A little bit of Music Theory

I spend way too much time on Pintrest, but it gives me some good ideas that we can use in Mini Music Makers to make the sessions a little more special.

Music has great ability to help our children achieve well in school.  One area is mathematics and language.

Music has rhythm and that rhythm is linked to time.  All of the rhymes we recite, have certain rhythm and here is when it starts helping us with Math.  When we are playing our instruments at the beginning of the session, we are practising our rhythms and beats.  The beat is the steady tempo that drives the rhythm of the songs.  A great way to understand rhythm is to use the Kodaly Method of putting words to the rhythm.

Now try it with the Itsy, Bitsy, Spider.

The Kodaly Method teaches music by putting a sound to a symbol.  This is the terminology they use:

Let's Play Kid's Music has a great example of practising the difference between rhythm and beat, with a lot of print outs to boot.



I would love to do this with the older kids, using the different sizes of Lego to represent time:

This is great as well:

If you want more information on child development and music in infancy and for toddlers, the Bright Hub Education has loads of information.  It is also a wonderful way to get information about things you can do at home.

If you are looking for more Halloween songs Let's Play Kid's Music doesn't disappoint.