Making Music with Your Under 5s

Written by Jacqui Davis

Jacqui is the owner and founder of Twistin Tots & Twistin Tinies Adventures and has been running children's music classes for the last 18 years.

Parents I meet at work are always telling me that their child loves music. Following nine months in the womb listening to mum’s heartbeat, it’s a no-brainer that when babies emerge, they enthusiastically move arms, head and legs in time to music when they hear a steady beat.

For young children, however, exposure to music offers important benefits. These early years are a critically important time in brain development – the rapid pace at which our brains develop in these first five years is never repeated. Rhythms found in music help to wire the brain’s sensory system, helping with future growth and development.

Neuroscientists believe that ‘mirror neurons’ are stimulated when young children see people performing physical actions; if they are performed to music, they offer additional benefits. Young children learn better when using their whole body – walking around or carrying them and moving in time to a rhythm stimulates the vestibular system, promoting balance and spatial awareness which are key developments for under fives.

Music with young children also encourages socialisation and self-esteem: when your child makes music themselves, it builds confidence and the applause they receive for conquering new activities builds self-esteem.

Music also promotes well-being. Singing to children is great for bonding since they love hearing the sound of your voice, even if you’re tone deaf! When you sing and your child feels you move them to the actions, this often means your child has your complete attention which they crave. 

Early exposure to the 3Rs – the rhyme, rhythm and repetition found in songs and nursery rhymes – helps with speech and language development.

• Babies quickly learn to recognise simple rhymes and enjoy the confidence they gain from knowing what’s coming.

• Banging or clapping in time to music introduces the idea of rhythms – useful for language development, problem solving and reasoning.

• Babies learn by copying. When children experience the repetition of sounds and phrases, they learn more quickly. As young children learn to speak, repeating words and sounds enables them to watch faces form different shapes for different sounds – a pre-cursor to speech development.

Here are a few musical ideas to help your child’s development. Practise them at home or attend classes to give your child the best start.

• Any unbreakable item has the potential to be a musical instrument and your child is guaranteed to love hitting them! Different-sized containers make different sounds. Your drum stick? A wooden spoon!

• Equip your child with maracas and shakers – things that make a loud noise and are easily held. With these, you can teach your child to recognise (and imitate) rhythms.

• Introduce an instrumental ‘call-and-response’ session: shake a rattle and show your child how to shake theirs in return; tap a drum and encourage your child to ‘answer’. It may take a while for them to get the idea, but once they do, they'll be ecstatic!

• Sing! And encourage your child to do the same! Songs and nursery rhymes have lots of repetition so children can copy repeated sounds and learn new vocabulary.

www.twistintots.co.uk

jacqui@twistintots.co.uk

07977 578359