first step (Color figure online)

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Also, this application can record the use history such as used time, reached step, usage count, and total number of plays of the explainer video.

3 User Test

3.1 Subject

The verification of learning effect using the application was conducted to three students (see Table 1) with intellectual disabilities who have learned figurenotes system and cannot match a musical note and a mark on keyboard by user test. Table 2 shows the result of the five-level (1:low–5:high) questionnaire on the skills of each student, which need to use the developed application. In Table 2, “Reading” means how each student can read and understand sentence, “Understanding sound” means how he can listen to and understanding sound, “Understanding word” means how he can listen to and understanding word, and “Imitation” means how he can imitate other people’s actions. This questionnaire was answered by each parent of subjects.

Table 1. Information of each subjects
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Table 2. The skills of each subject (1:low–5:high)
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3.2 The Method of the User Test and Evaluation

After getting their consent and giving them iPad installed the application, we asked subjects to use the developed application freely for about a week. After that, we assessed the application by examining the step they could reach finally, usage count, and total number of plays of the explainer video from its usage history. Also, we asked each parent of subjects to answer a questionnaire on the condition of a subject before and after the experiment for the reference of the assessment. The questionnaire consists of four five-levels (1:bad–5:good) questions and free writing (see Table 3).

Table 3. A questionnaire on the condition of a subject
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4 Results

Table 4 is the summary of the result of the usage count, the total number of plays of the explainer video and the final reached step in the use test period. Also, the result of the questionnaire is shown in Table 5 and Table 6. In Table 4, subject B and subject C used the application and watched the explainer video many times compared with subject A. From this, they seem to be interested in the developed application. Also, Subject A and Subject C could reach step5, playing “Alphabet song” step. From this, they could match a musical note and a mark on keyboard and learn rhythm by the figurenotes system.

Table 4. The summary of the result of the verification
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Table 5. The result of the questionnaire on the condition of a subject before and after the experiment (1:bad–5:good), question number refers to Table 3
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Table 6. The result of the questionnaire of the free comments by a parent
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5 Discussion

From the results of subject A and subject C, which could reach step5, in learning matching a musical note and a key and rhythm, it is assumed that the step-by-step learning starting from learning with only one musical note is effective. Also, from this, it is assumed that the developed application is effective for people with intellectual disabilities to learn the figurenotes system. However, because there were few subjects, we need to investigate for more people.

The paper by Maeda et al. has reported that learning matching is important for people with intellectual disabilities [5]. In this study, it is assumed that the matching a musical note and a key enabled them to reach the playing “Alphabet song” step.

In Table 5 and Table 6, some subjects improved interest and concentration before and after the experiment. Sahara has demonstrated that a teaching material that repeats around 30 s is appropriate for people with intellectual disabilities [6]. In the developed application, it is assumed that introducing the explainer video about 40 s made their interest and concentration improved.

In 4 and Table 6, subjects B watched the explainer video repeatedly, but he couldn’t reach after step2. Also, from Table 6, this reason is assumed that the words used in the video were difficult for him. Therefore, improving of understanding figurenotes system is expected by using easier words in the video.

6 Conclusion

In this study, the musical instrument playing application using figurenotes system with five steps starting from a simple matching learning was developed and the evaluation of learning effect using the application of it was conducted. As a result of the verification, it is assumed that a matching a musical note and a key on musical instrument performance is important. However, because there were few subjects in this study, we will need to investigate for more people after improving the developed application.