Excerpts from "Music Ability is Related to Literacy Skills"
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Evidence exists that listening to music can facilitate learning to read, probably by increasing children's awareness of speech sounds, which is important in learning to "sound out" words. Writing in the Journal of Research in Reading, studies show correlations between musical abilities and reading achievement.

They also ran a small study on the effects of a six-month program of music instruction designed to develop auditory, visual and motor skills. At the end of six months, the music students showed a significant improvement in reading compared to the controls, who did not change. These findings suggest that music instruction can cause an improvement in reading.