The Gift of Music
Parents across the globe have frequently wondered how they can help their infant children grow, learn and prepare for their future. They want their children to develop into the best adult they can be.
Stacie Stein of Cedar City, Utah, is one of these parents. Parents of five, Stein and her husband Kevin have worked to teach their children and develop their minds in multiple ways from an early age, including in music. “I have read a little about studies on music affecting our brain.” Stein stated, “I personally believe babies are able to benefit from good music early on just because it talks to our hearts so well. Music cheers us up or makes us cry, and it is good for our children to be able to develop an awareness of their feelings. It helps when they feel disappointed or happy themselves, they know those feelings better.”
To assist the Steins and other parents like them, the Orchestra of Southern Utah launched the national Gold Book Roundtable Award-Winning Baby Ears Project in 2009. The project encourages the use of music as a home enrichment tool by giving music CDs to new mothers through the Valley View Medical Center in Cedar City. The Steins received a copy in August 2009 with the birth of their youngest daughter Lucy.
“I love this CD.” Stein said, “The pieces are very beautiful and fun. I feel like it is a small way of being connected to the community; I tell my kids these are Cedar City's people on this album, look what Cedar City does to share their talents with everyone. I feel like that's what this CD means.”
"We have seen the benefits of fine music in raising our children and teaching our students. We wanted to share that joy with the wider community," said Sara Penny, OSU manager.
Research also indicates that classical music can affect the way an infant develops. According to an article recently published by LifeScience, playing Mozart music to premature babies at the Tel Aviv Medical Center in Israel seemed to help them gain weight faster and become stronger. After listening to the music, the babies were calmer and so expended less energy. “When babies' energy expenditure is decreased, they don't need as many calories to grow, so can gain weight and thrive more quickly - exactly what preemies need,” the article reported.
Previous research has shown that music can reduce stress, decrease heart rate, and increase oxygen saturation in preterm infants. Oxygen saturation is a measure of the amount of oxygen carried in the blood relative to the maximum amount the blood could carry. When this number gets low it can be a sign of heart or lung problems.
The researchers decided to try Mozart music because of a 1993 study that found that college students could temporarily improve their performance on spatial-temporal tasks by listening to a Mozart sonata for 10 minutes a day.
"The repetitive melodies in Mozart's music may be affecting the organizational centers of the brain's cortex," stated researcher Dror Mandel, a lecturer at Tel Aviv University.
More research has been conducted with babies and classical music, resulting in a general consensus in the scientific community that classical music does aid in an infant’s mental and physical development. This belief is shared by Dr. Robert Dowse and the staff at Premier Pediatrics in Cedar City. Dowse and his clinic are sponsoring the 2010 Baby Ears CDs, which will be given to the new mothers at Valley View Medical Center.
The benefits of presenting classical music to infants and young children are numerous and include both emotional and intellectual advantages. Stein commented that Lucy becomes calm and wide-eyed when she listens to the music. She seems very interested in it. “My whole family loves it,” Stein continued, “My children get excited when 'Jupiter’ begins; it is a really dramatic piece.”
Charlene Greenhalgh has been teaching at the Iron County Special Education Preschool for 12 years. She has also taught piano lessons for 18 years and directed a community children's performing group called "Sunshine Generation" for several years.
“When I started teaching school,” Greenhalgh stated, “I started a music program with the children. I knew it was important, but it was even more necessary for the children that I taught that had special needs. I found that when I used music to teach concepts, the children were able to learn more and retain the information longer than teaching the subject without the musical component. I also found that as we moved our bodies to the rhythm of the song or acted the song out, the children were learning faster and more easily than any other method.”
Greenhalgh continued, “[Music] is one of the few activities that engage both the right and left hemispheres of the brain. Because music has order and pattern, it helps the brain organize input easier.”
Greenhalgh also clarified, “The type of music does matter. Although it is important to expose children to a wide variety of music, not all music is created equal. It is important to listen to classical music as contains themes, patterns, and melodic phrases. It is also important for children to listen to developmentally appropriate music that teaches rhyme, rhythm, new vocabulary, and academic concepts.”
Some skeptics have questioned how a parent or grandparent can know for certain that classical music will help their child or grandchild’s mental development. The evidence can be seen in those children and young adults who were introduced to classical music at a young age.
Blaine and Kirsten Hofeling of Cedar City have made classical music a priority in her home. “If you're a Hofeling, you play music, and you usually learn several instruments.” Kirsten said. “Music is an absolute joy in our family. It has created in our family innumerable memories and happy times together and for them alone as they've played their instruments. It is a very bonding and strengthening tool in building our family relationships.”
The Hofelings nine children were each introduced to their instruments at the age of five. However, Kirsten reported that they were all exposed to music while in the womb as their home is always alive with the selected songs in the Suzuki repetoire being played by older siblings, and Suzuki recordings, and other classical music.
And do the Hofelings believe this exposure to classical music has helped their children? “Absolutely,” Kirsten stated, “Their minds are so supple and open as children. When you fill their hearts with beautiful music, they are naturally drawn to beautiful music. Raucous and offensive music has not been an attraction for them. They learn from a very young age, the power of music to communicate across ages, languages, races and religions. Music emotes emotions and feelings all of us can understand. It is a tremendous bridge to the human family.
“Music becomes a tool for coming into touch with their thoughts and emotions. It can be a motivator to work, an avenue for reflection, a memory of comfort, peace, happiness and security. They learn the soothing effects of music as well as the joy in the beat and movement of music. Music is such a marvelous tool to create moods and expression of oneself.”
With the Hofeling family half-grown, it is easy to see the benefits of classical music provides to young children. How classical music has helped the Stein family will be revealed on a future date. In the meantime, the Orchestra of Southern Utah is delighted to provide the Baby Ears Project and give Lucy and many infants like her a gift that will help them throughout their lives: the gift of classical music.
