Many thanks to Donna Koontz for her time!
Notes from Donna:
Academics
- Music exercises more parts of the brain than almost any other activity and research has shown that music helps children access parts of the brain that may be low functioning. Music is wonderful for children that have learning disabilities or differences!
- Sensory discrimination is the foundation for a number of high-level cognitive abilities. For example, language is enabled by fine auditory discrimination. While navigating through a space, a child needs to be able to organize visual and tactile input. This allows them to stand in line without bumping into someone, balance their bodies, use fine and gross motor skills, and focus their attention.
- Movement games and song games create experiences to develop these skills and opportunities for the child to cross the midline and develop bilateral coordination (right and left parts of the brain are working together to create fluid movements).
- Music helps children develop and refine their memory. Think about a song and what elements it has. It has structure, a melody, sometimes a chorus or refrain. It may repeat or it could have gestures if it is a song game. That’s a lot for a child to hold in their mind! Depending on song, music can affect short and long term memory.
- Example: Short call and response song - Kye Kye Kule - short term memory
- Example: A longer folk song or ballad - You are My Sunshine - long term memory
- Singing and performing musical games allows the child to use their imagination as they act out roles. They can transform into anything they want.
- Music and movement enhances thought processes, such as recognizing differences, logical thinking, pattern recognition, and math skills.
- Within music there are experiences of fast and slow, loud and soft, long and short
- The ability to perceive the parts of a song which are same or different helps the child recognize patterns, which is critical for building early math and early reading skills
- When a child perceives the structure of a folk song or piece of music, and holds it in the mind, they also develop logical thinking.
- rhythm and repetition in songs helps children to recognize number patterns
- music also paves the way for abstract thought.
- Because, unlike other arts, music doesn’t exist until it is recreated by the child and perceived by the other children, the child and the audience must form an abstract understanding of the piece being sung, composed, or created.
- The child is engaging the cerebellum, the motor cortex, and the frontal lobes [of the brain], while singing or playing song games. This plays an important role in language and literacy development.
- When children learn to sing and participate in songs that rhyme, they develop phonemic awareness
To sum this up
- The most important time for music and movement experiences is between the ages of birth and six. This is a time when children's growing brains are most open to musical influence and growth. Exposure to a variety of music and movement experiences is crucial during this period.
- You are key, because you are with children during this amazing part of their development.
- The children don’t care if you are not a pop star, they want the joy of singing together and the bond that music brings to a classroom community. They want to belong, to participate, to feel purposeful.
- I’ll talk more about the music and movement experiences you can bring into your classroom the next time we connect!
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Episode 9