Give your child a head start in life through early childhood music
The first five years of a child’s life is a window of opportunity for laying foundations through stimulating experiences for their overall development.
Cynthia Ensign Baney, an early childhood music consultant and composer states that the opportunity to experience music through speech, song, movement, dancing, creative movement, listening and playing instruments benefits the child by also developing the following areas: vocal and language skills, pre-maths and science skills, pre-reading and aesthetic development, i.e. sense of self, creativity and cultural awareness.1
Children through music integrate body, mind and spirit
Music Develops Language
Music is the universal language understood by all ages and all cultures. Through interaction and nurturing, children learn to speak by imitating sounds. In the same way, children learn to sing, play instruments and develop rhythm, i.e. cooing, humming, chanting and repeating familiar tunes and rhythms. Baney states, “The voice is the first and most important instrument. Vocal activities in a musical environment enrich and support language development.”1 Our speech is not monotone; it has musical qualities in inflection, rhythm and phrasing. Children explore the potential to communicate using movement, sound and speech patterns, i.e. fingerplays and singing songs. The cognitive processes involved activate language and reasoning in the brain.
Music Formula for Maths and Sciences
Music is maths. By clapping to music children learn maths patterns. By clapping rhythms, they learn science concepts, i.e. sound and volume.2 Dancing also develops maths and science by children being aware of their position and the group’s spacing and also feeling the rhythm of the music and its patterns. Music stimulates spatial skills through children’s imagination, i.e. forming pictures in their heads, manipulating objects in that picture and the ability to think in abstract form. Thus using higher cognitive/thinking skills required for maths, science and engineering are pre-developing, while also hinting at spatial intelligence, the ability to perceive visually and transform that vision.1
Music Fires Thinking and Learning Skills
A child’s brain function is like a giant dry sponge ready to soak up new information. Visualise a sort of cosmic 3D dot to dot. The dots represent neurons-brain cells, which are waiting to be connected via pathways of information called neural bridges. Each time a child is stimulated to think, either new neural bridges are formed or pre-existing ones are strengthened. The more neural bridges that are formed and strengthened, the more the intellect will be developed. Use it or lose it.1 This is the exciting connection that researchers are finding between music and firing of brain cells for intellect and overall individual development. Children are constantly watching, listening and remembering. They are working full time to make sense of the world.7 Songs, movement and musical games of childhood are excellent neurological exercises that introduce children to speech patterns, sensory and vital movement strategies.1 Says Dr Dee Joy Coulter, a nationally recognised neuroscience educator, “Logic and reasoning are also developed as the children begin to organise ideas and solve problems.”1
A Vehicle for Social and Emotional Development
We are emotional beings and we learn through sensory experiences. Children respond to the emotional component of music well before they can talk. It is particularly therapeutic for children who cannot express verbally happiness, anger or sadness by finding music as an outlet.3 Singing with others helps children to relate to others and have an opportunity to share, express themselves and co-operate.1
Physical Development
To the child music is movement. Children love using their bodies to learn and think with. By moving rhythmically children learn a sense of timing and a feel for spatial perceptions which in turn strengthens their young brains, by activating the lower part of the brain stem systems.5 Dancing develops gross motor skills of balance, large muscle movement and flexibility. Fingerplays and playing instruments improves small motor skills. Children use their bodies to communicate messages and represent actions. It is a great outlet for the natural high spirits and energy of young children.
Playing the instruments
Making live music and listening to it provides the child rich sensory and emotional experiences. Children learn they can create sounds outside of themselves and express themselves uniquely. Improvising and experimenting with drums, jingles, rhythm sticks and rattles allows children the opportunity to explore the connection between varied sounds and their ability to produce it.1 Children’s hand and eye co-ordination improves remarkably through the playing of instruments and this aids the development for pre-skills of writing. Allowing children to naturally experiment and spontaneously compose with no pressure gives them a joyful and stimulating experience.
References:
1. Baney. C (March/April 1999) p.p. 1-4 http://www.earlychildhood.com/Articles/index.cfm?FuseAction=Article&A=69
2. Bickart T (2000) p.1. “Integrating the Arts in the Creative Curriculum Classroom”
http//www.teachingstrategies.com/getpage.cfm?file/titles/bookinfocctlarts.html&userid=51070950 or http//www.creativecurriculum.com
3. Bridges D (1994) p.14, 123. Sydney, Hale & Iremonger Pty. Ltd
Boston B.O Wordsmith, Inc (2000) p.1.’Start the Music- A Report from the Early Childhood Music Summit” http//www.menc.org/guides/startmusic/stmreport.htm
4. Campbell D. 9/11/200 p.1-4 “Does Music really affect the development of children?’’
http//webmd.lycos.com/content/article/1700.50882
5. Teachers Strategies Inc 1997 p.1. “Circle Time: Making A Good Idea Better” http://www.teachingstrategies.com/getpage.cfm?file=/educatorslED_preschool/circletime.html&userid=51070950
6. Weinberger N (2001) p.5. “Feel the Music” Musica Research Notes V11.12,Iss1 Winter. http://www.musica.uci.ed/mrn/V817WOI.htmlacumidx960718#feel
7. Baney’s Article Title-“Wired for sound: The Essential Connection Between Music and Development”
Published in byronchild/Kindred, Issue 3, September 02