The quality of education in ECEC (0-6 years): The contribution of art music*

The notion of quality is at the heart of the democratic model of education (Goal 4 Agenda 2030). In the EU, the regulations on the ECEC - Early Childhood Education and Care (0-6 years) system since the 2000s show a holistic approach to childhood, focusing on the subjective right of every child to equal educational opportunities, insisting on the quality of education, attaching particular importance to the development of creativity, and supporting the idea of a coherent and unitary curriculum in the 0-6 system, linked to the subsequent segment of education and training. The article shows how the cognitive and socio-emotional development of the child, as well as her or his creative and innovative abilities, would benefit greatly from an education in art music from an early age, because of its aesthetic values and as a testimony of civilisation. Unfortunately, music, and therefore art music, has little or no place in the 0-6 curriculum. Based on the analysis of a number of normative documents on early childhood education, both internal and external to the EU, my contribution will propose three areas of intervention to build a quality vertical curriculum centred on art music education: the musical preparation of staff, the organisation of the curriculum in a historical and cultural perspective, and the design of the learning environment. These three lines of action are not always supported in a balanced way by the national frameworks for quality education in early childhood. The aim is to stimulate debate among experts in music pedagogy and didactics, as well as educators and teachers in the ECEC system, in order to develop pilot projects to experiment with vertical curricula in artistic music education.