100 Fans, 100 songs

We're having a "100 fans, 100 songs" challenge on the Kindermusik at the University of Memphis facebook page. For every 10 fans we add, I will give away a code allowing you to download 10 songs from the Play.kindermusik.com website, free of charge to a lucky fan-up to 100 total songs. You don't have to be a Kindermusik parent to be eligible-only someone who likes good children's music.

So, come join us!

http://www.facebook.com/KMatUMCMS

Music at home-Let the children be composers!

"Let the children be their own composers." - Carl Orff

We are hearing and seeing a lot of composition going on! The children are composing using rhythms and pitches, beginning to read musical symbols, and beginning to match iconic notation to sung pitches and to the black keys of the piano. This week, we continued working with Folkloric, M-R-D melodies on the three black keys of the piano, and began composing our own melodies using icons for the M-R-D pitches. This week, explore a few more three note melodies with your child. We also continued our study of Latin American music and instruments by exploring some characteristic percussion instruments found in Latin America.

Since it's the pumpkin time of the year, why not play a game from Mexico? 1-2-3- Calabaza!
http://www.spanishplayground.net/1-2-3-calabaza-traditional-mexican-playground-game/

Have a great week! ABC classes in studio will begin the 2nd unit, Join the Parade, next week. ABC classes at Lipman (which started later) will continue to explore Latin American music. Both groups will continue to develop music reading, listening, and basic keyboard skills.

Music at home-Spin and turn, dance and dip!

We sing through class with a hop and a leap and a twirl around! As the parent of a toddler, you are well aware of children’s love of both music and movement—and Kindermusik makes full use of this fundamental need!

Rolling, tipping, swaying, and twisting all stimulate the vestibular system, the body’s system that controls the sense of movement and balance. “The brain has a plan for development that involves specific and intensive motor activities to make full use of our complicated nervous system.”* When these motor activities are combined with musical experiences, the brain is further stimulated to form new synapses or connections. When integrated in this way, learning is at its strongest.

While singing or listening to your Home CD, enjoy “Rock With Me!” on page 22 of your Home Activity Book. How many different rocking motions can you and your child create?

Note-Friday classes will be on Fall Break October 14. Have a great week off!!

*Movement and Music: The Keys to Learning, by Anne Green Gilbert, Kindermusik Notes Nov./Dec. 1998

Music at home-Rolling, rolling, rolling along!

Isn’t it fun to play with balls!  Children and balls just go hand in hand.  This week, take some time to explore all the paths your family can create during ball play.  Does the ball move straight?  Curvy?  Zig-Zag?  You might also enjoy creating pathways with a ball.  Your little one may enjoy feeling a ball roll up and down her body while your older child will enjoy moving with the ball and maybe even on the ball!  Add balls to your family’s   favorite Moovin’ & Groovin’ song, moving the balls in different ways and along different pathways to the musical beat. The sensory balls included in your home materials are perfect for a different type of ball play. So are beachballs, foam balls, and even big exercise balls.

Playing with a ball not only provides your children with a means for social interactions with peers and adults, but also enhances the development of arm and hand muscles, eye-hand coordination, and cause-and-effect relationships.  Ball play also strengthens future recreational development including bowling, baseball, basketball, football and soccer. *

We'll have a "ball" together in class next week!  See you then,

*Cripe, Juliann, Kristine Slentz, and Diane Bricker. AEPS Curriculum for Birth to Three Years.  Diane Bricker, Ed. Volume 2. Baltimore: Brookes Publishing Co., 1993, p. 172.

Music at Home-Rockin' and Rolling toddlers

We sing through class with a hop and a leap and a twirl around! As the parent of a toddler, you are well aware of children’s love of both music and movement—and Kindermusik makes full use of this fundamental need!

Rolling, tipping, swaying, and twisting all stimulate the vestibular system, the body’s system that controls the sense of movement and balance. “The brain has a plan for development that involves specific and intensive motor activities to make full use of our complicated nervous system.”* When these motor activities are combined with musical experiences, the brain is further stimulated to form new synapses or connections. When integrated in this way, learning is at its strongest.

While singing or listening to your Home CD, enjoy “Rock With Me!” on page 22 of your Home Activity Book. How many different rocking motions can you and your child create?

Here's a great bathtime activity to use with your Kindermusik songs this week at home, from our friends at Family Fun Magazine.

Have a wonderful week!

*Movement and Music: The Keys to Learning, by Anne Green Gilbert, Kindermusik Notes Nov./Dec. 1998

 

Music at home-Pathways and shapes

The movement focus for Lessons 5 and 6 is pathways. Our world is most commonly organized in straight lines, emphasizing efficiency and directness. When children have the opportunity to explore lots of different ways to get from one place to another, they enhance their awareness of the world around them, and develop increased agility. When a child creates curves and zigzags with her arms and upper body, she frequently crosses the midline, helping to strengthen her corpus callosum and the ability of the brain’s two hemispheres to communicate with each other. When we explore the space we have around us, we can create new pathways—curved, circular lines; sharp, angular, zigzag lines; straight lines, forward and back, side to side, and all sorts of combinations.

Like other elements of movement, pathways help develop coordination and balance. What fun it is to have new ways to play on the playground, run at the park, and think about different ways to get from here to there.

Other ways to play with pathways include drawing paths with sidewalk chalk outside or with tape or hook-side velcro (my favorite if you have fairly low-pile carpet. One roll can be reused for a large number of learning activities for years as a child grows) inside and following them by walking, crawling, pushing toy cars, or rolling balls (like your sensory balls from your home materials) along them. This is especially helpful in reinforcing concepts as a child gets older, from simple shapes to letters, numbers, spelling words, and much more. I've even used this when teaching graphing to middle school algebra students! You can also draw pathways on paper and encourage your child to follow the pathway with a dot marker or bingo dotter, or to place stickers along the pathway (good for fine motor development).

Our piano skill this week is making and labeling paths on the piano-indicating to your child that they're moving higher, moving lower, playing short notes or long notes, playing on the black keys and white keys, playing one note or many.  There is no wrong way to explore as a toddler, and by labeling what they do, we validate their explorations and encourage vocabulary development that will later turn into playing music.


Have a great week, and enjoy all the pathways in your life!

Music at home-rhythm, rhyme, and squirrels?

This week we continued to explore rhythms, adding the two eighth note symbol, read as ti-ti. We learned that two eighth notes can share the same beat of the measure, while quarter notes and quarter rests do not, and practiced walking and running. You can use your notation cards to continue practicing this at home, adding the two eighth notes card. We continued to explore the three black keys on the piano with the song "hop, old squirrel" and used solfege to figure out the melody, and continued to work on lines and spaces on the staff. We also continued to explore the music and instruments of Latin America.


Here is a great musical matching game from Family Fun magazine to use to work on musical terminology and instruments while having fun!

Enjoy this video by Theresa Jennings and our friends at Plank Road Music that helps teach/reinforce the quarter note!