Affective Wellbeing and the Teaching of Music in Ghanaian Basic Schools: A Reflection

Any healthy education aims to develop the individual holistically. To help achieve and assess this goal, educational objectives have been categorized under three domains: cognitive, psychomotor and affective. The arts (music particularly), have been identified as being best suited for the training of the affective domain. Using a number of instruments and triangulation methods, we examined this claim. We observed that music teaching in Ghanaian basic schools has, to a large extent, not fulfilled this mandate. We recommend the need to rethink the music program in two main ways: a) reviewing curricula materials and b) providing requisite training for music teachers.