ScoreS2Duo is grounded in research as well as practice. Our research explores how music literacy is taught, experienced and sustained in real educational contexts, with particular attention to the relationship between curriculum, teacher agency, learner experience and meaningful musical participation.
A central strand of this work focuses on music literacy education in South African secondary schools. Drawing on qualitative and narrative research, this work examines how teachers interpret curriculum requirements, respond to unequal access and resources, and create pathways that enable learners to participate meaningfully in formal music education.
A second area of interest is teacher agency. Music teachers often work within complex and uneven contexts, making continual decisions about repertoire, curriculum, assessment, learner readiness and available resources. Research in this area considers how teachers adapt, mediate and sustain music programmes while maintaining opportunities for genuine musical learning.
ScoreS2Duo also engages with qualitative and visual research methodologies, including narrative inquiry, visual elicitation, qualitative data analysis and the use of visual tools to support interpretation and meaning-making. This methodological work reflects an ongoing interest in finding ways of representing teachers' experiences with both rigour and sensitivity.
These research strands increasingly connect with the development of Repertoire-Based Music Literacy Education (RBMLE). RBMLE explores how meaningful repertoire, including music already known and valued by learners and communities, can provide a bridge between existing musical knowledge and increasingly formal music literacy.
Across these areas, the underlying question remains consistent:
How can music education help more learners move from musical participation towards deeper understanding, confident literacy and sustained musical engagement?
Research at ScoreS2Duo therefore does not sit apart from teaching and resource development. It informs the workbooks, pedagogical frameworks, teacher-support materials and educational initiatives developed through the platform — creating an ongoing conversation between research, reflection and classroom practice.