How children learn music

By Catalogs Editorial Staff

Listening and imitating is how children learn music

Music is considered the international language. Music is something that people from all cultures enjoy hearing and love playing.

Introducing your infant to music at an early age benefits him tremendously. Statistically, those children who have been exposed to music and have a musical background, especially formal musical training, do better academically, particularly in math.

Giving a child the opportunity to play a musical instrument it is the best way for him to learn about music. Exposure to music dvds and music-based games and to instruments is how children learn music. Appreciation, motivation – and some natural talent – are the ingredients for creating a musician.

Children learn music by dancing to it, which is called creative movement, or while marching in a band and playing an instrument, even if it?s a make-believe marching band in your living room. Give your child a triangle and let him ting on it or sing songs with your child while strumming a guitar. Children learn about music the exact same way that they learn a language, by listening and then imitating.

When a child first undertakes a musical instrument, he is taught the scale, which is the basis from which melody is created. Children will learn the notes from the scale, which are written on a staff. A staff consists of five lines and four spaces.

When a young child bangs on a drum or piano or is given a toy horn that he must blow or a guitar to strum. he learns many things, including the differences between loud and soft sounds and how he can play quickly or slowly or change the sound of the music by altering his playing technique. When a child uses his fingers to play an instrument, this improves his coordination and fine motor skills. Music also puts the child?s ears to work. He can hear the different sounds.

Becoming an accomplished musician isn?t easy. The individual must understand melody, harmony, dynamics, rhythm, timbre and form, all of which are essential elements of music. It takes time, instruction and lots of practice to succeed as a musician because a child must be disciplined, focused and determined, which are qualities that benefit him in virtually all areas of his life.

Music is considered physical education because the musician must control the muscles that he is using the play an instrument. He has to have good coordination. He also learns to respond to the sounds that he is hearing, which his brain is interpreting. All parts of the body are at work, which is comparable to a run around the high school track.

The benefits of learning music

Playing a musical instrument and making music requires that he use various cognitive processes simultaneously. He must learn how to read music and figure out the slide position or the fingering of the note that he is playing on the instrument. The child must comprehend the concept of rhythm and determine how much air support he must provide if he is playing an instrument that requires that he blow into it.

It has been observed that children that are able to keep up a steady beat musically are more facile when it comes to reading. Learning how to play music teaches a child new words, often foreign words, as well as about word tenses and plural versus singular.

Early on, children can be introduced to concepts such as start, stop, fast, slow, loud and quiet through music. This can be turned into a physical game. Music helps a child learn to count and also how to read from left to right when reading sheet music. Language and math concepts are found in music so it stands to reason that when a child learns about music and an instrument, he can parlay this knowledge to other areas. Learning music reinforces a child?s ability to do math because he has to figure out fractions.

Music also teaches foreign languages because many of the musical terms are written in other languages.