The Itsy Bitsy Music class experience should get you off to an excellent start in creating a music-learning environment at home. The music has been carefully selected to expose your child to a wide variety of musical tonalities, rhythms, styles and textures. Just as important is the modeling of engaging ways to connect the children with the music. I hope these techniques will inspire you in your musical interactions with your child at home.

The key element that only you, the parent or primary caregiver, can provide in your child's learning environment is regular social interaction around the music. Researchers have uncovered many exciting connections between learning and social interaction. Social interaction is the key to bridging the gap between what your child can do on his or her own and what he or she can accomplish with adult help. This so-called "zone of proximal development" can be bridged so that your child reaches the goal of independent competency. Tools to help your child cross the zone are called "scaffolding".

You can help your child achieve independent competence by incorporating the following strategies into your musical interactions with your child:

• Physical touch and intimacy : The power of physical touch is incalculable in stimulating neural pathways. In the Itsy Bitsy Music context, physical intimacy includes bouncing, snuggling, lifting, touching, tickling and dancing with your child during music times.
• A two-way dialog : Musically, this happens whenever there is an exchange of musical ideas, perhaps during an improvisational instrument "jam", or when your child's ideas are incorporated into the songs and activities you do together. It's not all your child's ideas, either. It's give and take, adult and child.
• Mirroring and validating : Closely observe your child and acknowledge his or her emerging musical expressiveness. This is especially important when your child is experimenting with new musical ideas. Imitate and enlarge upon his ideas to deepen the validation.
• Modeling : Provide a shining example by modeling enthusiastic engagement with the music. Your child will learn by observing you, whether he or she imitates you, or not.
• Cheerleading : Celebrate with your child the achievement of learning the music and activities. Your non-verbal messages of support are as important as your verbal ones.
• Contextualizing : Optimal learning does not occur in a vacuum, but is embedded in a meaningful social context. Let the experience of music extend to all areas of your family's life, and adapt the songs to suit your own purposes. Find new words to the songs, invent new activities and create your own "musical culture" in your home.

Early exposure to music cultivates many skills that will continue to be useful to your children throughout their lives. The following are some of the skills that early exposure to music helps develop:

• Concentration
• Coordination
• Relaxation
• Creativity/Self Expression
• Self-Confidence

Researchers have also found a significant relationship between early exposure to music and positive performances in such areas as: reading comprehension, spelling, mathematics, listening skills, primary mental abilities (verbal, perceptual, numeric, spatial) and motor skills.

Creating a rich musical learning environment is not simply about listening to the CD's, or singing the songs the way they are sung in class. Take the songs apart and put them back together as you see fit! Connect music to meaningful events and routines in the life of your family. The essential thing is that you do this with your child, and in that process, you create your own musical experiences and a rich environment for learning. There can be no better way to support the learning of your child.
Printed courtesy of The Music Class, Inc.
© 2005 The Music Class Inc.
  

In music class we will sing the same songs from week to week. We will introduce only a few new songs from the CD collection each week. Notice how repeating familiar songs in class brings out the smiles with ooohs and aaahs.

Why do young children like to listen to the same song, watch the same movie, or simply do the same thing over and over again?

Michael Tipper, a memory expert, has a very interesting explanation on why repetition is so very important.

When you create a memory, a pathway is created between your brain cells. It is like clearing a path through a dense forest. The first time that you do it, you have to fight your way through the undergrowth. If you don't travel that path again, very quickly it will become overgrown and you may not even realize that you have been down that path. If however, you travel along that path before it begins to grow over, you will find it easier than your first journey along that way.

Successive journeys down that same path mean that eventually your track will turn into a footpath, which will turn into a lane, which will turn into a road and into a highway, and so on. It is the same with your memory: the more times that you repeat patterns of thought, for example when learning new information, the more likely you will be able to recall that information. In short, repetition is a key part of learning.

So when your little one wants to hear that track on the CD, or watch that movie, or play that game of peek-a-boo over and over and over again, remember that he/she is traveling on that super highway of learning!
Printed courtesy of The Music Class, Inc.
© 2005 The Music Class Inc.
  

From the National Association for the Education of Young Children*

Children are natural musicians, and exposure to music during the early years enhances the learning process by promoting language development, creativity, coordination, and social interaction. Caregivers can play an important role in incorporating music and movement into a child's life.

It isn't necessary to play an instrument well or sing in tune to help young children appreciate musical sounds, and they should not be encumbered with the need to meet performance goals. In fact, music play (whether recorded or live) can be an enjoyable, developmentally appropriate activity regardless of musical aptitude.

Music for Infants and Toddlers
Music can contribute to a soothing environment for infants and toddlers and they soon begin to sort out musical sounds from other sounds. Caregivers can nurture a disposition for music in very young children and toddlers by chanting to them; imitating the sounds they make; rocking, patting, and moving along to the beat. Respectful planning is sensitive to children's interests and balances active and quiet music and movement times.

Music and Movement
Older preschool children can understand movement as a form of nonverbal communication as they begin to tell stories and express their feelings through body movements. They learn to imitate patterns of sound and rhythm and become aware of music in nature, for example whistling wind, chirping birds and crickets.

Once children start to use their voices to sing, it becomes important for them to listen carefully. At this stage, children enjoy songs that ask them to move and swing around, jump, twist, and clap their hands. Playing "follow-the-leader" allows them to mimic and learn the different ways their bodies can keep time with a song, and use of simple props will help children integrate music with movement -- toys and teddy bears can "dance" too!

Children respond favorably to music that is familiar. Playing a recorded song several times as background music can boost familiarity and build vocabulary as the lyrics are learned. Inventing new verses for familiar songs and spontaneous singing as they play can help children understand that music is a form of creative expression.

It's important to expose children to diverse types and styles of music. Expanding children's horizons by offering a variety of music from other lands and ethnic groups is one useful way of accomplishing the goals of a multicultural education.

If given the opportunity, young children quickly realize that music communicates a variety of things, including feelings and ideas. They should feel free to explore and enjoy a wide variety of musical sounds and the body movements that music evokes. Whether singing and dancing to an old Beatles record, or playing a makeshift drum set, early exposure to music plays a fundamental role in a child's development.

Yellow School Center for the Arts
www.yellowschool.org

Newburyport Mothers Club
http://www.newburyportmothers.com

Newburyport Mothers of Multiples
www.newburyportmoms.com

"Musical Connections: Preschool Development and Music" www.sesameworkshop.com/sesamestreet/music/connections.php

"Feel the Magic of Music and Movement", by Elisa Ast All
www.iparenting.com/webmother/0700.htm

"Getting In Tune: The Powerful Influence of Music On Young Children's Development"
www.zerotothree.org/music/

"Music and Your Baby (Newborn to 1 Year)", S. Jhoanna Robledo
www.babycenter.com/refcap/baby/babydevelopment/6548.html

"Music and Your Toddler or Preschooler (Ages 1 to 3)", S. Jhoanna Robledo
/www.babycenter.com/refcap/toddler/toddlerdevelopment/6549.html