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...children are our GREATest teachers...we honor and respect them regardless of age ... . |
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a journey within who I am... |
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…A poem written from my heart... |
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I was happy with life I felt complete and in control Then one day, you walked into my life And my life would never be the same
You taught me what love was To share life with another, To hold each other just because To be there for each other To look into their eyes and see So clearly the depth of love
You taught me how to love To open up and trust another With your most deepest secret To allow them to make their own decisions Looking into their eyes you Reach the reflection of your own soul To feel safe just by listening to The breath of your partner Your arms give comfort to broken dreams Your kisses melt the pain away Love is eternal, not jealousy or mistrust
You taught me when to love To always be there, even when times are rough To listen patiently and openly to the troubles they have To surprise them with a kind gesture, just because To automatically know what the other person needsBefore they realize it themselves To respect their privacy when needed
You taught me why to love To be able to share the sorrows of the worlds To feel loved, because someone cares what happens to you To be a shoulder to lean on when the world is cruel To make their world right just by a smile or a touch To be able to look into their eyes and see Your future family, including kids in them
You taught me whom to love to love You… you showed me how true love could be By accepting me as I am You showed me how honest love could be By accepting me as I am You showed me how honest love cove could be By being critical of me in a loving and supporting way You showed me how pure love could be By being with me even if I am not perfect You showed me how real love could be By sticking by my side no matter how many wrong turns I made
And now I know it is true…. If you love something, set it free, if it comes back it is meant to be I can let you go with love You taught me the value of love Without it, the world seems bleak
I thought my life was complete Now I know it was not….you, your love, your faith, your trust in me Made it complete By teaching me what true love is….
The greatest give you gave Was teaching me how to love myself, To respect who I am, to stand up for what I believe, to be humble to those who are wise, to gain self confidence Why you ask? Because only when I learned to love who I am, could I love someone else unconditionally and as truly as you have loved me. For that , my friend, my love, I love you I will always cherish you… |
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Journal 1
This is the first day of class and I am so excited as this is a huge part of how I would like to teach. The concept of learning through creativity and openness and the concept of an atelier, is phenomenal. Malaguzzi is an amazing person – though every person is equally as important. I guess the equality shines through. How the cooks interact with the children and are respected at the same level as teachers. The culture of Italy lends itself towards the feeling of family and community. It is a huge reason why it is successful! Believing in children is so important, which then helps facilitates an even deeper understanding for the children. They are so open to learning and absorbing. It seems the adults and children are both teachers and students, and that is an amazing realization. I believe the community and government support has a huge impact on it as well. It would be great to see this type of community engagement in the US. They say mom’s will do it all for their children, and here they sure have with the help of others. The dedication of the women and all those involved in believing it was possible and making it possible. In fact, I am amazed at the dedication and determination of them. When I read about the school burning down 1 year later and the community coming together to rebuild it. It inspires me to believe that we too can find a creative way to get more parents involved in the system and to incorporate as much of the Reggio Philosophy as we can!
Journal 2
Today, in class I enjoyed learning about how the children are allowed to explore so freely and are trusted. The teachers are facilitators. In the article Preparing EC teachers to use art in the classroom, it exemplifies the importance of how art allows learning to occur. I strongly agree that art awakens all the senses; which then enhances education almost like learning on a multi dimensional basis. You utilize the 100 languages approach in this way which helps build critical thinking and helps develops self-awareness. When we communicate as adults, they say nonverbal accounts for over 60 % of our communication. So it is important to develop the skills in this area. I strongly feel the arts, and music and dance create development in this skill. Using our senses also allows us to develop our intuition, it allows us to be aware of this moment and really deepen our experience – which I feel also helps develop self-awareness and processing of emotions. The article reinforces this point in saying that engaging in art develops the ability to transform feelings and ideas into a visual form. It also states …knowledge in multiple ways and medias(art as representation of thought… I believe when you have a positive image of the child it enforces their belief in being able to do it themselves. We talked about the ah ha moment in class today, which is very important. I think being in this environment will help develop that moment quicker. I believed in this before I came to class, yet still I am learning so much and have had ah ha moments which are amazing!
Journal 3
Today, in class I had an ah ha moment. When we were talking about the variance between US and Reggio – it was mentioned that they are socialist and thereby social, and we are Capitalistic, thereby me society and environment. This is the key, we have to understand our surroundings and then make the changes needed. The article by Rankin about the dinosaurs project in the Anna Frank School was incredible. In reading it, I almost felt like I was there. I was impressed how Roberta spoke to each child separately and then all children came together and had a group discussion. She further formed her questions based on what her observation of them as well as from the adults’ discussion. The fact that parents transcribed the recorded sessions, and that too voluntarily shocked me. I wonder how to incorporate this within the US system and still maintain support from educators and parents. This should be done one step at a time. The importance of the variety of material and the trust of the children is so different. In the US, our concern is for ensuring “reading” ability – but what happened to wisdom as opposed to knowledge. The skills that the children in Reggio learn are life skills – and critical thinking as well as communicating with one another. Knowledge to me is learning the “book” and knowing the answer – but wisdom is the ability to apply.
Journal 4
The watch video that we watched yesterday still has such an impact on me I was amazed!!! How even babies have the ability to correlate is astonishing. So it reinforces that children are powerful and able beings. The Emergent Curriculum and Social Constructivism article really helped walk me through the process, reasoning and thinking of the Reggio way. Specific goals are not created ahead of time, the hypotheses and objectives based on their knowledge of kids. It is not set in stone; in fact it is flexible to allow the interests of the children to dictate where it goes. This approach combines the educational and social service aspect together. They look at the whole system, not that the child is coming to daycare for just some amount of hours in which teachers are responsible and the evenings in which parents are responsible. This is one of the reasons why I am looking at the course in Conscious Parenting and incorporating it within the school for the teacher and the educators. I want to give the child a consistent message and to open up and facilitate family/community involvement. The child is addressed as a whole, in the sense that parents and teachers work together towards the benefit of the child. And that too, they look at the child as powerful and strong. The family, children and the educators all are an integral part of Reggio. It is true that the child ability to learn is not fully enhanced in a situation where learning is formulated in advance. The concept of the researcher shows the student and teacher in one person – which in my belief is the best way to grow. It was interesting how the boys and girls pictures were so different – the female dinosaur was more accurately depicted in the boys pictures versus the girl’s distinguishing the female dinosaurs by the long hair, or the babies nearby. The thought process and the collaboration done among the adults was very detailed oriented and is how they determined to focus on size and dimension as it was the recurrent theme in the transcriptions.
Journal 5
Ok, there is just so much good information, it is hard to choose what to write on. So my days are overlapping. Yesterday, we watched the bicycle video, which was amazing. Only 10 minutes and how much was accomplished. One thing I noticed is that the child had the idea correct from the beginning, just needed tweaking. It amazed me to see how knowledgeable he was. Children are powerful; they have the ability to learn quicker than adults! He had support from his father. His father believed in him. The attention to detail that Reggio Emilia concept has is easily seen in their analysis of the group size of the children. Conflict is a huge part of learning and by having odd number of students it creates the environment for this. In fact, Gandini says that conflict is a driving force for growth. Groups of two encourage both a social and cognitive impact. It also teaches them how to adjust to each other, and the rhythm of communication. They believe that the maximum group size should be 5. I wonder how feasible this is within the US. I believe the key lies in the child’s image concept. Since they trust the children, it allows the teachers to really focus on the observing the children. It is a paradigm shift that needs to take place. The respect for materials from children is just amazing. I believe that we can do it in the US, we just need to start from a VERY young age. Of course, having parents on the same page is needed as well!! But maybe after peaking their interest and doing more community/family activities to increase involvement, highlights of the Reggio concept could be shown and then further exemplified by a in house project to show that it can work!! Seeing is believing.
Journal 6 Today was so much fun. The project to make a rainbow taught me how what you learn is important, but it should also grab a child’s interest. We created a sponge puppet, which was fun and forced us to be inventive. I noticed how we all hear and interpret things differently. In our puppet, we used 100% sponge, whereas some of the other groups used their material, but at 90%. It was also so interesting to see the color collage – how it was what people saw and cared about. The brown was for the earth, blue was healing or music. I really enjoyed it. For me hearing the music also made a huge difference in getting into the experience. In the article, Floating experiences, I really enjoyed the cloud project. It exemplified how diverse of an education is received from even a single project. How language development is enhanced when children compare their clouds, visual perception/discrimination skills are used when comparing their cloud to another or in the creation of it. When they try to find a similar cloud to theirs, critical thinking is prevalent. The realization of getting a bigger bag and more helium and still not having the created clouds float, caused them to revisit all aspects, in which they changed the tie to a lighter one which allowed the cloud to float! Because the US is driven by statistics and “reading” what are methods of evaluation to prove that through a project such as clouds, you developed all the skills mentioned above. Maybe have a research project that shows a control group and a Reggio inspired group doing a project that is child driven. They then compare skills learned. While volunteering at a daycare/preschool, I have seen many children who have the belief that they can not do something and it saddens me. It is something that desperately needs to change here in the US, and I feel Reggio approach can help this. The key is to have parents support the belief of the child image as well..
Journal 7
Class was amazing, going through all the different stations really opened my eyes to how important it is to expose children to a variety of material because experiencing it makes it that much more powerful. I especially enjoyed the sandpaper. Working with our group was a challenge. I so expected that we would be able to flow well together. So many times you want to step in and help or show them an easier way, and you have to stop yourself. I was with Caryn, who saw her brother in the other group playing with foam color on his face and that is what she wanted to do! So we did it and I know she really enjoyed feeling the foam and seeing how some of the colors intermixed. Each of our kids was separate and wanted to do their own thing. So I felt it would be good to do a group activity for 5 minutes so comfort is developed amongst the children tomorrow morning and my group agreed. Mandy suggested taking them outside where there is less going on so they can really work with each other.
Journal 8
Another fun day at class. I enjoyed the music art combination. I feel it really ties emotion to it well – in fact when we talked about how the paintings made us feel, what they smelled like – it was great!! This really challenges students to develop looking at 1 thing from a multi dimensional perspective. In development of intuition this is necessary. We did ring around the rosy and it worked! I also noted the importance of staying more in the background. We have Ellie, Caryn and Sophia and we finally got together on an idea of pizza! I noticed when you are helping one of the students, it is hard to keep an eye on all, Caryn was cutting the pizza and didn’t allow Ellie to cut and Ellie felt out and started crying, and it took a moment for us to realize this. At the end of class, we discussed what we can do to make this even more hands on experience and something that our kids would be interested in. We applied the negotiated learning process. The children had started on the design of our project – they had done both a clay pizza and pizza that they painted. The documentation process was started on the painting in how is a pizza made and corrections were made. Discourse happened between teachers as well as teachers and children. As they drew the dough, we asked questions about it and how does it feel or smell. And then later, we discussed some of the things we can do to make it a more authentic experience. In the Negotiated Learning through Design, documentation, and discourse article, it really struck me that they refer to the curriculum as child originated and teacher framed, as opposed to child centered or teacher directed. It reminds me of the concept, half empty or is the glass half full. Here we focus on the child needs to feel safe and loved and once the needs are met they can develop more. We praise children’s painting instead of understanding what they are communicating. But what if we thought they already have the understanding, and that we need to just ensure enough stimulation for them? I feel more should be on stimulation, but I also believe in giving and showing love.
Journal 9
Wow the sandpaper drawing and mirror type work was fun, and so informative for children in a fun way! There are so many different ways to communicate the same thing and to allow children access to this is helping them build critical skills. Today we brought in flour and items to make crust. We also brought in coupons for them to see. We first thought we would show everything to the children – sauce and cheese, but then thought just to focus on dough. It was so fun!!! They had a blast, they felt, smelt, saw what it looked like and were able to make comparisons between the flour versus the dough. We then painted our clay pizza (dough) with the sauce. Ellie put a little green on her side of the pizza and I asked her what is the green for, she responded I don’t know. It is a different sauce. I tried to understand what it represents but she didn’t respond. Upon reflecting on it, I realized that I needed to change my approach, like what they speak about in How to talk to a scribbler. The article states that the beginner in art needs encouragement in the form of verbal approval and respect. If I had said I like the green sauce maybe she would feel more encouraged to speak about it. Even when you provide them with a description, they learn new words on how to label things and since they created the painting and experienced it, they are more apt to remember and understand it. Also showing them, by tracing the line and talking about it helps guarantee that the child understands what the adult is referring to. Sometimes their feelings can be read in their facial or body expressions! Journal 10
Class is coming to an end and I wish it weren’t. This has been by far the most amazing course. For me the interactive portion in what we learn in class working with different forms of art and working with the children has been a time I will never forget as well as a time where I learned soooo much!! Thank you for the opportunity. Today in class, we worked with so many items. I enjoyed the sailboat project, though I was a bit nervous. I knew it would float, but when we were told it if it sank, it would effect our grade, I was uncertain. So if that pressure affects an adult imagine what it does to a child? In my trip to Iowa – the Maharishi school which has a preschool in it, they don’t give exams until around 4th grade. There are small tests, but nothing stressful. They believe following children’s interests and not stressing them out. They have transcendental meditation for kids above age 10 and they love it. I spent 45 minutes with the preschool observing and 2.25 hours observing the KG to 11th grade kids and I was amazed at what they do. Also they attend worldwide competitions and their “scores” are very high. I have learned that life is a teacher and the greatest teacher is children, their openness, innocence, belief, imagination and their utilizing all senses when they experience gives them a wholesome approach. We need to honor them and give them the tools to excel – it is within every child, you just have to spark that light! I also believe that this is the case with physically and/or mentally challenged children. To include them and believe they have the same abilities shows faith in them. When we believe in people, they also gain confidence and then prove you right! Does love come first or does belief and respect in the child come first, maybe it is a delicate balance between those! |
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reflections of my soul... |
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…My journals from a Reggio Emilia class at the University of Toledo... |
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This is a rather…long…paper that I wrote for a Language and Cognition course at the University of Toledo – a direct tie to my concept of Connection from Conception – kick back…grab a cup of coffee (and a few refills J) and enjoy!! References of the paper will be provided upon request…. |
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Music moves my soul... |
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…Does research substantiate the direct and indirect impact of music on cognitive development in early childhood? |
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OUR PHILOSOPHY |
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Music moves people in so many ways, in fact in the US, music is said to be the language of the heart and in India, music is said to move the soul. According to the Vedas’, the ancient text of India, the universe was created through the vibration of the sound AUM, which consists of three tones. It is broken into “aaahh” “uuuu” and “mmmh”. Music carries vibrations, which can affect the physical, emotional, intellectual and spiritual development of the child. The strength of music, or the vibration of it, can affect us in many ways; it can energize us, calm us down, de-stress or even help in focusing us. Mantras, a repeated group of words in a melody, can help individuals gain mental clarity and focus. Some people say infants are very open which is supported by the philosophy theory theory where the child is looked upon as a little scientist – does music affect them significantly?
Looking at the child from the theory theory perspective the child is said to have innate ability within them. Many theorists support the view that children have knowledge within them from the beginning. What creates this knowledge? Carl Jung and Edgar Cayce talk about the collective unconscious or the super conscious which gives people the ability to connect with others without needing to be in the same room at the same time or in a conversation with them. He believes that this impacts the behaviors of individuals and can influence the thoughts and knowledge of individuals. How can music be utilized to best develop the cognitive ability of a child within this view?
How does music affect the emotional development of the child, which in turn effects the cognitive development? Emotions are communicated through viewing the facial expression of others. While engaging in an eye gaze with another person, one is able to determine what the other person’s expression or feelings and intention is. In fact, “eye contact is considered to be the most powerful mode of establishing a communicative link between humans” (Grossman and Johnson, 2007). The eyes are said to be the windows of the soul, while music is said to move the soul.
In the Vedas’, “AUM” is considered the primal energy of existence which also translates into the fundamental understanding of the “I am” concept. This concept delves into the oneness in the universe or self-realization. This focuses on the human, albeit a child or adult, as complete, not just from an emotional or cognitive level. In the Vedas, humans are said to be made of 7 main energy centers, which is referred to as the Chakras which constitutes prana, or life energy. Each of the energy centers carries a different tone, or frequency and if music is played in alignment with the energy center a shift takes place. This shift can be a release or something as simple as a change in your emotions. When you hear your own high school prom song on the radio many years later, what feelings and memories are invoked within you? In fact, generally people will even remember the words of the song, fifteen years later, and if not, they can hum in conjunction with the song. However, can you just as easily recall the Pythagorean theory? Interesting how music moves us while also affecting our memory capabilities. At what point does music begin to affect the child?
From the moment of conception, music helps both the mother and child during pregnancy. It is a testament of time that babies enjoy rocking motion with soft sounds like humming. Is this because of the movement in the fetus as well as hearing the mother’s heartbeat and other sounds in uteri? Music played during pregnancy can have a calming effect on both mother and child and furthermore, exposure to classical music, like ragas, enhances intellectual development. Research shows that newborns prefer the sound of their mother’s voice to all else; even when compared to a lullaby. This supports the notion that there is some basic prenatal sound recognition that had developed.
Music has many benefits as can be seen in a study done that was done in China. It was proven that exposure to music during pregnancy and in the neonatal timeframe enhanced certain abilities within children, such as sitting and walking earlier than their counterparts when compared to the Gesell Infant Scale (Arabian, 2002). Another benefit of music is exemplified in the study of “Baby-go-to-sleep-tapes” which are tapes that are timed to an adult heartbeat as well as sound like one. They studied the effect of music on pain levels and found that the newborns that were exposed to music had lower pain ratings, which was observed through videotapes and higher oxygen levels obtained through blood work (Keck, Joyce, and Gerkensmeyer, 2002). A 1994 study showed that “prenatal exposure to the mother’s tongue can enhance fetal reactions to linguistically important speech sounds and, thus, could promote language-relevant perceptual tuning before birth” (DeCasper, Lecanuet, Busnel, and Granier, 1994).
Another study focused on mothers who watched a television show regularly as opposed to those that did not. The fetus movement through an ultrasound was monitored while hearing the theme song and compared to fetuses that had never been exposed to this music. There was an observance of increased movement in those whose mother’s watched the show regularly (James, Spenser, and Stepsis, 2002). DeCasper and Spence (1986) study showed fetal learning through monitoring children’s sucking responses of the mothers that had read out loud during the last six weeks of pregnancy (DeCasper, et al., 1994).
Though these studies support the concept of fetal learning through music, there is still a lot of controversy about the assurance of music being the cause, if any of fetal learning. It is important to not just look at the surface of learning due to recognition of sound. As noted in the James, et al. study in 2002, the fetus recognized a theme song as measured by fetus movement through an ultrasound. In my mind, the study would have more validity if they had another control group that had heard the theme song and had been monitored for both listening to the theme song and listening to the theme song with a few notes being varied ½ way through the theme song. It would be interesting to compare the movement of this group before, during and after the change. Did the movement go back to the same level before the change? The other change that would be beneficial in helping the validity of this study would be monitoring the heart rate as well. Therefore, research experiments need to take a look at multiple tests such as fetal movement, fetal heart rate and sucking patterns at one time in order to ascertain learning with confidence. This comprehensive approach combined with a more structured experiment that incorporates a more controlled environment will help validate the impact of music, specifically classical music, on cognitive development. Music has been prevalent in many cultures for many centuries. In fact one of the oldest religious books Sama Veda, is based on the importance of sound. Many cultures believe that music has a strong effect on cognitive development as well as social and emotional development. Cross-cultural experts in the field of Music as well as Psychology support this opinion. In the Indian culture, it is common knowledge that listening to different ragas, musical melodies, can help the listener move through situations as well as stimulate brain activity. When speaking about ragas, Vijay Raghav Rao, a renowned musician, dwells on why he makes music. It allows him to resonate with that ultimate work of art - life. He sees abiding similarities between music and the principles of creation; between the notes of a Raga, and the genetic code. In words as simple as they are elegant, he defines the notes of each Raga - inasmuch as they might represent a genetic sequence, and the emotions it may generate when performed as stipulated – akin to traits one may inherit as a result of a genetic code (Lokvani, 2006).
In Chennai, India Dr. T. Mthily, a Clinical Psychologist and Music Therapist who has a doctorate in Psychology with Classical music and its therapeutic values for the improvement in the behavior speaks about many benefits of music therapy, of which enhancing the concentration level of children, helping in the search of an individual's personal harmony, and expressing refined exhibition of emotions and clarity in cognition are just a few (Thirumalachari, n.d.).
This opinion is shared by Dr. Levitin, born in the US, who completed post-doctoral training at Stanford University Medical School (in Neuroimaging) and at UC Berkeley (in Cognitive Psychology). In his postdoctoral work, Levitin used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) in order to document the neural networks affected by music. It confirmed the notion that music affects the brain as a whole. “That music is, in a sense, a whole body experience: it manipulates our emotions and forces our toes to tap, hips to sway, and fingers to snap…mapping the networks of the brain with fMRI has led cognitive psychologists to understand where (not only when) the brain responds to a given musical stimulus, what the pattern of response is in the brain, and what brain mechanisms underlie emotion and memory…” (Miller, 2007). Further studies should incorporate a detailed understanding of whether the type of music impacts different areas of the brain? Does music have to be played for a certain length of time and can it be either listening to or playing music. In his book, This Is Your Brain on Music: The Science of a Human Obsession, Dr. Levitin, concludes that music can effect the development of other areas of the brain and that the “Mozart Effect” points to a relationship between learning in general and exposure to music at a young age..
Gordon Shaw and Francis Rauscher famously (and controversially) showed that listening to Mozart significantly raises spatial IQ – although only for about fifteen minutes. While this interesting finding remains scientifically robust, many researchers now debate the exact causation, pointing instead to issues of cross lateralization or brain processing to account for this so called ‘Mozart Effect’.” In 1997, the following study confirmed the finding that music, specifically, piano and singing instruction, are superior to computer instruction in enhancing children’s cognition. The experiment included three groups of preschoolers: one group received private piano/keyboard lessons and singing lessons, a second group received private computer lessons; and a third group received no training. Those children who received piano/keyboard training performed 34% higher on tests measuring spatial- temporal ability than the others. These findings indicate that music uniquely enhances higher brain functions required for mathematics, chess, science and engineering (Rauscher, 1997). Bulgarian educationalist, Georgi Lozanov, among others carries the belief that classical music enhances alpha waves in the brain, which is linked with pleasing and favorably receptive learning states. He created a detailed system in which using a sequence of songs and other music accelerates language learning (Lozanov, n.d.).
Prof. Uvnas Moburg, a leading authority on oxytocin research, shows that breast-feeding and touch are both powerfully oxytocin producing. (Matthiesen, Ransjo-Arvidson, Nissen, and Uvnas-Moburg, 2001). She and her colleagues believe that further research is also likely to endorse the role of music in promoting this natural well-being. In relation to the impact of music on the brain, many Neurological and physiotherapists believe that release of the hormone, oxyitocin effects memories. In fact, today, a lot of research is being conducted on the relevance of the release of oxytocin and its association with music and cognition. When a mother gives birth to her child, oxytocin is released and is known to create the bond between mother and child. Oxytocin has the effect of wiping the slate of memories clean while facilitating the ability to create new memories.
In Lecture 2 An Instinct for Music: David Huron refers to Walter Freeman’s book, Societies of Brains, in which Freeman implies the link between oxytocin and listening to music (Huron, 2001). However, Dr. C. Sue Carter, a neuroscientist at the University of Maryland in College Park and an author of the Nature report, points out “…oxytocin's effect is more frankly benign. All the literature so far suggests that it's associated with positive social behaviors," (Angier, 1993, p.1). Further studies are needed to validate the link between oxytocin and music leading to cognitive development. In these studies, it would be important to isolate the production of oxytocin when listening to music as opposed to when creating music, as oxytocin helps create new memories and form bonds between the mind and the body. Some of the factors that need to be considered are: when new memories are created - how long does one have to listen to music before it impacts cognitive ability and also after how long does the effect wear off?
Earlier we spoke about the energy centers, or charkas and the mind, body and spirit connection. Each of the 7 chakras correspond to a note in the musical scale do, re, mi, fa so, la ti and are affected by the note. By listening to these notes we can bring our energy centers, or life force, prana back into balance. “Music pertains to the perception and expression of the infinite spectrum of the rhythmic flow of the ahata nada (perceivable sonic currents) pervading in Nature. Both have direct impact on the shat chakras hidden along the endocrine column and hence affect our physical as well as subtle bodies” (Acharya, 2004).
But it is important to note that our thoughts, words and beliefs play an important part in keeping this balance. It is believed that classical music, specific ragas, can help the child, or individual in moving through emotions and developing spatial relations, as well as other cognitive abilities. Some studies show that not until the 5th month of pregnancy is the child is aware of outside stimuli – they can hear sounds outside the womb. There are studies that support the notion that music played during pregnancy can be recognized by the newborn child. In the 2002 study, by James, Spencer and Stepsis, they state learning occurs in the fetus, however “we have not examined whether this effect is specific to this stimulus (music) or sound exposure in general…no information that such effects are either long lasting or beneficial (James, et al., 2002 p. 438). There are studies that show that the fetus moves and breathes in rhythm to music played. So much so, that the “Baby-go-to-sleep-tapes” stated earlier have a calming effect on newborns. It is important to note that amniotic fluid is a good conductor of sound waves. Studies really support that exposure to classical music, like ragas, enhances intellectual development. Certain music pieces enable positive vibrations into the nerves of the listeners. A person first experiences music before it is transformed into thought and feeling. Indian Classical Music has a prevalent impact on individual moods and behavior. Specific Ragas with specific notes is positive for an individual’s mindset. The Vedas speak about the effects of Classical Music on individual life, behavior, and environment and for anyone who listens to it with engrossed attention. During the early stages of pregnancy, music given to expectant mothers has a beneficial effect for the fetus (Dr. Mthily, n.d.). However there is much controversy in being able to confidently say that music is what causes this intellectual development.
In 2004, the Schon, Magne, and Besson study looked at comparing pitch processing in music as well as language. They had short musical and linguistic phrases in which the last note and word respectively was melodically/prosodic in tune or not, in other words congruous or incongruous. This was established by increasing the pitch of the final note/word by 1/5th of a tone. It is interesting to note that a few recent studies show a tie between music and language in that melody and prosody are objectively similar. Prosody has both a linguistic and an emotional function and can broadly be defined at the abstract, phonological level, as the patterns of stress and intonation in a spoken language, and at the concrete, acoustic level, by the same parameters that define melody (i.e., the rhythmic succession of pitches in music), that is, fundamental frequency (f0), intensity, duration and spectral characteristics. Based on these similarities, Thompson et al. (2004) tackled the emotional function of prosody. They were able to show that adult musicians outperformed adult non-musicians at identifying emotions (e.g., sadness, fear) conveyed by spoken sentences and by tone sequences that mimicked the utterances’ prosody. Most importantly, they also showed that 6 year olds, tested after a year of musical training, were better than non musician children at identifying anger or fear (Schon, et al., 2006 p. 200).
The basis of this study was conducted with age 8 + or – 1 year children in that if the fundamental processing of pitch is the same for both prosody and music, then if an improvement in pitch is obtained in music it should extend over to pitch perception in language, which was the case. It is interesting to see that the musicians were able to detect the incongruity quicker than non-musicians, which may reflect that they need more processing resources and time to perform the task. In conclusion, “...the present findings highlight the positive effects of music lessons for linguistic abilities in children…also confirms that the ERP method is particularly well adapted for the exploration of positive transfer effects between music processing and other cognitive domains” (Schon, 2006, p. 206). After reviewing the above-related studies, some may still say that music doesn’t enhance cognitive development. In order to validate this link, extensive studies will need to be completed. Some of the key factors to validate in these studies are: is it just listening to music, or is it actually playing music that effects cognitive development? How long should there be exposure to music, before it affects you? How long is the impact of that piece? Does the type of music impact it?
I would propose the following multilevel experiment to validate the impact of music on cognitive and emotional development. First it is important to discuss the fundamentals of the study. The basis would be how music during pregnancy as well as in infancy affects cognitive development as well as emotional state. Once the child is born, an infant’s sucking patterns would be monitored as well. We would also perform a study as to whether oxytocin is released during music instructions and further enhances memory development. In order to validate the study, five groups of subjects must be created.
The first group would be mothers who had classical music that they listened to during an allotted time while doing normal household activities such as driving, cleaning, bathing, etc. The second group would be mothers who listened to the same amount of music, in the same manner, just not in the classical format. The third group would be mothers who listened to no music whatsoever. The fourth group would be mothers who listened to music as a separate activity without doing any activity during that period. The fifth group would be mothers who engage in classical music training in the form of violin lessons for the allotted time. The total number of Participants would be 500. The length of music exposure would be an hour between 8 and 11 am and an hour between 4 and 8 pm, with the participants taking 2 minutes before listening to the allotted music to relax by deep breathing. This technique would be inhaling and exhaling for the same number of seconds.
By creating these groups, we will be able to see the cognitive development attained by just listening to music, engaging in an activity with music in the background, playing an instrument as well as the impact of the type of music. The breathing technique is important to help create the same starting point for each of the groups, though it could also be considered to have an effect on the fetus that nulls the music portion only if each group reported the same data. However, we do not anticipate this to be the case. The monitoring of fetal learning as well as infant learning would be addressed by the suggested corrections of the current fetal learning studies mentioned above. It is important to note that emotional state would be assessed through the movement and heart rate of the fetus.
It would be important that all groups of women were of the same background, and socioeconomic level, as well as similar in educational level and age range. The participants’ exposure to music prior to the study should be at the same level and there should be no prior or ongoing engagement in any musical activity such as singing lessons or piano lessons. For the non-classical groups, it is important that no classical music is listened to during the research period. One of our key assumptions would be consistent with the theory theory view that all children have a similar innate ability, which lessens the impact of genetic factors. Only external factors will need to be controlled.
There would be a pre-experiment survey, which would address the marital status, cultural heritage, and frequency of classical listening in the past 6 months as well as types of music enjoyed and the amount of music heard during the day. This survey would allow us to select only first time pregnancies. In order for it to be a randomized sample we would have the first 100 participants as group 1, the next 100 would be group 2 and so on. The participants would not be informed of the purpose of the experiment. Also, after the sex of the child is determined, the study should incorporate an even number of male and female participants in each group to ensure any gender related differences be accounted for. The experiment should be performed from 4 weeks of fetal development until the child is born, with the music being played for the relevant groups at a normal level.
There are several different tests that would need to be performed within this study. The first test should be done during the fifth week when the baby’s heartbeat is taking shape and can be heard through an ultrasound. This will be the infant’s base rate, which would also serve as the basis for the child’s emotional state. Once the base rate is established, the technician should create a stress within the mother and monitor her rate as well as the child’s. The ultrasound should be done on all groups with notation of the heart rate and any movement detected through a video of the ultrasound. The basic procedure for all groups would be performed every two months until the infant is born, while the test procedure for all groups would be performed one week after the basic procedure.
The basic procedure consists of three sessions that are each fifteen minutes in length. The first session is fifteen minutes of silence; the second session is fifteen minutes of the music that the mother has been listening to; and the third session is fifteen minutes of “new” music. For the group that plays an instrument, the violin will be played for the second fifteen-minute session, and for the group that doesn’t listen to music, any music would be played. It is important to ensure that every two months, the second fifteen-minute session is a new piece. The test procedure would keep the fifteen minutes of silence; the second set of music would be the same, except that at an interval of 6 minutes and 11 minutes the music would change pitch and the third set would be eliminated. The six and eleven minute changes would be a pitch change of 30 seconds, in which any fetal changes would be captured in the ultrasound video that includes the heartbeat rate. At birth and one month after birth, the basic procedure will be administered with the test procedure following one day after the basic. At this point, sucking patterns will be added to the methods of testing.
Through these procedures we would expect to see the fetal heart rate decrease and fetal movement increase during the second session. The purpose of the first session is to establish the base rate for that visit. During the third session, we expect to see an increase rate that would indicate a change in emotional state. The test procedure will allow us to see the change in the heart rate as well as movement when the two changes of pitch take place, which would indicate the capacity for memory. However, there are still weaknesses in this approach. How does one account for the fetal movement changing as the fetus grows? We tried to minimize this effect by having the test procedure one week after the base rates are established. However being certain that movement or increase in heart rate is due solely to music is difficult. For future studies, it would be interesting to monitor how the mother feels upon listening to the music and what, if any, effect it has on the fetus being stressed or calm.
After birth, the child will still be exposed to the same music that they heard in uteri until six months of age when the next test is performed. The same basic as well as test procedure would be performed with monitoring of heart rate and body movement/facial changes. After completion of this test, infants will be put in five separate rooms according to the music they heard, with music playing for two hours with toys and different tasks that can be monitored through a two-way mirror and videotape. Their progress will be evaluated against the expected tasks of the same target age group according to the “Gesell Infant Scale”. Based on the “Gesell Infant Scale”, a comprehensive questionnaire would be created and provided to the mothers at the birth of their child. The questionnaire would be constructed in such a manner that mothers will be unaware that we are tracking the infant’s progress in the skills and tasks acquired during the first 6 months of age. Also, to certify the integrity of the study it is important that the participants enroll in the same daycare to ensure that the level of instruction and attention are equivalent amongst all infant participants. As mentioned above, the home environment should also be similar. It is important to ensure that parent’s are not feeling that their children are being graded on how quickly they learn. Another factor that would be difficult to control for are an infant’s sleep schedule, sickness and such external variables. The two-hour sessions may have to be recreated if a child’s normal napping time falls within the parameters of the test time as well as their comfort level with strangers in the room. It would also be interesting to view the role of oxytocin in music and cognition. At the inception of the study, the oxytocin level should be measured.
Also, at the birth of the child, and during the first four-breastfeeding session, the oxytocin level released by the brain should be measured for the mom as well as the baby. This level should be compared to the normal amount of oxytocin in the mother and will therefore establish if the child also releases oxytocin after birth. At the age of one month, 1 hour after breastfeeding occurs and having no contact with the mom, the level of oxytocin should be measured. In order to establish a link in the increased level of oxytocin and music, it is vital to perform the below experiment of children at 4 years of age. When the child reaches 1 month, the first test should be performed. All five groups should have the same music that they heard throughout the pregnancy in a session of one half hour. There should be a constant monitoring of the oxytocin level released at set intervals of 2 minutes. After the music session, children will be taught a sequence of items for 10 minutes and then tested on their memory of the sequence as well as a spatial temporal task. The monitoring of oxytocin in both breastfeeding sessions would help determine if the same amount is released in each session, or in the first session only. By establishing the levels of oxytocin at one month, it will provide a good basis for the base rate in comparison with the following study. These five groups should now split into a total of ten groups so that each original group has two subgroups. One set of the five groups should receive instruction with music lessons for the whole year, while the other set receives instruction with computer games. The instructions, whether music or computer, should be for two hours a day, for five days in the week in order to establish sound judgment on the benefit of music. At this point, the oxytocin level released by the brain should be measured for all groups every Monday during the lessons. During the test, no music should be played at all and the results should be compared. A second test that has same level of difficulty should be administered with music played in the background 20 minutes before the test for all group. This part of the study would validate how music can have a calming effect on children, as well as increase their scores because of less stress. The difficulty in this study would be the expense, and ensuring that all variables are equal as well as not losing any participants due to the different logistics such as the length of the study. In the future, it would be interesting to see if the effect on cognition is the same for individuals who have musical lessons as opposed to listening to background music versus instruction through music.
Another study could be a group home or shelter where women come during their pregnancies, which would further substantiate the impact of music on cognitive development. The reason for this would be the ability to control external factors such as ensuring that all participants are exposed to the same basic living quarters, which include food, activities, etc. In the proposed longitudinal study, it would be quite difficult to monitor such factors as the mother engaging in music related activities such as attending a musical event. This provides a starting point, in which other studies can build upon. The above studies would help validate what has been a controversial subject -does music impact cognitive development. We have shown many people who support the impact of music on early childhood cognition-in fact as early as in uteri. As many peer-reviewed articles show the validity of the statement, it is important to realize there is quite a bit of research yet to be done to truly validate this hypothesis. For instance, is it really the type of music that affects cognition or just the exposure to music?
Music moves through you so quickly and profoundly that within a few minutes of listening to an upbeat song, your mood can change. For many centuries, in other parts of the world music has been an integral part of the daily lives of families, including young children. As early childhood educators, it is important to provide the best learning environment for our children where music would play an important role. In addition, we should view the children as complete in and of themselves, which fosters an environment of growth, trust and mutual understanding. As a child I was taught the names of the States in the US in the format of a song, and to this date I recall almost all of the states. Even now, without the song, I cannot even recall half as many. I can still remember the words of so many songs from fourth grade; however, I do not remember the algebraic equation for the circumference of a right triangle. Besides assisting in memory, music allows us to increase our pitch and tone awareness, which can assist children in phonemic awareness. Even as we read storybooks to children, our tone has various intonations within it. Therefore, early childhood educators should develop an integrated curriculum with music to foster child development in so many areas including, but not limited to, emotional, social, spatial temporal tasks, and memory, as well as math. Many classrooms use music to help soothe and calm children before naps or during clean up time to get children motivated. Why not extend music to the instructional period as well – allowing enhanced learning in a fun filled environment.
…Peace to all… I believe in you...do you believe in you? Are you ready?
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