Community non-profits stepped forward to provide funding for instruments and instructors. Working from the Collier County Kindergarten Readiness Skills List, I determined what could be taught through the violin, then proposed teaching violin to four year olds in local pre-schools that housed at risk children.

​The results were both immediate and astonishing.  The students had great success in mastering simple open string songs, which gave them not only a sense of achievement, but also greater self-confidence in their regular classrooms. 

​In 2008, the Guadalupe Early Childhood Center in Immokalee, Florida requested I to bring the Pre-K Literacy/Violin Program to their center – most of whom have limited to no English language skills, and live well below the poverty line.  The Guadalupe Early Childhood Center program had 96 four-year old children enrolled in the literacy/violin program; and were taught by five FGCU Bower School of Music students.  For the little ones, the curriculum proved extremely beneficial for skills and behaviors designed to promote success in learning:  listening, focus, self-discipline, pre-reading, recognition of patterns, fine motor skills, memory and abstract thinking. Rather than proceeding to kindergarten unprepared, nearly all of them ranked in the top quartile of kindergarten readiness.  At the same time, the college students were learning patience and honing their teaching strategies.

In 2012, through the generosity of private donors, the Collier County programs expanded to include 4 Head Start classrooms in the Collier County Public Schools. The ultimate goal is to offer the program in all Collier Head Start Pre-K programs. The program has been replicated in other communities.

​I have come to believe that nothing is more important to children’s education than assuring they are ready for school and have a positive first year.  It is much, much easier to prepare students for kindergarten than to help older students improve their studies after they have experienced years of failure.

  • To bring a literacy-based violin program to Pre-K classes
  • To base the educational focus of the Pre-K program on exploration of sound, attention span, listening skills and fine motor skills
  • To integrate qualities of music that correlate to language - repetition, rhyme and exposure to a variety of sounds - and to further develop cognitive learning
  • To bridge all languages, since music is a language  of notation and performance
  • To promote active involvement for students
  • To foster collaboration between educational institutions and public and private organizations by identifying partnerships and funding opportunities
  • To expand the program to all Head Start  classes in Collier County
  • To continue the development of student assessment tools so longitudinal studies of the student may be incorporated into the program

Our Goals


OUR RESULTS

The impact of the MusicScores! program on the children is impressive.  The collection of quantitative data for the past four years shows great promise.​

  • Among Osceola County's initial base of 67 students, measures for getting ready to read, print knowledge, phonemic awareness, oral language and mathematics jumped from a range 22% to 75% to a range of 94% to 100%.   Additionally, fewer student absences were noted on violin days, as well as increased parental involvement in student education.
  • Collier County Public School example:   Avalon Elementary   
                 Kindergarten children with VPK violin experience:  90% passed the Florida Kindergarten Readiness Evaluation   
                  Children without VPK violin experience:  65% passed the Florida Kindergarten Readiness Evaluation
  • Close to 65% of the pre-school population in Collier County do not receive any pre-school training and enter school ill-prepared.
  • 70% of the total school population in the county  is on the free and reduced lunch program.
  • Funding capabilities exist within affluent coastal areas.

To cost-effectively create learners, by providing violin instruction that enhances literacy and focus, as well as social and motor skills, for pre-schoolers.

​our Rationale


​our mission

CREating Learners through Pre-K Literacy/Violin

After 38 successful years of teaching children in Ohio and Florida, I became intrigued with brain research.  At the time, studies showed that the left and right brain actually become better connected if a child plays the violin or piano before the age of 5, and that this physiological development enables the child to reach his or her potential. 

​And so was born the idea that would take me into the next phase of my career -- a Pre-K Literacy/ Violin Program that provides low income children a greater chance to succeed in school. The program is designed to help children learn how to develop their language, listening, social, developmental and motor skills, and dramatically increase their kindergarten readiness.


MusicScores! 

MusicScores Violin, Inc.

P.O. Box 111804  ​Naples, FL 34108

​MusicScores Violin

​judy evans, founder


​Creating Learners through Pre-K Literacy/Violin

​A note from our Founder

MusicScores!: A Music Teacher's Journey to Pre-K Literacy