Engage your baby in some serious "coo"

Musical Parenting Tip:  Speak, sing, and make voice sounds with your young baby!

Why?

• Exchanges of cooings, babblings, smiles, gestures, eye contacts, and tonal babbling are all part of vocal play.  As a communication game between adult and baby, it's basic components consist of touching, observing, gazing, listening, and imitating. 
• Pausing and waiting during vocal play demonstrates the important conversational element of 'turn-taking.' 
• Baby's responses to verbalizations are a rudimentary form of speech, language development, and conversation.

How?

• Log into your Kindermusik @ Home account, and watch the Baby Talk video!  Learn about your child's language processing, and why games with vocal play are important to learning. 
• Refresh your knowledge of the sign language for the animals we've sung about, then add the animal sounds, too.  What is baby's reaction?  If your baby has a vocal response to your sounds, extend the game by copying his sounds, yourself! 
• As you listen to your home CD, begin adding animal sounds, when they make sense:  crow during I Am Rooster;  Add animal sounds to the Old MacDonald dance; meow for the cat, moo for the cow, bark for the dog during Hey Diddle Diddle, etc.

Want to Learn More?

On our blog:  Read how engaging in vocal play with baby can speed your child's language development!

Kindermusik helps your preschooler distinguish between sounds, instruments, and language.

Musical Parenting Tip:  Notice & classify sounds with your preschooler.

Why?

• Listening to different timbres while playing various musical instruments allows children to learn to attend to relevant sounds and match these sounds to a specific instrument. 
• Preschoolers can then begin to code, sort, and categorize sounds according to timbre.  Activities in which children identify, compare and analyze sound qualities of instruments help children to develop auditory discrimination skills. 

How?

• Log into your Kindermusik @ Home account, and take your child on a trip to Grandpa's Farm!  Be sure to include some vocal play, as you imitate each of the animals you see :) 
• Cue up  On the Farm (from the ‘All Around the Farm’ CD).  Choose sounds from around your house to represent each animal (could be traditional musical instruments, or just some stuff from the kitchen that makes sound when you tap/shake it).  Have fun listening for the identifying timbre of each animal sound, and play along with the corresponding instrument! 
• Have a family dance party to the songs There Ain't Nobody Here But Us Chickens, and I am Rooster.  Be sure to talk to your chicken & rooster friends, while you dance.
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Want to Learn More?

• To learn the ways that musical instruments are classified by professional musicians and music scholars, check out this slideshare, featuring traditional ‘families of the orchestra,’ as well as the more current ‘Hornbostel/Sachs’ classifications.
• On our blog, read how our Kindermusik games dealing with timbre & auditory discrimination can help your child's readiness for school!

Repetition Strengthens the Brain AND MORE!

Musical Parenting Tip:  Keep those Kindermusik Classes going!

Why?

Studies show that students who participate in the arts perform better on tests

The arts help them develop observation, patterning, differentiation, and a host of other learning skills.

Using colors and other visual aids to learn patterns (like using scarves or hoops to create patterns) helps with understanding of math concepts.

How?

Come to Kindermusik, every week! 

Use the Kindermusik @ Home materials to keep your child engaged in activities on non-class days.

For instance, check out the colors & shapes in the Tangram Farm!

Watch the 10 Fluffy Chicks video, with your child.  Then, try to do the motions, together!

Want to Learn More?

Read Is your child a visual learner?

Read 10 Ways visual learners study

Developing "little singers" from 12-24 months!

Musical Parenting Tip:  Sing Sol-Mi Songs with Your Child (like the ones on your Kindermusik CD and that we are learning to sing in class)

What is a Sol-Mi song? It's a song that makes good use of the sol-mi interval (also knowns as the 5-3 interval in a basic chord). This musical interval is the easiest for children to hear and then sing as their very young voices are developing. So sing song with this interval and sing them a lot! (i.e. Eggs away, Eggs away...)

Why?

• 'Young children often cannot distinguish between their speaking and singing voices, and thus sing in a kind of speaking drone.  Children should be encouraged from a young age to explore the upper, or head voice (upper adjustment), and employ their voice for singing tasks as much as possible.' - Teaching Kids to Sing, by Kenneth H. Phillips
• According to Scholastic Parent & Child Magazine (Dec/Jan 1999), singing with and to your child can:
• calm when upset, soothe fears, and reduce irritability;
• enhance a child’s grasp of language and sense of beauty;
• remind a child that he/she is cherished and loved;
• improve communication and intimate bonding between parent and child.

How?

• One way to encourage your child to sing, is to sing, yourself!  Singing to a child is a priceless gift.  It doesn’t matter if you feel like your voice is not star quality; to your child, the sound of your voice is the best sound in the whole world. 
• Play the Little Bo Peep, peekaboo game!  Sing ‘Bo Peep, little Bo Peep, now it’s time for hide and seek’ on the notes ‘Sol & Mi’ (use the notes G & E to start).
• Watch this Farm Sounds video.  Enjoy copying all of those animal sounds with your voice.  How does your child react?  If he makes a sound in response, keep the game going by imitating the sound she made, yourself! 
• Play a movement game by moving a scarf or small towel from home to the Wind in the Corn song (from the Big Red Barn CD).  Can you add windy sound effects with your voice?  Invite your child to make windy sounds, too!

Want to learn more?

On our blog – how to sing to (and with) your child.

Keys to Singing for Preschoolers!

Musical Parenting Tip – Sing ‘Sol-Mi’ songs with your preschool child

Why?

• 'Young children often cannot distinguish between their speaking and singing voices, and thus sing in a kind of speaking drone.  Children should be encouraged from a young age to explore the upper, or head voice (upper adjustment), and employ their voice for singing tasks as much as possible.' - Teaching Kids to Sing, by Kenneth H. Phillips
• According to Scholastic Parent & Child Magazine (Dec/Jan 1999), singing with and to your child can:
• calm when upset, soothe fears, and reduce irritability;
• enhance a child’s grasp of language and sense of beauty;
• remind a child that he/she is cherished and loved;
• improve communication and intimate bonding between parent and child.

How?

• One way to encourage your child to sing, is to sing, yourself! 
  Singing to a child is a priceless gift.  It doesn’t matter if you feel like your voice is not star quality; to your child, the sound of your voice is the best sound in the whole world. 
• cue up the 'Sounds of the Farm' track (on the ‘Around the Farm’ CD), and singalong with your child.  Notice that the 'driving on down to...' lyrics are sung on 'Sol' and 'Mi.'  Also, show your child how to sing the last line: 'what sound will we hear?' on the numbers, '5-4-3-2-1.'
• Listen to the 'Clever Cows' track on your home CD, and sing the cows up & down the hill, together (then, watch the cartoon cows move up & down the hill during the Clever Cows fingerplay activity).

Want to learn more?

• On our blog – how to sing to (and with) your child.

Variety of Music is KEY to developing the Brain!

Musical Parenting tip:  Listen to different types of music, with your Toddler

Why?

• “Different forms and styles are used for specific effects based on the way the rhythm, tempo, melody, and effect have been developed by the composer… Accelerated learning techniques use a variety of music with contrasting elements and effects to create a comprehensive, multifaceted learning experience.” – Rhythms of Learning, Chris Brewer & Don Campbell
• 25% of classes are auditory learners – is your child one of them?
• Long & short sounds (legato & staccato) are opposite styles of articulation that can be experienced through a variety of modes, heightening children's awareness of this element of music. 

How?

• Explore a variety of sounds & music with your child.
• Take time to read aloud to your child each day.
• Encourage your child to teach others how to do things. Expressing instructions orally is usually a task auditory learners excel at.
• Use a device to record your child’s voice and invite them to play these clips back.

Want to Learn More?

• To assess whether your child is an auditory learner, and how to help them succeed:https://www.speechbuddy.com/blog/language-development/speech-buddies-parents-corner-is-your-child-and-auditory-learner/
• To assess whether you are an auditory learner: http://www.educationplanner.org/students/self-assessments/learning-styles-styles.shtml