New technologies for new music education: the Continuator in a classroom setting

In this paper we describe a new didactical experience carried out about the interaction between young children and the Continuator, an interactive reflexive musical system elaborated at SONY- Computer Science Laboratory in Paris (Pachet 2003). From a pedagogical view the general aim was to analyse if and how the Continuator can be used in the daily school activities. We are also interesting to understand the role of the teacher in two different situations: in the free games and in the guided activities with the system. The experience was carried out with 18 children of 3/5 years old, in an Italian kindergarten (Bologna). Children, divided into small groups (3/4 children), played with the Continuator for three times. The children reached high levels of well-being and pleasure, very similar to those described in the Theory of Flow (Csikszentmihalyi, 1996). They learned to dialogue musically with the system, developing autonomy and learning to manage some kinds of collaborative playing. These factors gave rise to some particularly careful and prolonged bouts of listening, stimulating the children to think in sound, spending time with the system and developing a genuine desire of “play” with music. This practice experience shows the Continuator could represent a versatile device to enhance the musical invention and exploration in classroom setting. The system’s double role of partner and teacher seems to enhance socialization and an important self-regulation (Canevaro, 2002) of the group.