Play with Me Week 9-

Music Helps Children’s Listening Skills.  I don’t know any parent who would say their child doesn’t need help with listening.  This is a skill that is always being refined.  Throughout our music group your child is learning to listen not only to the teacher but to the music and how to respond to it.  Music encourages the ability to listen and thus to concentrate. Songs encourage speech and auditory discrimination. Through music, children learn to hear tempos, dynamics, and melodies. Listening for loud and soft, up and down, fast and slow encourages auditory development in the brain.

One of the examples this week that we are doing is Ring around the rosies.  The musical cues to fall down and then stand back up are teaching children to listen and follow the instructions of the song.  Once they understand the cues they will ask to do it again and again because they like seeing the whole group doing the cause and effects of the music.

Because children respond so well to music this might help you at home by incorporating music into your day.  Do you find that your child forgets to wash his hands after going to the toilet or doesn’t brush his teeth long enough.  You can make a simple song that will help cue them to do these basic hygiene skills.  You can also use music to help calm your child by using soft humming of a favorite song while gently rocking them.

This is why when you start singing the clean up song they know exactly what to do, you can do this to help get them buckled into their seatbelt.