Music Installment #2 - Pre-Natal and Newborns

Today was an exciting one for our family.  My daughter found out if they are going to have her 4th boy, or finally get a baby girl the end of May.  They came over and the boys all excitedly announced, "We're having a girl baby!"  And, my other daughter who has two girls is expecting a boy baby the first part of May.  That was very exciting news too!

Because of the two little grandchildren on the way, I decided to share this part about music that addresses Pre-natal, and Newborns.

Pre-Natal

Anthony De Casper of the University of North Carolina has shown that fetuses store in their memories complex songs that are sung to them daily during the last trimester.  After delivery, babies respond with increased attention to these familiar songs.  (The Times-Picayune 3/13/95)

Babies - Soothing tapes placed in hospitals.

What the hospitals have noticed, says Woodford, is that restless babies, even some babies in pain following surgery, will nod off to sleep, sometimes as soon as the tape is turned on.  Hospitals are not generally the most comforting of places.  There are too many frightful procedures, too  many strangers, too many alarms and beepers and TV sets, all creating a 'Startle effect.'  But lullabies and heartbeats are calming, even in the worst of situations, he says.  More than 30,000 of the tapes have been stolen (ooo, Kind of freaky, but on "Good Luck Charlie" a guy just now was practicing his violin, a classical piece.  Teddy bursts into the room and he says, "Huh, that was exciting for a second."  I thought so too, that's why I'm telling about it!) from US hospitals since they were first introduced seven years ago.  Woodford also says nursing homes have found the tapes helpful in calming down Alzheimer's patients."  (Elaine Jarvik, Deseret News)

From my own personal experience, my unborn children were exposed to great music at church.  Then, when I was expecting my fourth baby, I started my first child in piano lessons.  The Suzuki method.  It has you play the tapes of the songs they are going to be learning every day.  My three children were ages 5, 4, and 1.  So, they were all young enough to greatly benefit from listening to it.  Then, when I was expecting my 5th child, the older children were listening to more advanced classical music every day.  And, after my 5th baby was born, she began sleeping through the night at age two weeks!  It seemed miraculous.  I just thought she must have known that with four other little kids, I needed her to be a happy, calm baby.  But, after reading this, I have to seriously consider it was the music that could have had something to do with it.

I highly recommend playing classical music and lullabies for your little children, and those who are "on the way." 

Doreese

First New Year's Resolution for Parents: GET MUSIC INTO MY CHILD

My last blog of last year had to do with music, and I will be leading this year off by talking about music again.  The next few posts, we'll be discussing the influence of music on education.

Why should you care about music?  Because there is a direct relation to higher test scores and exposure to good music, as well as personality traits, and lots of other good stuff!

I'm using information from articles by Michael Ballam posted online 10/24/2002.  

1.  Developing "neural circuits" or pathways of synaptic response which causes and retains learning

      "Last October researchers at the University of Konstanz in Germany reported that exposure to music rewires neural circuits."   A study was done of nine string players, and the amount of the brain dedicated to the thumb and fifth finger of the left hand was significantly larger than in non players.  How long the players practiced each day did not affect the cortical map.  But the age at which they had been introduced to their muse did.  "The younger the child when he or she took up the instrument, the more cortex he or she devoted to playing it.  Like other circuits formed early in life, the ones for music endure."

      Chugani played the guitar as a child, then gave it up.  As a father, he started taking piano lessons with his young daughter.  She learned easily but he couldn't get his fingers to follow his wishes.  "Yet, when Chugani recently picked up a guitar, he found to his delight that, 'The songs are still there,' much like the muscle memory for riding a bicycle."  The musical brain learning window is 3 to 19 years.  Few concert-level performers begin playing later than the age of 10.  It's much harder to learn an instrument as an adult.

               

Next time I will talk about what we can do about developing the "musical muscle" in our children's brain.  And, don't stress out if it is impossible for you to give your child an instrument and music lessons, there are still things you can do!

Doreese