Music is a natural part of childhood and family life. Lots of families put their babies to bed with lullabies. Babies and young children are calmed by soft melodies. Parents and grandparents delight in watching children ìdanceî to music. ìRing-around-the-Rosieî is one of the first songs children like to do ñ now they can control when they ìfall down.î Through the ABC song, many parents teach their children the alphabet.

When you help your child enjoy music, you're also helping your child develop learning skills, like listening, coordination, imagination, and memory.

Children need to find healthy ways to express who they are and what they're feeling, music is one "language" that can be extremely helpful in that way. Through music, we can deal with our thoughts and feelings: those interior things that really matter to us.

Listening to Music

A radio, cassette player or CD player can help you and your child have fun with different kinds of music.

• Use the radio, cassette or CD player to introduce your child to a variety of music, including classical, jazz, and songs from other countries. Just enjoying listening a while to whatever holds your child's interest. You could borrow tapes and CDs with different music from the library, too.
• When children hear music, they often like to move to the sounds. You might turn some music on the radio and encourage your child to move with the beat. Then switch to another radio station with different music and let your child dance to that.

Music and Rhythm Games

To help your child develop learning skills through music and rhythm:

• Read or recite nursery rhymes, like ìBaa Baa Black Sheepî or ìLittle Bo Peep.î These rhymes usually have a rhythm pattern that is clear and easy to follow.
• Sings songs with your child while cleaning up or while riding in the car.
• Do finger plays with your child, like ìWhere is Thumbkinî and ìItsy Bitsy Spider.î These help children develop finger coordination that they'll need for writing.
• Clap out rhythms like the syllables in your child's name, or clap along with a song.
• Clap out a simple rhythm, like ìshort, short,longÖshort, short, longî and have your child repeat the pattern. Try other patterns, like ìlong, short, short, longÖlong, short, short, long.î Your child could create rhythms by clapping or by using a wooden spoon on a pan, bowl, or empty box.

Homemade Instruments

Playing an instrument gives a child a more active part because he or she is actually making the music. There are lots of ways to make simple instruments from household things:

• A ìharpî can be made from an old shoe box. Take off the lid. Stretch different sized rubber bands around the box. As your child plucks the bands across the open part, he or she can hear different sounds.
• With your supervision, your child can make musical jars by filling glasses or jars with water at different levels. When tapped lightly with a spoon, each jar makes a different musical tone.
• Fill empty plastic containers with dried beans or popcorn kernels. Be sure to seal the containers tightly. Children can shake these instruments to play along with songs or make up their own rhythms.
• Paper towels tubes can become cardboard trumpets. Children can decorate the tubes and then hum through the opening in one end to create kazoo-type sounds.

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