Integrated Learning for Preschoolers
Parenting Tip: Learn Kindermusik games from your child, and play, sing, read, write, and move together! Why? Each Kindermusik activity has multiple objectives, and helps your child to develop multiple skills, at once. When we sing Hello, we are using listening ears, singing voices, practicing steady beat & tempo, and using appropriate dynamics. As we …
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Baby’s Awareness of Rhythms
Parenting Tip: Move & tap to rhythms with baby. Why? Rhythmic awareness is simply being aware of steady beat and meter in music and in our surroundings. The most fundamental property of music is beat, the underlying, unchanging, repeating pulse that occurs in song, chant, and rhyme. Your child was first exposed to be in …
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Instrument Exploration for Toddlers
Parenting Tip: Create an ‘instrument petting zoo’ for your toddler! Why? When a child takes up a new instrument and bangs, pushes, rolls, and shakes it to find out what sounds it makes, they are working on the skills of curiosity and persistence. When they decide they would like to try the instrument that knocks …
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Preschoolers – Connecting Symbols & Sounds
Parenting Tip: Write a song using symbols! Why? Just as children must learn the relationship between sounds and letters and words in order to begin to decode or interpret the printed word, children learn the relationship between sounds and musical symbols in order to begin to decode or interpret the language of music or the …
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Exploring Timbre with Baby
Parenting Tip: Explore kitchen sound-makers with baby. Why? The distinctive quality of a sound is called its timbre (pronounced “tam-ber”). In Kindermusik classes, and in everyday life, baby hears a variety of sounds – scratchy sounds, booming drum sounds, individual voices and groups of voices singing and speaking, and many others. As Baby experiences the …
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Tempo for Toddlers
Parenting Tip: Move to fast and slow beats! Why? Children perceive the world through their senses, and learning is most enjoyable and effective when multiple senses of a child's body are involved. For instance, when the children are clapping fast & slow tempi, they feel the movement of their hands, hear the sound their hands …
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Preschoolers & Expressive Movement
Parenting Tip: Create dance moves for every room in the house! Why? Expressive movement is pretend play that’s functioning in a new way – giving your child motions that they might not normally use. For instance, the movements involved in pretending to build a house create an opportunity to use familiar movements in a new …
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Counting Games with Baby
Parenting Tip: Count to the ‘Peekaboo I See You’ game with baby! Why? One, two, buckle my shoe. Three, four, shut the door. Five, six, pick up sticks. Seven, eight, lay them straight. Nine, ten, begin again. You did it, didn’t you? Before you finished reading that nursery rhyme, you found yourself singing it, …
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High and Low Sounds with Toddlers
Parenting Tip: Play with high & low sounds! Why? An activity that pairs opposite concepts (like high & low) allows toddlers to comprehend not only what something is, but also what it is not. This helps children to clearly understand and define what each word represents. Playing games where your voices move way up …
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Social and Community Development for Preschoolers
Parenting Tip: Create a ‘family band,’ with your preschooler! Why? Three and four-year-olds are acutely aware of the important people in their lives. Social behaviors are learned interactions that occur through their experiences with each of the people they encounter. In Kindermusik class, one of our goals is to foster community within our classes, …
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