Forging the bond through music

FOR years, child development experts have published report after report on the positive effects of music for babies and young children.
It has been well proven that music is important for young children, not only for their musical development but also their social, emotional, physical, cognitive and language development. And research has found that all of these areas of human development are intertwined and musicis a wonderful way to facilitate growth in each of these areas.
Kindermusik works on these fundamental principles. Simply put, Kindermusik is a music and movement programme. Each week in class, parents and their young children play, listen, and dance to music that will impact on both parties in profound ways. That’s because every song, story and two-step has a carefully chosen purpose in a creative curriculum—one that’s designed to stimulate and strengthen the vital neural wiring taking place in a child’s mind.
The Kindermusik programme, for babies from 0 to 18 months, up to children between five and seven years, has been running very successfully in Glór, Ennis for over four years. The current Kindermusik facilitator is Fiona Driscoll. She trained as a Kindermusik educator two years ago and has been teaching the programme for over a year. Previously, she worked as an arts and crafts teacher around Clare and in the United States. Fiona has taken over the Glór Kindermusik from Finola Ryan, who previously ran the classes for a number of years and has also been her mentor.
“Before that, I had worked with children with special needs in the United States on a programme called When Children Learn Differently, especially children with autism and Aspergers Syndrome and a range of physical disabilities,” she explained.
Fiona was born and raised in Shannon and now lives in Quin.
“Kindermusik basically offers a programme to educate parents how to interact with their children through music and movement. First and foremost, it has to be fun for the parent and the child. Essentially, kids are wired to learn when they are moving, so Kindermusik is very much a multi-sensory experience,” Fiona commented.
So a Kindermusik session is not a music class. “Some parents might think that their child will learn how to play an instrument very early on through Kindermusik but that is not what the programme is about. It is as much about movement, words, sounds and communicating and is very much focused on child development,” she added.
The Kindermusik sessions for babies in the 0 to 18-month age group are starting again on April 13 and will be held every Tuesday and Thursday morning for the following eight weeks.
“The focus for parents in this first Kindermusik session is to give them support to use rhyming, phrasing, chanting and repetition. The sessions are 45 minutes long and include various activities. The class starts with a hello song, welcoming everyone to join in. Even a very young baby recognises this song as a signal that some sort of action is starting. Then I follow on with a warm-up, which is basically a baby massage. After that, we do a little bit of exercise, incorporating cross-lateral movements, which stimulates the use of both sides of the brain.” After that class, participants get up and move with their baby.
“We focus on the festibular system which controls co-ordination. Essentially, it’s the baby’s GPS system, which stimulates baby’s senses through movement. Parents are encouraged to hold their baby in different ways. In general, I lead the group in song but some of the activities necessitate rhythmic music more so than song, as that stimulates different senses and movements in a baby. We focus on teaching babies some basic actions, such as up and down, fast and slow, start and stop and how each relates to music. This has the knock-on effect of teaching baby basic commands,” Fiona added.
The theme for this session for 0 to 18-month-olds is Dew Drops.
Fiona stressed that this is not a class where parents sit back and watch their baby doing something.
“Parents have to actively participate or it doesn’t work, so both the parent and baby are down on the floor on soft mats. The social aspect of the class is key but parents have to be really hands-on.”
After the initial eight-week session, parents can move on to the next age group level.
“This works really well for parents and children and becomes a familiar activity for them weekly. Kindermusik has a huge benefit in body language, movement, speech and language development and confidence. It is a real bonding time for a parent and their child and that’s at the very core of the concept of Kindermusik – facilitating parents to build a strong bond with their child from an early age in a safe environment where they have the reassurance to understand that children need different kinds of stimulation,” Fiona explained.
For each programme, participants get a take-home pack, which means that they can carry on the programme at home, so it’s not just the 45 minutes every week.
Fiona is also teaching programmes for the other age groups. She teaches Kindermusik for three to five-year-olds and another session for five to seven-year-olds on Saturday mornings in Glór. She also runs sessions called Family Time, for those with more than one young child, catering for children from 0 to five years, every Saturday at 2pm.
A new term of these programmes will start in September.
She also runs summer camps of the various Kindermusik programmes during July and August.
The classes are proving very popular and parents seem to love the whole experience. Aislinn Ó hEocha from Ennis has a one-year-old son, Donncha. “We have attended Kindermusik with Fiona three times on the 0 to 18 programme. I first brought him at four weeks .I wanted to meet other mothers and do something beneficial with my baby. So it was a social experience for both of us. It was essentially a great excuse to get out of the house with my baby. I have noticed the benefits to us both from the music and movement and Donncha is definitely very musical already. When he sees the Kindermusik CDs, he reacts very definitely. He loves to move to the music and he loves the books that come in the packages too. I have incorporated things that I’ve learnt in the class, such as the way we swing the babies. It definitely has helped us to bond and it is great one-on-one time. I intend to continue on with Donncha through the Kindermusik programme,” she said.
Úna Ruddle is mum to two children, Emma, four, and Eoin, two.
“I started both children in Kindermusik when they were 11 months. Emma continued going until she was four and Eoin is still in the programme. Initially, I went because I liked the idea of the social aspect of it for me and my child. I think it’s good for babies and toddler to see other children who are in the same age group. All three of us made good friends through the class. Like-minded people tend to be in the classes. I feel that it helps give a little independence to the child as the programme progresses and definitely instils confidence. Going to a Kindermusik class has been a great source of excitement for both of my children. Fiona engages very well with the children. She has a special gift. We love Kindermusik. It is a very relaxed atmosphere and basically a lot of fun,” Una commented.
To book a place on Kindermusik or to find out more about the programme contact Fiona Driscoll on 085 7636233.