They say that the children express themselves in different ways as their music knowledgebase expands, and my boys (15 months and 4 years) are definitely doing that.
In the second class of the 10-week session, the little one alternated between grabbing his shoes and trying to figure out how the door worked to meeting the others in class by going up to the other participants and engaging them. He was quite fascinated by the name tags, and liked sticking and un-sticking his name tag, and that of the mom next to us. He liked the feel of it on his fingers, and kept trying to shake it off then on again.
The baby also went right to the center of the circle and intently watched the teacher play a recorder (I think it was a recorder-- it was a wind instrument of some sort that she held downwards instead of sideways). He also played with the little eggs filled with sand a bit when they came out, and pounded on the drums with us during instrument time. His favored activity from the first class was playing with the brightly colored scarves and we didn't do that this session. He did, however, locate the bin where they were stored and try to get this bin out of the larger metal bin and wasn't able to do this. So he wandered back to us and sat in my lap for a moment, then went back to trying to put on his shoes.
My older son was more shy than he was in the previous class, and hid behind me for a bit, then sat on my lap for a bit. He also let me carry him as we stomped around in a circle. He vocalized a bit, but not singing. Right after class he asked me why we didn't sing the fishing song ("Crawdad") and I told him we did. He asked why there were no sticks this time. I found it interesting that the teacher had chosen to do some of the same songs but in a different way (she did a 3-part harmony with one of the songs, and an energetic version of one that had been mellow the time before).
After we got home, my older son, who had been shy around her in person, said he wanted to see the teacher again, and he has been playing the CD incessantly. I mean, so much that these tunes are in my head over and over. Every time we are in our play area, he pops over to the CD player and turns it on. I spend time explaining why he must turn it down before my head explodes.
This afternoon, after the baby got up from his nap, his brother asked us if we wanted to hear a song. I said of course. Then he strummed the guitar we've had (and mostly ignored) for ages and sang a made-up tune about an excursion he went on to see the cable cars and a ferry ride and about how the cable cars work.
Something is "awakening," or being stirred in him at least. It is quite fascinating to see the effect two 45 minute classes and a new music CD has had on him.
Here is what we thought of week one.
+++++++++++++++
Disclaimer: Many thanks to East Bay Music Together for letting us attend for free in exchange for my thoughts in writing.
No comments:
Post a Comment