Kindermusik Family Time – Here, There, Everywhere Lesson 5
Beep! Beep! We’re off to the city. “Here we go a-walking down the street… and STOP” The children enjoyed using the sign language gesture for STOP. Actually, the act of making the sign almost requires the child stop their movement in order to form the sign with both their hands.
When your child moves and stops his body, he is practicing an important skill. Moving then stopping develops a skill called “inhibitory control,” or the ability to stop oneself and wait. This vital life skill builds confidence and self-discipline—a confidence that stems from the awareness that “my body does what I ask it to do.”
Take a ride together in your dining room chair bus while singing “The Wheels on the Bus.” Be sure to go through green lights, but don’t forget to stop when the light turns red! It was fun to use the parachute as a unique way to enjoy this song. You can do the same this at home with a table cloth or sheet. Have your family hold all around the edges of the cloth, then walk around in a circle as you sing the main verse. Then try out other verses, “up and down”, “swish, swish, swish”, “bumpity, bump”, and make up some of your own.
“What is that that sound? “ Track 23 on your home CD is full of bus sounds. Are you listening to them, or can you hear them? Consider this:
“Listening and hearing are very different skills. Most of the senses―sight, taste, and smell―involve chemical reactions, but ears work purely in a mechanical way. Hearing is a physical process. Sound waves create vibrations that are transmitted as nerve impulses to the brain. Listening is much more complex, as it includes the mental processes of interpreting and absorbing a message and storing and retrieving information. Hearing is a sense most people are born with, but listening is a learned, mental behavior” Adapted from Early Childhood Experiences in Language Arts 4th edition by J. M. Machado, 1990
The more your children experience the difference between listening and hearing, the more they can develop focused listening skills—or the ability to block out the outside noise and focus in on one noise. Coming to
Kindermusik on a regular basis gives your family the opportunity to build and practice this listening skill. And since you’ve got the sounds on your own CD, they can hear all the repetitions they want. As you listen, stop the CD and talk about what you are hearing. Then maybe you can go for a bus ride, or trolley ride, and see what ALL kinds of sounds you can hear. Make a list, and talk about the sounds of the city. Have fun in the city! The next excursion is to the Aquarium, so start listening to your second CD as well. They LOVE it when they are familiar with the songs before class.