Music for your preschooler: A yes or a no?

There is no doubt in our minds that music is an integral part of a child’s learning curve. Infact they say a child must know a sport, a language and a musical instrument. Early exposure to music has many advantages of which we are all well aware, perhaps thats why we heard classical music when we were pregnant and made our children listen to Mozart thinking they will excel academically listening to his compositions.

The Benefits of Music

Kids who grow up hearing music, singing songs, and moving to the beat are enjoying what experts call “a rich sensory environment.” That’s just a fancy way of saying they’re exposed to a wide variety of tastes, smells, textures, colors, and sounds. And researchers believe this forges more pathways between the cells in their brains. It is during the early years, new neural connections are forming more rapidly than at any other time in our lives, and during our mid – childhood years, the brain starts to prune these connections, retaining only the most important and most often used ones. This becomes the basis for our understanding of music and ultimately the basis for what we like in music, what music moves us , and how it moves us. This is not to say that we can’t learn to appreciate new music as adults, but basic structural elements are incorporated into the very wiring of our brains when we listen to music early in our lives.” says Daniel Levith Ph. D(2006) This is Your brain on music.

Musical experiences are an important way to help create these pathways, also called neural connections. And while listening to music is certainly key to creating them, it’s when kids actively participate in music that they make the strongest connections.

Research shows that kids who are actively involved in music (who play it or sing it regularly):

• do better in reading and math when they start school
• are better able to focus and control their bodies
• play better with others and have higher self-esteem

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, for whom the Baby Mozart Music Festival DVD is named after, has become one of the most celebrated composers of all time. However, his musical achievements as a child are equally amazing. At the age of just three-years-old, Mozart was already playing the clavichord (basically, a small piano). One year later, he was already writing short pieces of music!

Signs of Mozart’s musical genius continued during his childhood. At just five-years-old, he gave his first concert at an Austrian university. At seven-years-old, Mozart once picked up a violin and played perfectly part of a musical piece that was new to him. Amazingly, Mozart had never had a single formal violin lessons! Young Mozart toured Europe for three years, and was featured in various concerts for kings and queens. When he returned to Austria, he wrote his first opera at the age of 11-years-old!

Here are some reasons why nurturing early childhood music is so vital:

1. Music can help to develop a child’s fine motor skills (i.e. using small muscle groups to play a piano) and gross motor skills (i.e. using large muscle groups to dance). In addition, music improves vocal, speaking and listening skills.

2. Rhythm and pitch are part of your child’s natural development. Sometimes children
would rather sing than listen, skip than walk, and dance instead of standing still. Is this normal? It is, and here is proof:

o A fetus is already aware of the heartbeat of his or her mother.

o For centuries, music and lullabies have become standard methods for helping babies to fall asleep.

o In what experts refer to as “The Mozart Effect,” exposure to classical music can have a significantly positive effect on humans’ physical and mental health. Several studies have proven this theory. And this beneficial effect of classical music influences not only adults, but children as well.

3. The sharing of musical instruments and playing in a “band” can help toddlers to learn important social skills.

4. Music can have an important influence on the development of a child’s brain, particularly through the age of six-years-old. During these years, the most significant brain development occurs.

5. Infants and toddlers tend to be less inhibited about making errors, than older children are. After children start elementary school, they are required to learn the “correct” way to sing a song or play an instrument. However, pre-school children can have jam session on a toy grand piano, without being worried about hitting the right keys. As a parent, try to grin and bear the sour notes.