Music activities and free musical play have significant developmental, social, and emotional benefits for young children. Early childhood educators can play an important role in integrating music-related activities into children’s everyday lives. This study explored the music experiences of early childhood educators in British Columbia (BC) before they become educators. Using an interpretive phenomenological approach (IPA), this study sought to address the following research question: How do early childhood educators’ pre-professional music learning and pedagogical experiences influence their use of music in their practices with young children in formalized childcare settings? In this exploratory study, I conducted semi-structured and in-depth interviews with six early childhood educators who had studied early childhood education (ECE) in BC, worked in the Greater Victoria area, and had music-related experiences before and during their post-secondary studies. I identified the following three main themes in the data: (a) Sense of Belonging; (b) Repeating and Performing, and (c) Growing by Doing. These themes highlight further subthemes to present insights into the relationship between early childhood educator participants’ music experiences (before becoming early childhood educators) and their views on and use of music with children in their ECE practice. The findings and their implications based on participants’ shared stories can assist ECE post-secondary programs, BC educational policymakers, as well as future researchers in this area to address and support early childhood educators’ music-related professional experiences. / Graduate

Ämnet är musikterapi med hjärnskadade personer, skrivet inom ramen för Magisterprogrammet i musikpedagogik med inriktning musikterapi vid Kungl. Musikhögskolan i Stockholm, 2012. Syftet med uppsatsen är att bidra till ökad kunskap om hur det är att tolka och förstå hjärnskadade personers sätt att kommunicera i en musikterapisituation, då dessa har nedsatt kommunikationsförmåga, afasi, svårt med empati, ett utslätat känsloliv, stel mimik och liknande. Uppsatsen har en kvalitativ forskningsansats med hermeneutiska inslag och metoden är semistrukturerade intervjuer. Undersökningsgruppen utgörs av tre professionellt utövande musikterapeuter som alla tre har erfarenhet av musikterapeutiskt arbete med personer som drabbats av grava, förvärvade, hjärnskador. Forskningsfrågan är: På vilka sätt uppfattar tre musikterapeuter hjärnskadade patienters upplevelser av musikterapi? / Music Therapy with brain-damaged patients is the topic of this paper, written as a part of the master program in music education profile music therapy, at the Royal College of Music in Stockholm, Sweden, 2012. The objective is to focus on how music therapists understand and interpret the music experiences of brain damaged patients, as the patients may show reduced communication skills, aphasia, empathic difficulties, flattened emotions and/or rigid facial expression. The essay has a qualitative research approach including hermeneutic elements. The material consists of interviews with a research group of three professionally active music therapists who have worked with patients suffering severe acquired brain damage. The method used is semistructured interviews and the material has been interpreted hermeneutically. The research question is: How do three music therapists perceive the experiences of brain damaged patients in music therapy?

With a rapid growth in smartwatch and smartwatch audio technologies, there is a lack of knowledge regarding user needs for smartwatch audio experiences and how those needs can be satisfied through user-centered design. Previous smartwatch user behavior studies suggest that audio app usage is not a primary use case for the smartwatch. However, audio applications are increasingly incorporated into smartwatches, which leads to the question of the apps’ purpose, validity, overlooked contexts and use cases. This thesis aims to understand what kind of audio experience(s) a user-centered design process might generate for the smartwatch. The design process generated insights from smartwatch users of audio applications, that were used as design guidelines for Context Awareness, Micro-interactions, and Device Ecosystem. The resulting prototype HeartBeats considers Context Awareness with heart rate music recommendations, Micro-interactions with one-handed song skipping and Quickplay music, and Device Ecosystem with speaker access and phone battery support. / Med en snabb teknisk utveckling av smartklockor och tillhörande ljudteknik finns det en kunskapsbrist om användarbehov och hur dessa kan tillfredsställas genom användarcentrerad design. Tidigare forskning om smartklocksanvändares beteenden tyder på att ljudapplikationer inte är ett huvudsakligt användningsområde för smartklockor. Ljudapplikationer implementeras dock allt mer i smartklockor, vilket leder till frågan om vilket värde de ger och om användningsområden möjligen har förbisetts. Den här uppsatsen syftar till att förstå vilka sorts ljudupplevelser en användarcentrerad designprocess skulle resultera i för smartklockor. Designprocessen resulterade i insikter om smartklocksanvändares beteenden med ljudapplikationer, vilket användes som designriktlinjer för kontextmedvetenhet, mikrointeraktioner och ekosystem av enheter. Den resulterande prototypen HeartBeats nyttjar kontextmedvetenhetgenom att rekommendera musik med användarens hjärtrytm i åtanke, mikrointeraktioner med en gest för att byta låt och snabbstart av musik, samt ekosystem av enheter genom snabb åtkomst till klockhögtalare och stöd för att spara telefonbatteri.