Feelings

Part Five: The Emotional Life of the Toddler

Control of emotions is one of the most complex challenges facing toddlers and their parents. children vary greatly in the intensity of how they experience and express feelings, depending on inborn temperamental factors, but it is a rare toddler whose feelings do not become intense and overwhelming at times. As parents provide both limits and loving support to their toddler, they are helping the child gradually learn ways of handling and modulating their feelings so that the tantrums of the 2-year-old ideally give way to emphatic verbal argument of the pre-schooler.

Developing competence in language and increasingly complex symbolic play skills will help this process immensely. Music as a fundamental route for the expression of human emotion, is an excellent tool for helping young children learn to identify and channel emotions. Very young children can identify and channel emotions. Very young children can identify music that makes them happy or sad, and enter enthusiastically into singing songs, or even verses within the same song that express emotion. Learning to identify loving, contented feelings and feelings of anger, fear and sadness are equally important human tasks. Musical expression of these wide ranges of emotion can help make them more manageable, less overwhelming, and much more understandable to the child who language skills are still emerging.

It is clear that many of the elements that make up a Kindermusik class enhance a toddler's ability to progress in these crucial tasks. The structure of the Kindermusik program and the opportunities it offers have the potential to directly enhance each parents ability to support his or her child in these tasks, and thus increase th joy inherent in parenting a bright, musical toddler.

What’s typical language acquisition?

Although every child is different, these are some guidelines...

Babies start acquiring language since they are in the womb. But by the time they are 6 months old, they are vocalizing more and they respond when they hear their names!! (how cute is that!).

By their 1st year, they start saying some words or approximation of words. Although these words are not produced perfectly, they use these words with intention and consistently. Around this time they are also able to follow some simple directions such as give me the ball, come here, etc.

Around their 2nd year, their vocabulary explodes! They know about 250 words! (Be careful with what you say, they learn words quickly!). They use 1-2 word sentences.

Between ages 4 and 5, they expand their vocabulary and they learn best through pretend play. They answer basic questions, they can re-tell a story (not many details), and participate in conversation.

Keep in mind that each child is different and they learn differently. So, if your child is not doing some of these things, don’t panic yet! If you have questions contact your pediatrician, your local school or contact ASHA to find a speech pathologist in your area.

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Reprinted from : Language, Music and More Blog
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Your Toddler and Beat and Rhythm

If anyone seems to march to the beat of a different drummer, it's a toddler. But watch your toddler during any music time and you'll see how remarkably capable s/he is of moving in time to the music. It may look awkward, but not only can s/he keep a simple beat, he enjoys it. the toddler years are all about taking chage of one's own body, and moving to the beat is yet another way of saying, "I am the master of my arms and legs!" You may even find your child inventing his own little nonsense songs, complete with his own unique rhythms.

Learning to dance in rhythm has some fascinating implications for developing cognitive skills. Rhythms are patterns: some very simple, such as the on-two, one-two of a march, and some much more comples (salsa, anyone?). Although we parents may think that learning how to count is the first math skill we teach our children, learning about patterns is a math skill that begins much earlier. So keep on dancing...One-two, cha-cha-cha.