by Author Sumihollingworth

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Do early years music-making sessions need a shake-up?

I was one of the researchers commissioned by Youth Music to explore effective ways to engage ‘hard to reach’ parents in early years music-making activities. This prompted us to ask questions like how relevant and how appealing are early years music-making sessions, and to whom? And what we found made us think maybe we all need to raise our game here to really engage, challenge, stimulate and bond with our young children

Image: Stanley by Aleks Rowley

Music is good for you. We don’t need research to confirm this for us. Even if all the research in the world told us that music is bad for you, we wouldn’t believe it. There is also a general consensus that making music with our young children is a positive activity, one with multiple benefits including physical, cognitive, social and emotional, not to mention the all-so-important parent-child bonding. (1) It is of course a worthwhile endeavour then, for Youth Music to invest in music-making in the early years, and to encourage this activity amongst parents.

But what does early years music-making look like? And how might more parents be supported to do it?  These were two questions Youth Music was asking. As part of this endeavor, a group of researchers (2) were commissioned to identify effective strategies to engage parents in early years music making (from ages 0 to 5) - starting with exploring the existing provision. With a New Labour policy focus at the time on the ‘hard to reach’, we were asked to explore effective ways to engage ‘hard to reach’ parents in early years music-making activities.  

Rather than focusing on this (somewhat vague and nebulous) group ‘hard to reach parents’ as the site of ‘the problem’: (a group of parents somehow hiding from well-meaning professionals, avoiding their parenting responsibilities, evoked in much of the policy literature) our research had a conscious aim to explore the ways in which formal music-making provision might disengage, exclude or alienate some particular parents, or their children. The aim was to explore how best to engage and meet the needs of all families through early years music-making. This prompted us to ask questions like how relevant and how appealing are early years music-making sessions, and to whom? And what we found made us think maybe we all need to raise our game here to really engage, challenge, stimulate and bond with our young children, who are emerging in a society that is changing before their eyes, technologically.

A proportion of the research involved observing existing early years music-making provision, and conducting interviews with professionals running sessions and parents attending. This aspect of the research revealed the challenge for early years professionals and musicians to negotiate the constraints of formal service provision and provide a space which would attract all parents. A discussion of these challenges, possibilities and ideas on effective practice are detailed in our report, but perhaps most illuminating was a small number of interviews we undertook with parents who specifically did not go to formal music-making sessions. And what was revealing were the ways in which early years music-making was going on informally; which perhaps formal sessions can learn from.

We focused our efforts in ‘socio-economically deprived’ locations (viewed, by some, as locations of parents who need to be ‘reached’) and accessed parents via a multiplicity of means including phoning parents who had ‘dropped out’ of sessions; posters in Children’s Centres, community centres, libraries and leisure centres and approaching parents with young children in such locations. We gathered a small sample of eleven parents from across four ‘case study’ areas, who were willing to talk to us about their everyday activities with their young children; the role of music in their lives and what they think about early years music-making provision (if anything). And while eleven parents is by no means a generalisable sample, given that such parents are so ‘hard to reach’, and given what we found through doing this, we felt like we had done a pretty good job in at least beginning to explore this issue.

What we found among these nine mothers and two fathers was something of a resistance to organised music-making provision. There was a general view from these parents that, in their experience, provision was not necessarily stimulating enough for their children. There was deemed to be an over-reliance on traditional nursery rhymes, when their children had a much more diverse and modern range of musical tastes. Some parents remarked at the disappointing range of instruments available for their children to play.  Provision - which often involved a fixed hour session, with a prepared structure of songs to engage with as a group - was often perceived to be too structured and formal, when getting out of the house on-time and keeping a hungry toddler under control is a struggle. The focus and design of sessions for solely under-fives made problems for some parents interviewed who had older children, as such sessions could not always keep the older children’s attention. For these reasons, early years music-making sessions were constructed by some as ‘not worth the money’. Why put yourself through all that hassle, timekeeping and financial cost when you can have some friends round, put the children’s favorite chart hits on your i-player and dance around the living room together?

The assumption can be that parents who don’t engage in formal parent-child provision are ‘at risk’ of poor parenting, or are somehow missing out on this activity. However, music was an important part of most of these families’ lives, albeit in an informal way. What we referred to as an ‘everyday musicality’ infused these families’ home lives. Music was routine and habitual rather than being a discrete compartmentalised activity, like a formal music-making session might be. Parents often engaged their children in music-making at home, with friends, and at parties. Examples included dancing around the kitchen to the radio; playing rock guitar with dad; singing with dad’s church band who come to practice at the house every Wednesday; children being ‘selector’ with the iPod at home and in the car; singing in the bath.  First and foremost, music was described by these parents in terms of enjoyment: as a deeply felt, embodied practice with huge emotional resonance, even for babies in the womb.  But parents also clearly revealed what their children learnt through music and music-making in the home.  This was not planned, structured learning but inconspicuous learning through doing. One four year old daughter learnt all the words to her dad’s songs he had written and sings with his band; another family talked about their three year old navigating Spotify and selecting their favorite pop songs; another mother talked about her four year old learning to play a drum machine.  

A range of contemporary music styles and genres were enjoyed by parents and their children alike, from classical to heavy metal, ska-reggae to electronica, to the general background ambiance offered by Magic or Heart FM. Often parents and children listened to a range of different types of music, not as a replacement to nursery rhymes, but as a complement to the repertoire which might include Twinkle Twinkle Little Star, to ‘wind down’ at bedtime. One mother talked about how her two year old’s favorite current activity is wiggling and giggling around the kitchen to the LMFAO chart hit ‘I’m Sexy and I Know It’.

 

 

While some might lambast this as vastly inappropriate music, video and lyrics for a two year old, others might value it for the subtle ways in which very young children are learning appropriate and inappropriate behaviour, through satire and parody.

Music is all around us and we need to recognise popular music as having important symbolic, socio-cultural significance and providing an important learning experience for children. While older children and adults not only listen to, engage and learn from lyrics, younger children also absorb a huge amount about society through engagement with pop music.

 

 

Some might argue this is positive, some may have misgivings, but nevertheless, we argue, failing to build on, and engage with children’s interest in popular culture, is perhaps a missed opportunity.  Young children can be just as active everyday music ‘consumers’ as older children and adults. Tapping into this active, independent engagement with music with children from a young age could nurture children’s ability to make and produce music, particularly given the technological competence of very young children these days. When it comes to early years music-making it is perhaps important not to infantilise our children.  There is important intergenerational learning to be explored in terms of music appreciation and making. Perhaps we don’t need to focus on engaging ‘hard to reach’ parents in early years music making, perhaps what we need to do is learn from the kids.

Read the full report

Download the full Engaging 'hard to reach' parents in Early Years music-making report here.  

Notes

1) See Lonie, 2010 Early Years Evidence Review, Youth Music for a thorough review 2) Professor Jayne Osgood; Dr. Deb Albon; Dr. Kim Allen and myself, all at the time based at the Institute for Policy Studies in Education (IPSE) at London Metropolitan University.  

Share your thoughts

If you know of any innovative music projects in the early years, we, and Youth Music, would like to hear about them! Let us know in the comments below, or join the Early Years Music-Making discussion group.