We Value PLAY

It's March, and if you live in a snowy place you might be feeling the effects of cabin fever by now.  Your family needs to have some fun and movement- the good news is you'll get it this week in Let's Play Music class!

At Let's Play Music, we value PLAY.  We believe that fun, spontaneous experiences heighten enjoyment and create magical discoveries.

Play is how children figure things out; play is HOW they learn.  Fred Rogers states it perfectly: "Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning.  But for children, play is serious learning.  Play is really the 'work' of childhood."



Four Reasons to Play
Kids learn best when they're playing, but why?  Here are my top four reasons with an explanation of how you'll see play shape our classes.

1. Play gives children the opportunity to try out new ideas in a safe environment. When "it's just a game", a student has freedom from evaluation and judgement. During games, it's easy to embrace mistakes with a laugh, because they are a built-in expectation.  (Read the post on the learning process to see why embracing mistakes is so necessary!) 

I think of many games, like Frog in the Middle. I am secretly giving students practice finding and matching a beat, aurally identifying melodic patterns, and matching and singing pitches. The students love this "practicing" because it's so silly! They are excited to take a turn showing off their dance.  They don't worry about performance tests, but they DO strive to master their moves and hand signs so the game will be better each week.

Every LPM game has a secret agenda, but to avoid damping the fun, I don't tell students about it during class. (Watch for next month's post on being sneaky.)

It makes sense that all of us are willing to try new things when we're unafraid of punishment for not being perfect.  In making music, we have to start somewhere, and it's far from perfection.

2. During play, children practice human values: cooperation, sharing, turn-taking, and conflict resolution. I recently heard a lecture from a child psychologist who would gauge these skills by timing how long children could sustain a group game.  One child would invent parameters for the play, "Let's play house", but others would inevitably add suggestions, "no, superheroes!" When the children could compromise, resolve conflicts, and be flexible, then they could keep the game going instead of giving up ("mom! we're bored!") or losing participants ("forget it! I'm not playing with you!"). Play time is an opportunity to practice interacting with others. "Okay, let's be a superhero family and we can pretend to go on a trip."  

By now you've caught on that Let's Play Music classes are about more than just teaching your child to do something.  Let's Play Music is about teaching your child to become something.  Our game-oriented class gives opportunities to practice these skills.

When I play the games like Circle Left, with my class, they work because everyone participates in making the circle rotate.  I offer each student a turn to decide how we will march/fly/skip/dance.  I remember one class when a student flopped to the floor during a game, upset about some offense.  Another classmate also stepped out of the game and gently went to him. "Oh, are you sad? Will you come back to the game? We would all like if you come be part of our circle. Will you come with me?"  My heart swelled as Sylvi reached out to her classmate. Her focus on considering everyone showed that she was practicing these skills.

3. The child at play is self-motivated and actively engaged.  Too-common are the stories from adults who took a few piano lessons as kids but for some reason didn't stick with it. Was practicing drudgery? Were lessons like a lecture? Were you wondering when it was going to start being fun? Did you wish going to lessons was as fun as going to Let's Play Music!?

I know your child will practice every day if it's part of your daily routine, and if he's looking forward to a weekly prize, or if he knows he doesn't get screen time until it's done.  Each of these extrinsic motivators has a definite place for establishing the practice habit early on, but what will happen when you take those motivations away someday? (I, for one, am planning on having my kids move out someday.)  

Our long-term goal is to help students discover the fun and joy and playfulness that can be found in making music, so they will eventually be self-motivated, intrinsically-motivated, to continue with practice and music studies when they graduate. Yes, making music takes focus, effort, and WORK (so does mastering the final level of Super Mario Bros). This brings us back to the fuzzy line between work and play: when your child can find the PLAY within the WORK, he'll have the motivation to stick with the training.

We don't pretend music-making is not hard work, but we do find every opportunity to highlight the silly and fun potential.  The process of finding joy in the work of music is sometimes a long, slow, road. So we keep our eye on the goal and make sure to help students recognize the joy whenever we can.

4. Play provides opportunities for fine and gross motor development. This truth applies to all of the playtime activities your child enjoys.  I'm thinking about the countless hours my own daughter spends dressing and undressing her baby dolls: definitely lots of fine motor practice there!

Moving around doesn't just improve motor skills; mounting scientific evidence from neuropsychologists and neurophysiologists teaches us that movement is crucial to learning.  Experiential, active instruction is most likely to lead to long-term memory of new concepts.  Playing a game in which you run to the magnet board, add your skip or baby step, and dash back to your seat helps you internalize the concept more strongly than if your teacher just showed it to you.

Not surprisingly, physiological stress reactions can negatively affect learning.  When your mind is in "playtime" mode, you are physiologically relaxed and ready to learn at your best.  Physical movement helps the brain perceive events and information in a non-stressful way so is learned more easily. Teaching via physical games is a winning strategy we use in Let's Play Music class!

Stages of Play

Finallly, one more big difference between Let's Play Music and other options is our group class format.  Parents sometimes wonder if their child would be better off with a private teacher right from the beginning.  Now that we know children learn through play, classes are formatted to accommodate the style of learning and playing at this age, and that translates into playing with friends.  
How do children play at each age?

Ages 0-2 : Solitary Play: Plays alone, starts to interact with adults. 

Ages 2-2.5: Spectator: Observes other children and copies them, enjoys repetitive motions.

Ages 2.5-3: Parallel: Plays along-side other children (not necessarily with them), copies actions of other adults and children. Play is imaginative.

Ages 3-4: Associative: Starts to develop cooperative play, starts to develop friendships, shows interest in 'why' and 'how' things are done during play.

Ages 4.5-6: Cooperative: Thrives in small-group play, enjoys cooperative games, enjoys learning and applying rules and demonstrating mastery.

When music theory is taught via silly group games, our students are set up for success.  Learning with a group of 5 friends is easier and more engaging for them than having a teacher one-on-one.

Our Teachers Model Play
Check out these Let's Play Music teachers using playfulness to enhance teaching:

Sarah McKay in Marietta, OH, introduced the song BINGO to her class, and realized they needed a few moments to treasure the joy of pretending to be doggies. After a moment of play, they had laser focus for learning the rhythms.

Michelle Bellingston in Pittsburgh, PA, helps her daughter find easy and playful ways to make practicing fun, like putting on a show for her stuffed animals.  

Marie Guthrie in Mesa, AZ, finds ways to sneak learning into playtime with her family.  During the popular card game, Sleeping Queens, they sing melodies from our Royal Problem puppet show when a dragon card is drawn!

Ann Cue in Madison, WI, makes sure parents have fun and play along, because kids love it!  When it's time to put on silly "root-finding glasses," moms get to dress up in style! Finding the roots of the chords has never been sillier or more successful.

The Results are In
The National Association for the Education of Young Children (NAEYC) has identified the importance of playful learning in supporting children's development.  They also note the importance of joyfulness in learning- not typically assessed as an outcome of programs, but identified for its importance. When children find something fun, they learn more effectively.

If you are excited about PLAY and its role in your child's education, be sure to register for Let's Play Music classes, and then perhaps enjoy some additional reading:

The Power Of Play: Learning what Comes Naturally, by David Elkind.
Smart Moves, Why Learning is Not All in Your Head Carla Hannaford 
Play=Learning: How Play Motivates and Enhances Children's Cognitive Growth, Dorothy Singer.
Play: How it Shapes the Brain, Stuart Brown
A Moving Child is a Learning Child, Gill Connell
Playful Learning: Develop Your Child's Sense of Joy, Mariah Bruehl.

Stay tuned as we focus on one of our CORE VALUES each month. Our classes are patterned and structured differently from other programs; you'll understand why as we explain what we value.

-Gina Weibel, M.S.
Let's Play Music teacher

Celeste Stott: Music and the Karate Kid

Celeste Stott: Creating Musicians in Montana

Hi, Everyone!  I am Celeste Stott from Choteau, Montana.  I live at the base of the Rocky Mountains.  We have a cattle ranch about 20 minutes from a tiny town of 1800 people.  Choteau is amazing: the people value music education and make sacrifices to participate.  My studio is unique because I teach in my generous in-law’s home so that my clients do not have to travel quite so far.

I have been married almost 22 years and have 4 children: 2 boys and 2 girls.  I love to scrapbook, sing, play the piano, play the violin and dance.  I love taking pictures of the Rocky Mountain Front, especially on horseback.  My favorite pictures I take are of my children.  I love to cook and bake for others.  A few of my bucket list items are to go hang gliding, play the cello and the harp.  

My sister introduced me to Let’s Play Music in 2005.  When I talked to her on the phone, I would hear my very young nieces and nephews playing advanced piano pieces.  This program called to me and I knew I wanted it for my own children, too.  I saved my pennies and trained in 2008 and started teaching 4 classes. I was thrilled to have had such a supportive response from my music-loving community. My 3 oldest children had the privilege to graduate from my first group of students and have continued in piano, singing and playing other various instruments.  

A Blessing to Children in the Area

I trained to become a Sound Beginnings teacher with the first group to train in 2012.  What a gift this program has been to my studio and children in this area. I am thrilled every day to see the benefits of learning during the music-learning window.  There is no substitute for teaching ear-training during this window of time when young children are most sensitive to it. My daughter is in her second year of Sound Beginnings and loves it. I could tell when she was a tiny baby that she had already learned a great deal about her voice and music.  I am convinced that all my teaching and singing during her pregnancy formed permanent hard wiring in her brain for music aptitude.  She truly was a little mocking bird, matching my pitch as early as 5 months old! This was phenomenal to witness!  I am blessed to see this happen for other children every day.  

My True Passion

From the time I was tiny, I knew I wanted to be a teacher. I am thrilled to have found my true passion: teaching music to children.  Children are my favorite people ever and they are pure joy to have in my life.  They are why I do what I do.  My love of music and my conviction of the importance of children learning music is the second reason I teach Let’s Play Music and Sound Beginnings. I have taught piano and violin for over 20 years to anyone who wanted to learn and am blessed to have these two programs that have taken my teaching to a new level.

Music for 'The Karate Kid'

I love how Let’s Play Music teaches music with music, uses as many senses as possible, uses the full body, by “experiencing” music first and it is all done through play!  I am blown away at how in a matter of 24 nonconsecutive months, children are playing in 5 different keys, composing, transposing, improvising, and have a knowledge of chords and their structure!  I love how sneaky we are about teaching theory in a fun way! 

I had a parent compare LPM to “The Karate Kid".  Mr. Miyagi was training Daniel-san in Karate when Daniel only thought he was painting a fence and waxing a car.  This parent was expressing that the things LPM teaches are preparing children to be a whole musician, one step at a time, even if they don’t understand how it will all come together.  I am able to see how these tiny steps have made a difference in my violin and private piano students that have become complete musicians in Let’s Play Music as a primer to further study.  It makes all the difference in the world!

The most rewarding part of teaching Let’s Play Music is that I get to be a part of sharing my love of music with another person.  I know music will be my student’s life-long friend and will help all of their cognitive learning.  

Pay It Forward

My vision is for my students is for them to love music and share it with others.  Talk about paying it forward!  That is my dream….to make the world better by sharing the gift of music!  I hope my students will leave my studio equipped with confidence, a great self-esteem, concrete musical skills and a desire to continue to compose and play music forever.  I adore every one of my students and I am grateful to have them a part of my week!  Their unconditional love, cute stories and things they say and enthusiasm are priceless to me.

You may watch me teach here.

-Celeste Stott, LPM Teacher