Enhancing Musical Performance Competence through Body Percussion-Based Instruction for Grade 5 Students

In competency-based primary education, musical performance competence plays a vital role in developing students’ expressive ability, confidence, and engagement. However, music instruction in many primary schools still provides limited opportunities for embodied rhythmic practice and performance. Body percussion, which uses the human body as a musical instrument, offers an experiential and accessible approach to addressing this limitation. This study examines the effectiveness of body percussion-based instruction in enhancing musical performance competence among Grade 5 students. The research was conducted through practice-based implementation in regular music lessons, integrating body percussion activities such as clapping, stamping, and coordinated body movements into singing, listening, and performance tasks. Data were collected through classroom observation and reflective feedback from students and teachers. The findings reveal noticeable improvements in students’ rhythmic accuracy, bodily coordination, expressive movement, performance confidence, engagement, and collaborative skills. Teachers also reported that body percussion is a feasible, inclusive, and low-resource instructional approach suitable for primary classrooms. Interpreted through experiential learning theory, the results highlight body percussion as an effective pedagogical strategy aligned with learner-centered music education in primary schools.