Toddlers Music and the Classroom

Toddlers Music and the Classroom

Ok everyone lets put our coats away, and get ready for our day. What are we doing Dannie asked? Are we dancing? I don't know I relied it's a surprise, lets let the rest of the class get settled then I'll tell you. I looked up just in time to see my last kid coming down the hall screaming at the top of her lungs. Yep this will be a fun start to the day. I go through my music choices choosing the most up beat music I can find to start my class. I know that it will wake up my kids and get there attention allowing them to let go of whatever troubles they faced at the start of there day and start over fresh. As my parent drags my last student into the room the parent is looking as frustrated and anger as her screaming daughter.

I grab Keri from her mom assure her mother that her daughter would be ok and step back into the class room. As we step back into the room I start the music, I watch as my out of order class starts to come to life. All of a sudden instead of screaming and crying I have laughter and dancing. They become fully engaged. The focus shifts from the worries of home or being left to the excitement of being in class that day, getting to play with their friends and getting to learn something new for the day.

What's really neat is to watch the expressions on their faces as they fully immerse themselves into the music; it is as if nothing else exists. Their world has suddenly become a happy joyful place; the worries from the start of their day have been washed away, and carried away by the rhythms and beats of the music.

From your intro I understood that you paper will be about the music and how it is helps children with their emotions. I think this intro works good as a hook because it is like a simple story that is not hard to read or relate to. This intro can keep readers attention because it doesn't have complex words that can confuse reader. - LF

There has been a lot of research out there on the use of music to help shift the mood of a person, when dealing with depression and other emotional issues I wanted to look at how music could affect a classroom of 2-3 year olds. As a preschool teacher we are always looking to new ways to engage our class. We are looking for new ways of teaching them we are looking to new ways to get them to work together, and we are always looking for ways to improve the behavior of the terrible 2-3's. This can sometimes be a challenge for much different reason.

The first being every child response in his or her own way depending on how they are raised. The other challenge is that there are different levels of maturity; even at such a young age there can be vastly different levels of understanding. We have to as teachers find ways of engaging and addressing each of those students no matter where they are, and it needs to be universal so that there is not one student standing out over another we also have to be mindful of the children that are exceling and need the challenge of more learning.

This balance can be hard to achieve when dealing with a 2-3 year old class. The biggest problem that we face is behavior. How do I get a 2-3 year olds attention for long enough to teach them? I found in my classroom that if I started the day off in a positive way that their behavior throughout the day stayed positive. I would start the day with music and dancing. However I did not step back and just watch them free play and dance around I danced and sang along with them. This allowed them to see that it was ok to be as load and crazy as they wanted to be. I wanted them to be free to fully express themselves without the restriction of how much noise they were making or how goofy they were being. I wanted each child to participate as much or as little as they wanted