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Nurturing Born Musicians |
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Current research in the field of children’s musical development and multiple intelligences, tells us that ALL children are born with the potential to sing in tune and march to the beat, thus achieving basic music competence. Just as with language, cognitive, social, emotional, and physical development, a child’s brain has a critical period during which he/she can develop musically. Researchers have found that the period of developmental music aptitude occurs between the ages of 0 – 9 years. Dr. Howard Gardner, Ph. Ed. at Harvard University and developer of the theory of Multiple Intelligences states that musical intelligence is as equally important as Linguistic, Logical-Mathematical, Spatial, Bodily-Kinesthetic , Interpersonal, Intra personal, and Naturalist intelligence. My program not only develops your child musically, but also touches upon all of the Intelligences of which Dr. Gardner speaks.
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Songs |
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Movement |
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| Gross motor activity such as dancing to a folk song, playing rhythm instruments and marching to a beat helps children build rhythmic security and self-confidence. | |
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Icons and Pictures |
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In keeping with the Kodaly method of teaching music, icons and pictures are used to remind children of songs they know. For example, a simple picture of an umbrella immediately brings to mind "Rain, Rain". Drawing pictures not only reminds them of a song, but helps them focus their attention to the teacher. With many pictures used during vocal musicianship classes, pitch, beat, and rhythm are subconsciously presented in the way the picture is drawn while the children are singing. Icons or pictures are abstracted into musical notation over a period of time. Thus, children can read and write standard musical notation "without being taught."
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Music Notation |
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Born Musicians help our "supersingers" develop their music pre-writing skills. Icons or pictures of specific songs are abstracted into musical notation over a period of time. In the same manner, pitch, beat, and rhythm presented in such a way that they are abstracted into musical notation (they look like notes on the board). Thus, children can eventually read and write standard musical notation without being “taught”.
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Listening |
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Born Musicians also incorporates some listening activities to develop internal hearing. Many times we use gentle lullabies or play an instrument to teach an appreciation for the softer tones. |
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Hand Signs |
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Stories |
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To give children a chance to use their imaginations, all of our teachers include stories in their lessons. This is a favorite time for the children and the songs incorporated into the storyline seem to be the first songs the children remember. |
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