Musical Babies
From birth to about two years, we learn about our environment through our senses and motion in space. Piaget called this the sensorimotor stage of development. Newborns get to know their mothers through the sound of their voices, the smell of their bodies, and the touch of their skin. Healthy babies respond to the environment by sucking, mouthing objects, grabbing, cooing, kicking, and crying. As their motor skills develop, they explore their world by creeping and crawling, experiencing what’s around them. During this stage of development, music offers incredible opportunities for sensory stimulation and motor activity.
Newborns are active listeners. Even though hearing isn’t fully developed at birth, infants can discriminate between sounds and will seek out their source. They are attracted to the sound of their mother’s voice. Adults spontaneously use “baby talk,” or infant-directed speech (IDS) with newborns. IDS is typically higher in pitch, uses simple syntax and shorter phrases, is spoken at a slower rate, has exaggerated prosody, and is often used with more exaggerated facial expressions, at least in Western cultures.
Infants as young as two days respond to changes in rhythmic patterns. At two months they begin to focus their attention on singers or musical instruments. Because of this, parents who sing lullabies to their children create and strengthen natural affectionate connections between them. The child is stimulated by the parent’s voice, and the parents are given immediate positive feedback by the attention of the child.
As babies mature, their responses to musical sounds and objects expand. Light bells or chimes may create smiles as early as three months. During their first six months, babies respond to music with generalized movements and begin matching vocalizations with their caregivers. As they seek sensory stimulus, they pay specific attention to musical sound sources - songs, lullabies, chants, rhymes, rattles - and the musical inflection of the voice. Attach an ankle bell to their booties and babies will squeal with joy as they discover they can make sound by kicking. Give them a toy that makes noise when they strike it and they will be equally elated. In both cases they are encouraged to move, increasing strength and coordination.
As babies grow, their movements become more purposeful and deliberate. They start rolling over, sitting up, crawling, and eventually walking. At the same time, they learn to manipulate objects, including shaking rattles, banging pots and pans, and learning about the connections between sound, shape, and size.
At the same time, their motor activity is expanding and refining, as is their ability to vocalize. Babbling and vocal play is normally seen around 12 to 16 months. This kind of sound-making is an important part of developing motor control of the tongue and lips in preparation for language. By the time they are 19 months old, melodic and rhythmic patterns begin to emerge in their vocalizations. They begin to spontaneously make up short songs and melodic phrases with flexible, irregular rhythms. Listen to a toddler playing and you’ll hear short melodic phrases that serve as a precursor to more sophisticated speech.
At this point in a child’s life, music is a wonderful tool to promote learning because of the very nature of the sensory-motor stage. Music at this stage in life elicits responses within sensory, communication, cognitive, social, and motor domains. Appropriate musical activities, designed around the child’s level of development, are natural tools for education and therapeutic use to assist the child in making up for any deficits in skill building. Through these activities, children gain greater mastery over their environments and themselves.
