Musical experiences entail various modes of interaction and communication amongst the participants, such as speech, sound, gestures, gaze, body posture and movement, proximity, and image. Drawing from the field of social semiotics that focuses on human experience (van Leeuwen, 2005), multimodal analysis enables the study of modes in the specific context with the aim to grasp the multiple meanings and representational affordances in a social-cultural encounter (Bezemer & Kress, 2015). In education, the use of multimodality has been studied in various environments and therefore relevant pedagogical models have been articulated (Jewitt, 2008). In music education, only a small number of relative studies is available, as research interest in multimodal analysis in the field has grown in the last few years. Multimodal analysis does not entail a methodology but a semiotic approach; therefore the challenge for the researchers is to examine the construction of meanings, their use and their interaction in the examined social-cultural settings (Tomlinson, 2012). In our presentation, we focus on the latest Greek secondary school music curriculum. It is necessary for educators to decode the modes in the text (oral information, images, sounds, music, graphics, etc), with the aim to understand the semiotic codes as a nexus not a sum. A multimodal reading enables us to see details which would not be visible through a different analysis. Emphasis is placed on the exploration of the meanings that derive from an ensemble of modes, such as aural, spatial, kinesthetic, haptic, and verbal mode. Also, we explore the question whether the Greek secondary school music curriculum is in line with the current context of digital multimedia. Applying a multimodal framework on music curricula can help the music educators enrich their teaching practices while taking into consideration the emergent musical environments.

• Curricula and critical approaches
• Digital environment and music Education

Regina Saltari is a Lecturer at Institute of Education, University College London (IoE UCL). She lectures at the MA in Music Education and supervises pre-service music teachers in PGCE Music. She is an ISME Research Commissioner for the period between 2024 and 2026. Previously she lectured at the BA and MA Music Education programmes at the Ionian University of Corfu in Greece and the European University of Cyprus. During her doctoral studies, she carried out extensive ethnographic research on the culture of children’s musical games in Greek school playgrounds. Her research interests include ethnography, multimodality in music learning, music curricula, informal learning practices and acoustic ecology in music education.

May Kokkidou (MEd, PhD, post-PhD) was born in Thessaloniki. She is a music education specialist and researcher and has published numerous papers in international and national journals and conference proceedings. She is author of many books: “European Music Curricula: Philosophical Orientations, Trends, and Comparative Validation”, “From kindergarten to early adulthood – Findings from a longitudinal study”, “Music Definition and Music Education: many perspectives, many voices, many questions”. She works as adjunct lecturer at the MA Programmes (University of Macedonia, European University Cyprus). She served as president of the G.S.M.E. (2007-2012). Her recent research work focuses on music curricula studies, semiotics of music, philosophy of music education, and multimodal music perception.