of this is actually so crucial to what kids this
age need to learn. If you spend some solid
time every morning doing dancing and motion songs with your toddlers and preschool
kids, you are likely to notice a sort of calm
come over them afterward. (That lull was always a prime time to get a little book work
done with older siblings.)
My favorite resource for this age was
Wee Sing and Move, both the songs and the
booklet. The booklet guides you through
the movements. This was essential to my
survival for several winters in a row when
we had three toddlers in the house. Often, I
would also let them get out many little obnoxious percussion instruments, and make
as much racket with the music as their merry little hearts desired. Another fun thing
to do is give them streamers or ribbons to
swirl around and dance with.
As they got older, the children were interested in plucking out songs they knew
on the piano, like Mary Had a Little Lamb,
Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star, and Humpty
Dumpty. My kids loved sitting on the edge
of the couch, and falling off every time we
got to the line “had a great fall!”
Instruments
As your child is nearing the age of five, I
would say it is time to have an instrument
in your house (other than toddler percussion kits). What kind of instrument you get
depends on budget, space, and your own
musical history. Maybe you already happen
to have a piano in the house. If you do not
have a piano, and that is not really an option for you, you can purchase a lap harp
or a recorder.
The thing I love about the lap harp is that
you can get sheet music that slides right under the strings, and you just pluck the string
that is above the printed note as you read
the music. This basically takes the abstract
concept of reading music out of the equation, which makes playing songs more accessible to young children. The lap harp will
be much more successful if you play with it
also. Anytime I want my kids to be interested in something, I just do it myself, and
soon they are all hovering around me begging for turns. You can purchase a lap harp
for about forty dollars.
What I love about the recorder is that
children love to just blow through it as
hard as they can, and produce the most
horrible screeching noise you have ever
heard. (Maybe that isn’t my favorite part.)
They love it; they seem to think it is just
so amazing that they can make that hor-
rendous sound come out of a tiny little
tube. Recorders are one of the most inex-
pensive and easy to learn instruments out
there. Try to splurge, and get a nice ten
or fifteen dollar one instead of the ones
from the dollar store. You can also get
very simple and easy to follow beginner
books for the recorder, and this is a great
way for children to begin the process of
being able to read music. Reading music
is an abstract skill, and I usually wait until
around age eight to begin teaching that
aspect of music.
Another fun thing to do is to rent the
percussion bells, which you hit with a mallet, from the local music store for a month
or two. Then when you cannot stand to
hear those bells again, you just return
them. Parent win!
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www.MarciaWashburn.com
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A unique music appreciation cours
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Learn along with your children!
What kind of instrument you get depends on budget, space,
and your own musical history.
