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Pre-service teacher degree programs are increasingly crowded with subjects covering the wide gamut of knowledge a teacher requires. Ensuring musical knowledge and language for classroom teaching poses a difficult problem for teacher educators. This article examines the challenges of including in the pre-service classroom teaching program a music sequence of learning that successfully imbues an understanding of music. It demonstrates how music education has been carried out at Charles Sturt University on the Albury-Wodonga campus over the last five years. It also discusses the difficulties of retaining successful music learning in the new cross-campus degree, due to external limitations and cross-campus facilities.

Professional early childhood educators are often asked for advice about whether or when a young child should learn to play a music instrument. Many educators who do not have a background in music education may not be confident in providing such advice. A range of overseas research has supported learning a music instrument in the early childhood years, noting the importance of parental support. This research project investigated the effects, especially emotional, on children's lives of adding instrumental music lessons to their general education, using the strategy of surveying professional musicians about their childhood experiences. Of the 46 professionals surveyed, all but two reported that the addition of music lessons to their general education had improved their enjoyment of childhood. Implications for early childhood professionals and teacher educators are also considered. (Contains 3 tables.)