Music therapy in kindergarten: tasks and goals, choice of music, development methodology, features of conducting classes and a positive impact on the child

2024 Author: Priscilla Miln | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 00:21

Music accompanies us throughout his life. It is difficult to find such a person who would not like to listen to it - either classical, or modern, or folk. Many of us love to dance, sing, or even just whistle a tune. But do you know about the benefits of music for the body? Not everyone has probably thought about this.

But the pleasant sounds of melodies are used as a treatment method without drugs. This method is called music therapy, and its use has a positive effect on the body, both adults and children.

A bit of history

The fact that music has an effect on the human body was pointed out by the philosophers of the ancient world. Plato, Pythagoras and Aristotle in their writings talked about the healing power that the melody has. They believed that music served to establish harmony andproportional order throughout the universe. She is also able to create the necessary balance in the human body.

Music therapy was also used during the Middle Ages. This method helped in the treatment of diseases that caused epidemics. At that time in Italy, this method was widely used in the treatment of tarantism. This is a serious mental illness caused by the bite of a tarantula (poisonous spider).

This phenomenon was first attempted to be explained only in the 17th century. And two centuries later, scientists began to conduct extensive studies of this phenomenon. As a result, the fact was established that the twelve sounds included in the octave have a harmonious connection with the 12 systems of the human body. With the directed influence of music or singing on our body, amazing things happen. The organs are brought into a state of increased vibration. A similar process allows you to strengthen the immune system, improve metabolism and activate recovery processes. As a result, a person gets rid of ailments and recovers.

Thus, music therapy is considered not only the most interesting, but also a very promising direction. It is used in many countries of the world for he alth and medicinal purposes.

Music and children

Kids living in the modern world spend most of their time playing computer games and watching TV screens. Most often, parents do not mind such activities for their child. Indeed, at this time, silence reigns in the house, and adults can safely go about their business. However, moms and dads should remember that frequent communication withcomputer and TV can negatively affect their baby. After all, cartoons often radiate outright aggression, and there are a lot of violence and murders in the plots of films. All this negatively affects the fragile psyche of the child. But it happens that even the relationship between parents is not going well. In this case, the baby gets a real psychological trauma. He becomes insecure and withdrawn. Often these children experience feelings of fear and guilt. They are afraid that no one needs them, and no one is able to protect them. In addition, these children develop bad habits.

All this has a negative impact on the relationship between children. But at a young age, contacts with peers play an extremely important role. It becomes difficult for the child to enter the team because of self-doubt and fear that they simply will not be accepted.

Music therapy for children can help in this case. It is a psychotherapeutic method that allows you to correct emotional states. The use of this therapy leads to the rapid elimination of mental stress.

The huge benefit of music therapy for children lies in its ability to eliminate behavioral problems, as well as experience age-related crises that are associated with the development of the baby.

The harmonizing effect of melodies on mental processes is used in work with preschoolers. In this case, the teacher can use a huge number of methods. Regardless of which one is chosen, music therapy sessions forpreschool children have only one goal. It consists in the fact that the baby begins to realize himself and his existence in the world around him.

Importance of conducting classes

Music therapy for young children is a special form of work with toddlers. In this case, the teacher uses various melodies, which can be either recordings on a tape recorder, or playing musical instruments, singing, listening to discs, etc.

Music therapy in kindergarten is a great opportunity to activate the child. Thanks to this, he begins to overcome the unfavorable attitudes in his mind, establishes relationships with people around him, which improves his emotional state. In addition, music therapy for preschool children is also necessary for the correction of various emotional deviations, speech and movement disorders. This technique helps to correct deviations in behavior, eliminate communication difficulties, and also cure a variety of psychosomatic and somatic pathologies.

Music therapy also helps in the development of the child. It creates optimal conditions for educating a little person's taste and aesthetic feelings, helps him discover new abilities.

The use of music therapy for young children contributes to the formation of their norms of behavior and character, and also enriches the inner world of a small person with vivid experiences. At the same time, listening to songs and melodies allows solving the problem of forming the moral qualities of a person,aesthetic relationship of the baby to the world around. At the same time, children are brought up with a love for art.

Music therapy programs

Specialists note that the combination of traditional means and teaching methods with listening to melodies and songs can significantly increase the level of development of preschoolers. This has also been proven by research. Music therapy for preschool children can be used not only for psychological and pedagogical correction, but also for therapeutic and prophylactic purposes. The possibilities of this method are wide enough. At the same time, a specific music therapy program for preschool children can be selected by a specialist from an extensive list that is available today.

K. Shvabe, who is one of the founders of this type of treatment, pointed out that there are three directions in using the sounds of melodies:

• functional (prophylactic);
• pedagogical;
• medical.

Musical influences that are components of these directions, in turn, are:

• mediated and non-mediated, based on the scope of application;
• group and individual, differing in the way of organizing classes;
• active and supportive, with a different range of action;
• directive and non-directive, indicating the type of contact between pupils and the teacher;
• deep and superficial, which characterizes the alleged finalcontact.

Let's take a closer look at some of these methods.

Private Music Therapy

This type of impact can be carried out in three ways:

1. Distinctively communicative. With this type of influence, the child listens to a piece of music together with the teacher. In this case, the melody can improve the interaction between the adult and his pupil.
2. Reactive. This effect promotes purification.
3. Regulatory. This type of influence allows you to eliminate neuropsychic stress in a child.

These forms in the music therapy class in kindergarten can be used separately from each other or in combination.

Group audition

This type of music therapy class in kindergarten should be built so that all participants in the process can freely communicate with each other. Only in this case, the classes will become quite dynamic, because within the group, relationships of a communicative-emotional nature will certainly arise.

Organizing creative activities is one of the best ways to relieve stress. This is especially important for those children who cannot speak out. It is much easier for them to engage in creativity, where their fantasies will find expression. Stories are very difficult for them.

Passive music therapy

This is a receptive form of influence, the difference of which is that the child does not take an active part in the lesson. In this process, he is a mere listener.

During classes withUsing the passive form of music therapy in kindergarten, preschoolers are invited to listen to a variety of compositions or listen to the sounds, selected in accordance with the state of he alth of the baby and the stage of treatment. Such activities aim to simulate a positive emotional state. All this will allow the child to get out of the traumatic situation through relaxation.

Let's consider options for conducting passive music therapy classes in work with children.

1. Music pictures. In such a lesson, the child perceives the melody together with the teacher. In the process of listening, the teacher helps the child to plunge into the world of images proposed by the work. To do this, the child is invited to focus on the musical picture. Within 5-10 minutes, the preschooler should be in the world of sounds. Communication with music will have a beneficial effect on the preschooler. To conduct such classes, the teacher must use instrumental classical works or the sounds of the wildlife world.
2. Musical modeling. In such classes, teachers are encouraged to use a program that includes fragments of works of various nature. Some of them should correspond to the mental state of the preschooler. The action of the second works neutralizes the influence of the previous fragment. The third type of music is necessary for recovery. At this stage, the teacher should select melodies that have the greatest emotional impact, that is, positive dynamics.
3. Mini relaxation. Conducting such classesmusic therapy in kindergarten helps to activate the muscle tone of the pupils. The child should feel and understand his body well, learning to relax it when tension occurs.

Active music therapy

During classes of this form, the child is offered singing and instrumental playing:

1. Vocal therapy. Such music therapy classes are held in kindergarten and at home. Vocal therapy allows you to create an optimistic mood in the baby. And for this, he must sing songs that will bring the inner world of the child into a harmonious state. In their texts, the formula "You are good, I am good" must certainly sound. Vocal therapy is especially recommended for egocentric, inhibited and depressed children. This method is also included in the preparation of a music therapy program for school-age children. With group vocal therapy, all the children present at the lesson are involved in the process. But here the specialist needs to take into account the moment of secrecy in the general mass and the anonymity of feelings. Participation in vocal therapy will allow the child to overcome contact disorders, affirming their own feelings for a he althy experience of existing bodily sensations.
2. Instrumental therapy. This type of music therapy also helps to create an optimistic mood. At the same time, children are invited to play a musical instrument.
3. Kinesitherapy. The general reactivity of the organism can be changed under the influence of various means and forms of movement. Such a process will make it possible to destroy pathological stereotypes, which are oftenoccur during the illness. At the same time, new attitudes arise in the mind of the child, which allow him to adapt to the surrounding reality. In such classes, children are taught the technique of expressing their emotions using body movements. This allows them to achieve relaxation. This type of music therapy is used in correctional work with children. Such classes contribute to the normalization of psychological and communicative functions. The kinesitherapy method includes a plot-game process, rhythmoplasty, corrective rhythmics, as well as psycho-gymnastics.

Integrative Music Therapy

In a similar technique, in addition to listening to melodies, the teacher also uses other types of art. He invites children to play a game to the music, draw, create a pantomime, compose stories or poems, etc.

Important in such classes is active music-making. It increases the child's self-esteem, which helps to overcome ambivalence in behavior. In order for children to perform simple pieces, the teacher can give them the simplest instruments, such as a drum, a xylophone, or a triangle. Such activities, as a rule, do not go beyond the search for simple harmonic, rhythmic and melodic forms, representing a kind of improvised game. Children participating in such a process develop dynamic adaptability and are fully prepared for mutual listening. Due to the fact that such classes are one of the forms of group music therapy, during theirall participants must actively communicate with each other. This will allow the process to be as dynamic as possible, which will lead to the emergence of a communicative-emotional relationship between children. The most important thing in this case is the child's self-expression through playing the suggested musical instrument.

Dance Movement Therapy

This form of practice serves as a bridge between the conscious and unconscious world. Dance movement therapy allows the child to express himself through movement. This will allow him to maintain his own individuality and establish contact with his peers. Such classes are the only type of music therapy that requires significant free space. During the dance, the child's motor behavior expands, which allows him to realize the conflicts of desires and contributes to the experience of negative feelings. Such an impact leads to liberation from the negative.

The combination of dance with singing or improvisation of movements to the sounds of classical melodies is especially valuable for a child's he alth. Oscillatory rhythmic movements that are performed to music that has three measures also have therapeutic value.

Treatment of speech disorders

Musical rhythm helps to eliminate some speech therapy problems. Among them is such a disorder of speech function as stuttering. Music therapy for children with speech disorders is carried out in the form of subgroup sessions. At the same time, the specialist offers his wards rhythmic games, breathing exercises andplaying the melody in a slowing down as well as in an accelerating tempo.

They also use music in the process of independent work. At this point, there is no verbal communication. With such music therapy, the exceptions are exercises for children in the form of reading to music. The specialist makes sure that the volume of the sound of the melody is strictly metered. The sounds that children hear should not be too loud, but at the same time too quiet.

The development of correctional programs for music therapy and their further use for the treatment of children with speech defects require the joint participation of music educators and psychologists.

It is worth noting that the use of this technique to eliminate speech pathologies is considered to be very effective and promising. This became possible due to the strong influence of music, which it has on the emotional state of a person. During such classes, as practice shows, there is a correction and development of perception sensations, which allows stimulating the speech function and normalizing the prosodic side of speech, that is, timbre and rhythm, as well as the expressiveness of intonation.

For children with speech therapy problems, special programs are being developed in which only those works that all little patients will certainly like are used. It can be musical pieces that are well known to children. The main condition for choosing a work is the factor that it should not distract the child from the main thing, attractingits novelty. The duration of listening does not exceed 10 minutes during one lesson.

Autism treatment

The main task of the music therapy technique for correcting the condition of children with a similar mental disorder is to establish auditory-vocal, auditory-motor, and visual-motor coordination, which should subsequently be synthesized in one activity.

The basic principle of conducting classes with children-outs lies in mental ecology. It provides for the presence of soft music at the beginning and at the end of classes. During the period of work, the specialist must carefully monitor changes in the emotional state of each small patient, adjusting the intensity of therapy if necessary. In addition, classes are built on the principle of passing from simple to complex material. Their structure includes:

1. The greeting ritual.
2. Regulation exercises that help activate motor, auditory and visual attention.
3. Exercises of corrective and developmental nature.
4. The ritual of farewell.

Music therapy for children with autism is a highly effective remedy for many problems.