[Julia Park]

I had one experience working with children at this age and level during my internship. I remember feeling very uncomfortable and confused because I did not understand their developmental level. One of the main reasons why I decided to join Sprouting Melodies group was because I did not honestly knew how to bond with my own baby and I wanted to learn how to do that. The cognitive and physical abilities of babies at this level are very limited and I personally felt very uncertain of how to meet my baby’s needs in creative ways. Sprouting Melodies helped me understand the developmentally appropriate responses as I provide my baby opportunities to sing, move, play instruments, and listen. I am looking forward to sharing this knowledge with other moms who are having similar struggles that I had.

[Julia Park]

Five words to describe music experiences in Sprouting Melodies 1:
trust, awareness, bonding, support, and joy

5 sentences you can use when speaking to parents about musical responses of children in SM1:
Sprouting melodies 1 is a special form of early childhood music class focusing specifically on the children’s developmental level between 0-9 months old. It is very important to have knowledge on babies’ developmental growth and know what is developmentally appropriate for them. The first developmental level is the “awareness” stage and during this stage, you can expect the babies to look or not to look, reach toward music, and to turn attention toward music or turn away. The next developmental level is the “trust” stage. The babies will turn attention toward music or turn away, to choose how to explore instruments (hands or mouth), and the duration of instrument play. Music can be utilized to help babies to enhance in language approximation, tolerance of novel experiences, reciprocal communication, and movement synchrony.

Create a plan for songs and music experiences to use in a Sprouting Melodies 1 session:
1. Instrument Exploration: “Do you wanna be my friend?” Have instruments on the floor (middle of the circle) on the same eye level as the babies.Therapist begins to play an instrument while singing while babies and parents can come around and explore different instruments.
2. Hello/Gathering:”Good Morning to you”. Go around the circle and call out the names of the each babies by replacing “to you” with their names on the second verse. Encourage other parents to sing and say the names even if it’s not their child.
3. Body Percussion: “Are you ready for music?” Use hands to clap and feet to stomp with the help from the parents.
4. Lap Ride / Tickles: “Hold on Tight!” or “Wiggly Jiggly Car”
5. Instrument Play: “In my little Hand”
6. Gross Motor Movement: “I can move around” or “Just like me”
7. Cool Down: “All of this is me” Sing slowly in the minor key.
8. Goodbye: “Good bye my babies” to “Rock a bye baby” tune. Make sure to go around the circle and name each babies. (Good bye my babies until next time. We will see you again next time. Good bye my darling (insert name). Good bye my babies until next time).

[Julia Park]

I believe music therapy’s role in community based settings are to achieve non-musical goals in natural, fun, and supportive ways. Music therapy can support and partner up with other health professionals to achieve the therapeutic outcome faster and more effectively. Music therapy is a an adjunct therapy meaning “in addition to” the whatever therapy people need. For an example, music therapists partner up with physical therapists, occupational therapists, and speech therapists in rehabilitation settings to help other professionals and the client to achieve their physical goals. In sprouting melodies, music therapy is used as a tool to bring babies, families, and communities together to support, educate, and build relationships with each other.

[Julia Park]

I have questions regarding to the new songs introduced in this week’s module. Could we have the music to the new songs (lyric and chords)? also what does (NR) (EKS) (MRP) mean?

One more question… when we are all finished with the training, could we come back and have access to the videos?

Thank you very much in advance!

-Julia

[Julia Park]

I definitely agree with Nicole. Parents need to have safe places to socialize where they are welcomed to bring their babies yet also educational and fun.

[Julia Park]

Nicole, because Sprouting Melodies provide variety of programs for children with peers, siblings, and families, I think it would be an excellent tool to work with military families and their children. It is difficult to raise children when you are moving so frequently without much support from the other spouse because they are gone a lot. I can’t imagine how hard it would be for military families for not having the stability in their home because you are in a new environment every 1-2 years where you need to rebuild the community all over again. That sounds very stressful and exhausting. I also think Sprouting Melodies would be a great tool to support the military families.

[Julia Park]

I plan to go back to work in August using Sprouting Melodies. It has been a challenge for me to make the transition from a working professional to a full time stay at home mom. As much as I love spending time with my baby, the past 8 months has been a full of questions, uncertainty, and exhaustion. I want to use my experience as a new parent to help support and educate new parents through Sprouting Melodies. The needs of the first time parents are: chance for the parents to have fun, connect with other parents, and ask questions. As music therapists, we can fulfill those needs because we are trained to meet both musical and non-musical goals.

[Julia Park]

Music therapists use music as a “tool” to accomplish non-musical goals. When music therapists engage with young children, their focus is not only on children learning music but much more. Sprouting Melodies seems to emphasize on the relationships between the children and their peers, parents, and families through music. Music therapists can also help new parents understand the developmental level of the children in both non-musical and musical formats. I can understand why Sprouting Melodies provided by music therapists can be such a great asset to the community because it brings children, families, and communities together.

[Julia Park]

Great work Nicole!

[Julia Park]

Nicole, it is so wonderful to hear about the amazing work you do with your client. Your client should be in the responsibility stage according to the normal developmental stage but it is impressive to hear that you are tailoring your session based on his needs and circumstances. I especially love using silence in the songs. How impressive it is for him to go from 1 word to 5 word phrases! Great work.

[Julia Park]

I have used these four music experiences in my practice but I am not currently working with this age group. I believe music is very intrinsic and instinctual for everyone. as I remember my daughter during the awareness stage. My new born baby opened her eyes and smiled when her father played a lullaby on a guitar or when we played her disney lullaby CD and she would instantly stop crying and listen to the music. My daughter is 8 month old now and she is in the trust stage (birth to 18 months). She cannot sing yet but she does use hard consonants such as K, P, M, N, and B most of the times when vocalizing. At this stage, vocalization is very limited except for a lot of cooing and random melodic intonation when she wishes to express her needs like feeding and even her emotional state (sad, happy, frustration, and excitement). In terms of playing instruments, my daughter learned how to hold the mallet and hit the drum when she was 6 months old. The duration was very short though and she would put the mallet inside her mouth the remaining of the time. She also uses her pincer grasp to grasp shakers and shake the instrument for a short periods of time. She can now reach out and grab instruments of her choice. My daughter began to sit up on her own without much support at 6 months. She began hitting the table or her knee when she hears a familiar tune and soon began to clap. She can stand for a few minute with someone else’s support. She has a much better listening skills where she will look towards the person who is singing or playing the instrument. She also responds by turning her head when someone calls her name. It is very interesting to see her musical developmental growth as I observe her in first hand.

[Julia Park]

Developmental Sequence of music responses:

I.Singing
a.Awareness: Look at faces of the singer and make cooing sounds with the singer.
b.Trust: Make pitched vocalization and imitate the pitches from the singer.
c.Independence: Begins to sing and melody sounds more recognizable. Able to vocalize the preference of the song with simple single words like “me” or “moo”.
d.Control: Pitch is clearer when singing. Able to sing songs independently. Child is able to control the volume when sings from soft to loud. Able to sing and play a simple phrase.
e.Responsibility: Able to control the vocal timbre to express emotion and can introduce novel lyrics and melodies.

II.Playing
a.Awareness: Able to open and close hand to hold the instrument for a short period of time. Able to play shakers by moving fingers. Can also reflexively bang or bring two objects together to make sounds.
b.Trust: Able to bang on the drum and piano or hit the strings of the guitar in random patterns.
c.Independence: Able to use a single finger to press the key on the piano. Able to hold the drum with one hand and the mallet with the other hand to play the instrument on her own.
d.Control: Able to listen and imitate a simple rhythm. Able to play drum along with other children. Able to blow in order to play a simple wind instrument.
e.Responsibility: Able to use all finger to play keyboard.

III.Moving
a.Awareness: Move her body rhythmically in response to music.
b.Trust: Able to reach out and grab instruments. Bring instruments to mouth.
c.Independence: Crawling or walking to get to the instrument of her choice. Later able to walk, run, and start and stop movement with the music.
d.Control: Able to use both hands equally and has more physical control. Able to jump!
e.Responsibility: Able to engage in social dances with others to the music.

IV.Listening
a.Awareness: Baby will cry when discontent and make cooing when content in response to the music.
b.Trust: Show a look of pleasure when she hears consonant or familiar music. Looks towards the location of where the music is playing.
c.Independence: Use vocalization in response to familiar song and also changes facial affect when she hears the emotional content of the music.
d.Control: Child can recognize and adjust her movement in response to the tempo of the music.
e.Responsibility: A child can hear and match the pitch and melodic intonation of music.

[Julia Park]

My client is my 8 month daughter right now. She is currently in the infancy stage which is from birth to 18 months. This is when children develop a sense of trust when caregivers provide reliability, care, and affection. A lack of this can lead to mistrust. For her development stage, I find that bonding songs and music for transition work really well. In addition to that, my client was able to focus outwardly to music in response to “play”- style by hitting the drum with drum sticks in both hands just a few weeks ago. It was such an exciting moment to watch her experience music outwardly. I now know that this is part of the musical characteristics for “Trust” stage. Like Shelly has mentioned, most parents are in the performance mindset instead of growth mindset which means their focus in more on the result instead of the process. Music therapists play such a crucial role in not only teaching developmentally appropriate songs to the families but also psychoeducate the families the normal developmental stages and realistic expectations for their children that is appropriate for their developmental stages.

[Julia Park]

Like Susan, I have noticed children respond well to songs from Disney like “Frozen”. I was born in South Korea and lived in Boston, Alabama, and California. I still have friends and families in those places. Most of my friends have little kids by now and Disney songs play such a huge role. It seems like kids love songs with storyline and pictures that they can associate with. When I worked with geriatric population, I had an older Korean male who asked me to sing “Arirang” which is a popular Korean folk song. This song reminded of him his home country and his friends and families. He teared up and thanked me immediately. We were able to share a brief yet an intimate and powerful moment together where I was able to show him the respect of his country of origin through music. I believe it is always good to know at least one song from a different cultures background. Folk songs seems to be a great tool to reach people from different culture. In fact, my old internship supervisor required all her interns to memorize one folk song from different cultures which became very handy.

[Julia Park]

It appears some of you tried “Hold on tight!” and had a good response from the kiddos. I am reading the comments from everyone and can’t wait to try these other songs that you guys have picked. Thank you!

[Author]

Posts