Why is it important to bring music into your children's lives?

Research Encourages Focus on Music and the Arts to Enhance Early Childhood Development

Music Research

The No Child Left Behind Act of 2002, states, "Studying music encourages self discipline and diligence traits that carry over into mathematics, science, foreign languages, civics and government, economics, arts, history and geography." Research supports that music helps prepare the mind for specific disciplines of learning; skills learned through music carry over into study skills, communications skills, cognitive skills and abstract reasoning skills useful to all parts of life, according to a 1997 article in Neurological Research.

Young Children

Don Campbell, author of The Mozart Effect, traced neurological development during childhood and found prior to a major spurt of neural integration in the brain during the elementary school years, learning occurs through movement and quick emotional associations. For example, by age two, the brain has begun to fuse with the body via marching, dancing, and developing a sense of physical rhythm. The more music children are exposed to before they enter school, the more deeply this stage of neural coding will assist them throughout their lives.

Parental Involvement

Findings from a study conducted by three researchers at Sam Houston State University in Texas reports that early music training can improve intelligence, and the amount of parental involvement in the music training can greatly affect the amount of improvement. Strong correlations were found between musical abilities in young children, particularly the ability to match vocal pitches and reproduce rhythmic patterns and abstract reasoning abilities.

The study also showed that parental time spent with a child is a more important factor in predicting intelligence test success than such factors as single-parent households, poverty, low parental education levels and ethnic minority status.

School-aged Children

Arts education makes a tremendous impact on the developmental growth of every child and has proven to help level the "learning field" across socio-economic boundaries, states the involvement in the Arts and Success in Secondary School, James S. Catterall, The UCLA Imagination Project, Graduate School of Education & Information Studies, UCLA, Americans for the Arts Monograph, January 1998.

Arts education has a measurable impact on youth at risk in deterring delinquent behavior and truancy problems while also increasing overall academic performance among those youth engaged in after school and summer arts programs targeted toward delinquency prevention, according to the YouthARTS Development Project, 1996, U.S. Department of Justice, National Endowment for the Arts, and Americans for the Arts.

Community-based Arts

Findings from the Living the Arts Through Language + Learning: A Report on community-Based Youth Organizations, Shirley Brice Heath, Stanford University and Carnegie FoundationFor the Advancement of Teaching, Americans for the Arts Monograph, November 1998 reports that:

Young people who participate in the arts for at least three hours a day, three days
a week for at least one year are:

• 4 times more likely to be recognized for academic achievement.
• 3 times more likely to be elected to class office within their schools.
• 4 times more likely to participate in a math and science fair.
• 3 times more likely to win an award for school attendance.
• 4 times more likely to win an award for writing an essay or poem.

Young artists, as compared with their peers, are likely to:

• Read for pleasure nearly twice as often.
• Perform community service more than four times as often.
• Participate in youth groups nearly four times as frequently.
• Attend music, art and dance classes nearly three times as frequently.

Consider bringing music into your child's life by taking lessons or classes with us at Harmony Music Studio - where the gift of music lasts a lifetime! 281-992-9800
Originally posted on Kindermusik.com

Free Kindermusik Classes and Early Enrollment Deadline August 1st!

Hello friends! The summer is quickly drawing to a close, and I wanted to remind you that we're taking enrollments for the Kindermusik Fall Semester. If you register and pay your deposit by August 1, you'll receive $20 off your tuition for the semester as an early enrollment bonus! And don't forget, younger siblings and children of students enrolled in private lessons get a 50% discount on Kindermusik tuition. Let me know if you need me to send you a registration form, or you can register over the phone, or at the front desk or online.

I'll be hosting free Kindermusik classes on July 30th (for those wishing to see what a class is like and still get that early bird special!) and again from August 2-16th during the International Demo Days promotion with Kindermusik International. Please check the schedule or ask Ms. Tabby for class availability. If you'd like me to schedule a custom demonstration class for you and 2 friends, please don't hesitate to call me at 713-306-4023 and I'll be happy to do that.

I know a lot of you would love to participate in Kindermusik, but it is financially a stretch right now. Don't let this tough time interfere with enhancing your child's development! Here are some creative ways to help pay for the class:

1. Gift certificates are always available! Have grandma or grandpa, aunts and uncles, etc. contact me for any sized amount! Family and friends love to help with Kindermusik, especially when our children already have so many toys!
2. Sign up by AUGUST 1 to get that $20 early bird discount on tuition!
3. Bring a friend to Kindermusik, and if they sign up, you will receive $10.00 off of tuition up to $30.00!
4. Make EVERY DOLLAR count with Kindermusik! Other programs are fun, but Kindermusik is fun AND educational. At just $12.00 a class, this is the best value per dollar that you will find for your child. Here is what the experts say...

"Children participating in Kindermusik improved 28 – 37 percentile points in their standard intelligence tests over children without Kindermusik." -Sam Houston State University Study – May 1998.
"Four-year-olds exposed to Kindermusik have better self-control than children with less Kindermusik history." - George Mason University Study – May 2005.

5. Scholarships are available through private donors and the Ruth D. Anderson Children's fund. I have already applied for funding from the RDACF at Kindermusik International, because I want every child to be able to participate in this program. I donated my time and energy so several families could participate last semester for only the cost of materials. If you want to donate to this scholarship fund, please contact me!

I hope these ideas are helpful for you. I value your commitment to Kindermusik, and to supporting local music programs. If you have any other questions or concerns, or want to know which class will be best for your child, please contact me! My schedule is up and running on the website! I have classes for each age group from infants, toddlers and pre-schoolers to children from 5-7 years. Have a great rest of the summer, and I look forward to being together again beginning September 1st!

Musically,
Ms. Tabby
713-306-4023
kindermusik@harmonymusicstudio.com