Hi there, I'm Dr. Kat, and I'm the creator of this Coursera hosted MOOC on How Music Can Change Your Life. I've been lecturing and doing public talks about how music can change your life for the past 20 years. And whilst doing that, I began to see that many people around the world believe in music, and know that music makes a difference to themselves, their relationships, and their communities and cultures. So there are plenty of people like you that know music has worked for them, but they don't exactly know how it worked. I created this MOOC to explain how it works so that you can use music more and better to make a difference in your own life and the lives of the people that care for. And ultimately, to make the kinds of changes that will make the world a better place. Since music is complex, I chose to break it down in six different ways, to get experts to explain how music works from six different perspectives. They are, how does music influence the body to support fitness and rehabilitation? How does music motivate the mind to promote academic achievement? How does music reflect the psyche to improve mental health? How does it foster intimacy to strengthen relationships? And how does music enhance connectedness to support communities, as well as how music expresses culture to honor our diverse society? So come and join us, as we explore this exciting topic, and you can choose which ones are the most interesting to you or canvas them all to get a broad understanding. No matter how you approach it, you'll be able to get something very quickly that will help you understand how to apply music and to change your life. Now, here is the key point of the MOOC. Each of these ways of understanding music is based in a different set of beliefs, and uses different bodies of theory to explain how music can be used to promote changes in your body, and mind, psyche, relationships, communities, and the broadest levels of society. The truth is, you have to use music in quite different ways to achieve any of these changes. Because music has multiple potentials. It doesn't just work in one way. So for each module, I've invited expert colleagues from around the world to describe what they know about how music works from a particular prospective. I've asked colleagues to make 30 minute audio podcasts where they explain how they have applied these research findings and theories, and what they have learned from doing that. And Elly Scrine, who is the academic assistant for this MOOC, has gone out on location to bring you videos of how people are already using music in different ways to change their lives one step at a time. Like me, Elly is a qualified music therapist. And music therapy is a profession of people that apply and have developed many of the principles around music, health and well being that we cover in this course. I'll be there to guide you through the six different perspectives by providing some brief videos at the beginning of each unit. These will give you the taste of the materials to be covered, and help you to listen out for the key points and theories that our experts will be detailing. For those of you who like to make sure that you're grasping the materials, we've designed ten multiple choice questions for each unit. These will quickly quiz you about the key ideas that have been covered in the video interview, the podcast, or the articles. And each time you answer a question, you will also be provided with more information on that topic with links to more research and literature. For those of you who are really interested in how you can apply these ideas to change your life, we've designed learning tasks to accompany each unit. Each one helps you to identify a goal that you would like to achieve with music, and then carefully design a program that will move you in that direction. You'll have to think about what music, and when, and how you'll use it. And finally, you'll need to evaluate whether it's been successful. And if it hasn't, identify how you might change it to try again. Each of these learning tasks is associated with a different unit and will also provide you with practice opportunities for the final assessment, which is actually very similar to these, but thinking about other people, rather than yourself. In the final assessment, you'll design a program for a group of people, adopting one of the six perspectives that we've worked through. Each of us tends to find one or two of these perspectives more compelling than the rest. So, you can choose the one that you prefer. So as you begin, I invite you to explore as many of the perspectives as you like, and to use the learning tasks and assessments in ways that suit you. Listen to the audios and videos as many times as you'd like, since I can assure you that there is a lot to be grasped in each one. My colleagues are all international experts who may inspire you to consider learning more about their particular area of interest. Whether that's in reading or studying music therapy, music education, ethnomusicology, music sociology or any of the other disciplines that are touched upon here. I look forward to sharing what I've learned about how music can change your life, and ultimately, make the world a better place.
