The MDAST takes about 30 minutes for a child to finish if they don't take any breaks. However, it is perfectly fine for your child to take a short break for a few minutes in between sections. If they do, however, the total time will be longer.

A parent must fill out the parental consent on the Permissions First page for a child to receive the password to be admitted to the MDAST. That means children can not take the MDAST without at least one parent's permission to do so.

The MDAST measures the music aptitude for children in Grades K - 5 (ages 5 - 11). It was created to find out how children think about and hear music.

The MDAST has five sections, or subtests, that help us understand how children understand the music they hear. The items on it compare pairs of music samples and ask children if they are the same, different, or "I don't know." The five sections are: musical pitches, melodic contours, composer comparisons, musical style comparisons, and musical era comparisons.