Kindermusik featured artist David Holt and how music saved his heart

Years ago, musician and archivist David Holt lost his daughter in a car accident. In the grieving process he made a list of things to live for. 


Simple things topped the list, he says in this Ted Talks video. The feel of a baby's hand, seeing Bluegrass musician Doc Watson play guitar, watching daffodils bloom in the spring. 


Around that time, someone gave David a steel guitar and a bottleneck slide. Something about that sound - the glass bottle neck slide over a resonator guitar - helped David express something he couldn't say before, he says: the healing power of music. 


David was also a featured speaker years ago at the Kindermusik Convention in Nashville, TN several years ago. Many of the Appalachian folk songs David plays in his show are also part of the Kindermusik experience, in addition to the wide variety of music you'll hear in Kindermusik classes.

Explore more songs in the folk genre in the Kindermusik online music store here.

Math students in California start with the basics: Music Education

"Math teachers know that fractions can be hard for the average third-grader. Teachers at a public school in San Bruno, Calif., just south of San Francisco, are trying something new. They're teaching difficult math concepts through music, and they're getting remarkable results."

npr.org: Fractions curriculum in Fractions Curriculum Strikes the Right Note with Students. 

To learn more about teaching early concepts of music and notation to young children, ask about the Young Child program in Kindermusik Training.

Kindermusik for the Young Child

Age range: 5 to 7 years old

Class length: 60-70 minutes

Children learn to play three basic instruments - a stringed, wind, and keyboard instrument - along with early concepts of music and notation.

Using a small-group approach to music education, Kindermusik for the Young Child provides a pressure-free class where your child can develop a strong musical foundation by learning the concepts, language, notation, and vocabulary of music and its greatest composers. 

The program is designed to prepare the young child who is eager for first experiences with musical symbols and instrument discovery but is not yet ready for formal lessons and traditional music reading with an instrument. Parents or caregivers are encouraged to attend the last 10-15 minutes of class. 

Cereal Box Guitars

We loved this cereal box guitar, made by a creative parent. Visit The Fraker's Acres blog to learn and see more.

What the Mahler 9 taught me about active listening

Photo by The Inhabitant

Can you hear me? Rub the outer edge of your ears. 

Will your cell phone ring while you're reading this? If so, can you turn it off?

In Kindermusik Educator training, we learn that focused listening is an active experience. It's a learned skill, and it's one of most critical lessons in early childhood. Recent events in the news remind me that listening is also an ongoing lesson - it doesn't stop in childhood. And we may be living in an era when the simple act of listening is one of the most distracting parts of our day.

If you haven't heard the recent story, the twitter version goes like this:  "Concertus interruptus: unsilenced cell phone brings a New York Philharmonic performance to a halt." During Gustav Mahler's Ninth Symphony" -- a haunting piece some say the composer wrote as he faced his own death -- a cell phone started ringing in the audience," according the story in cnn.com.

"New York Philharmonic conductor Alan Gilbert reacted to the intrusion by stopping the music. He didn't melodramatically fling his arms down; rather, he merely dropped his hands, which alerted the musicians to stop playing, according to Jo. 

Then, the only sound in the great room was the "Marimba" ringtone of the cell phone, Jo said. 

Gilbert turned his attention to the owner of the phone, who was seated on the front row, and asked, "Are you finished?" 

When there was no reply, Gilbert said, "Fine, we'll wait," and placed his baton on his music stand, according to Jo."

I loved Gilbert's calm reaction and focused listening as he waited for someone to turn off the cell phone. As Kindermusik Educators and musicians we have a unique opportunity to help families practice the art of listening - even in the midst of unnerving interruption. We learn in Kindermusik training to model active listening behaviors - to rub your ears, bend closer to the listener, and model the "your turn, my turn" response. We help families learn how music literally helps little ones "tune in" to the sounds we want to hear, and don't want to hear. 

We also have a chance to help parents learn the simple act of turning off their phones for some focused listening in class. It could become the one hour a day when a child isn't interrupted by a parent's ringing cell phone.  

Here are a few ways we could introduce the concept in the classroom. 

1. Make it a part of your class routine. In class we learn to take off our shoes before Kindermusik, include the reminder to turn off your cell phones, too, as a part of the class ritual.

2. Remind families that listening is a learned skill. Children learn "focused listening" by watching adults model appropriate listening behaviors. When they see adults take action to listen - by showing them how we're turning off our phones to completely focus and listen to the child - we're showing them how we value what they have to say, and that we want to hear them without interruption.

3. Slip in the reminder during the "rub your ears" reminder during class. Remember to ask questions: "Is your cell phone off? Are you ready to listen?"

The idea is to learn how to live with technology - not complain about the problems. In your classrooms you have a unique opportunity to help parents learn how to better model active listening among modern day distractions. A reminder that might activate just before they go into a movie theater or to a concert symphony hall.

Can you hear me now?

Introducing Bryant Belin

“I believe in the education of the entire individual,” said Bryant Belin, educator, musician, and newly licensed Kindermusik Educator. “That is why I have chosen to use the Kindermusik system with young children.”

Belin is the owner and director of VP Music Studios and soloist at Tryon Congregational Church. He has more than 10 years teaching and performi ng experience. He graduated from Coker College with a B.A in vocal performance and has participated in the graduate certificate program at the University of South Carolina – Columbia.

In 2007, Belin was invited to study and perform in Spain as well as the Rome Festival of 2011. He has taught voice, music theory and music fundamentals in general, not only in the Western North Carolina area but also in various places throughout South Carolina.

In addition to currently pursuing his master of music degree in performance from Converse College, he has also participated in studies from Boston University’s MM Music Education program. He sings as a bass-baritone concert soloist, Sunday soloist and choral section leader in the Western North Carolina area for various churches and organizations, including the Congregational Church of Tryon, Blue Ridge Sacred Chorale and Asheville Lyric Opera. He was a featured soloist at Tryon Fine Arts Center’s 2011 Do-It-Yourself “Messiah.”


Welcome, Brian. 


source: Tyron Daily Bulletin

Natural Science

Patricia Kuhl is in the news again. The leading expert on language and author of "The Scientist in the Crib" received a French award for her work using highly scientific approaches to understand the highly scientific process babies use to learn language.

Kuhl talks more about it -- in her own endearing words -- in the above TEDTalks video.

Kuhl is a frequent speaker and internationally-recognized expert on the topic (she has her own wiki page for crying out loud). She has a way of making science sensible and relatable. Even still, every time I read a new research report, or discover another story about a scientific breakthrough on child development or parenting, something inside me goes, "Well, duh. Yea."

Some scientists literally go around the world to discover something that in the end, seems like common sense -- in retrospect. Hindsight is 20/20, right? Science and scientists use their intuitive skills to uncover the mystery of intuition.

In Kindermusik training, we learn about the science driving a parent's natural instinct to care for their baby. We also learn about the child's developmental process, so we can match the right activities to nurture and challenge those developmental milestones.

Kindermusik makes the science of parenting, sensible. Natural.

Photo by Motorito

The result for Educators is a deeper understanding of what's happening between a care-giver and a child. It's a beautiful thing to watch grandpa play "Got your nose" with his grandson. And in Kindermusik training, we learn the natural science behind this endearing moment: Grandpa has just doubled the child's chances of learning the word "nose" because he said the word when he grabbed that cute little nose. And sitting in the arms of a loving grandfather, the chances of a child remembering that word just rose exponentially.

Not duh, but "awe." As in "awww, isn't that cute?" And "awe," as in amazing.

Some parents have a "knowing" about their parenting. Some parents want more information. In Kindermusik classes, we nurture both. We can speak to both types of learning parents.

It's a natural science.

Take a look around

Miss Sunny asks her parents to share what's so great about Kindermusik, and we agree!

Good Beginning

"I have seen the amazing results that occur teaching students a second language through music and movement."