Immersive Language
by Gabrielle Krieger
I've had quite an eclectic upbringing. My dad was adopted from Costa Rica and lived all around the US in his teen formative years, so I've had the privilege of experiencing many parts of the country during my childhood, EXCEPT for Costa Rica.
My dad realized Spanish would be very important at a later date, so he organized a Spanish class at the library for me and my mom and my sisters. We studied out of a Spanish study guide, and from my own harshness on myself, had a lot of tears when I couldn't remember how to properly conjugate "Usar". Anyway, you can imagine where our lessons ended up. I definitely was not speaking any Spanish when I finally met my extended Costa Rican family at 13 years old.
Fast forward a few years, I'm about to start the business, and my dad recommends that I live in Costa Rica for a few months while I have the opportunity. Of course I snatch it up, and enroll in a Spanish Immersion school. Right from day one, students not only study, but ONLY speak Spanish in the classroom. I was able to move through four levels in a two month window and am fluent in most circumstances besides intricacies and heavier topics.
Why did that work for me? What was the difference in my first and second scenarios? Exposure and immersion! I hadn't heard Spanish prior to my first Spanish lessons because English was all that was spoken around the house. Later on, I was culturally submerged in it, critically listened and heard it every day. Same intent, vastly different outcomes.
What does this have to do with music lessons?
It's the same concept - in order to learn something innately, one has to be submerged and surrounded by it to understand it to its fullest. Here are some really interesting studies from NAMM foundation:
"- Strait, D.L. and N. Kraus, Biological impact of auditory expertise across the life-span: musicians as a model of auditory learning. Hearing Research, 2013. Researchers found that after two years, children who not only regularly attended music classes, but also actively participated in the class, showed larger improvements in how the brain processes speech and reading scores than their less-involved peers."
Not to mention that playing music regardless of your children's age is a fantastic bonding experience! Here's another one from Frontiers Institute.org:
Several particular elements of music may support its relationship to social bonding. Tarr et al. (2014) suggest that two mechanisms that support the relationship between music and social bonding are interpersonal synchronization and the release of endorphins. Music has a predictable, rhythmic structure that facilitates interpersonal movement synchrony with others (Savage et al., 2020). The pitch range and scale structure of children’s music may also allow for coordinating vocal interactions, supporting group experiences and connectedness (Savage et al., 2020). Additionally, the repetitive structure and multimodal social cues (voice, facial expressions, movement, and touch) employed during musical games sustain children’s attention and support their social learning particularly when in the meaningful context of parent-child interactions (Lense and Jones, 2016; Mehr et al., 2016; Trehub et al., 2016).
This shows up in my classroom as well in anecdotal form; my students who are surrounded by a variety of music types and genres by parents at home, in the car, on their own, have a very high retention rate, easily retained playlist and ability to express themselves verbally and musically. As we prepare for our new fall schedule, you will find Mark and I assigning a lot of appropriate listening material for your students!
Sometimes it's hard to break out of our listening patterns. The good news is we live in a digital age! Spotify, Apple Music, and Youtube are great places to go to discover new music. There's a great side effect of vast musical exposure; your student will more than likely rekindle their passion for their music lessons once they see how easy it is to play the songs that they love the most.
This month, I encourage you to connect with music in your own way outside of the lessons to fuel your student's fire for music! You may be surprised what they end up enjoying with their own musical taste.
Sources:
https://www.nammfoundation.org/why-music-matters/music-research-kids
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2021.641733/full