Spotlight on Learning: Village
By exploring with sound, babies and young toddlers practice their visual thinking skills or spatial-reasoning skills. Good visual thinking skills are essential for a child to later excel in math, science, and geography. We spend time in Kindermusik doing this together by playing different instruments and experimenting with lots of sounds, such as the different bird calls we "sing" together. In fact, children participating in Kindermusik tripled spatial-reasoning skills during a recent research project (link to graphic of study).
Everyday connection:
Be a Sound Explorer with your child. How many different sounds can a bath book, baby spoon, and Kindermusik Chime Ball make? Does a sippy cup with milk make the same sound as a sippy cup filled with cereal? What items on your changing table make sounds that can entertain your baby during a diaper change?
Be a Sound Explorer with your child. How many different sounds can a bath book, baby spoon, and Kindermusik Chime Ball make? Does a sippy cup with milk make the same sound as a sippy cup filled with cereal? What items on your changing table make sounds that can entertain your baby during a diaper change?
Spotlight on Learning: Our Time Wiggles & Giggles
Listening skills provide the foundation for all aspects of language and reading development. In Kindermusik, we help your child develop active listening skills that she needs for later school success. When your child starts elementary school, she will spend an estimated 50 to 75 percent of classroom time listening to the teacher, to other students, or to media. In Kindermusik, we help your child develop her listening skills. That's why along with singing, dancing, and instrument exploration, children gather around to listen to the sounds of the bath, an elephant, cat, or other specially chosen sounds. She is learning to understand and make meaning out of the sound. In other words, she is learning how to be an active listener. (That doesn't mean her "listening ears" won't fall off when you ask her to pick up her toys!)
Everyday connection:
Go for a Sound Walk. Ask your child what he hears. Does he hear the geese flying overhead? What about the leaves crunching beneath his feet? Is that an ambulance or a baby crying? Point out sounds you hear and see if he can hear them, too.
Go for a Sound Walk. Ask your child what he hears. Does he hear the geese flying overhead? What about the leaves crunching beneath his feet? Is that an ambulance or a baby crying? Point out sounds you hear and see if he can hear them, too.
