Most have heard people say that having a baby listen to classical music will make him a smarter child. This claim is a bit deceiving. Tuning into a bit of Mozart each day is definitely not going to make your child into a prodigy. However, music stimulates a child's development, including emotional, motor and linguistic skills. So, if the preceding statement equates to a smarter child in your eyes, then so be it.
A loving parent's singing voice can stimulate linguistic skills. Even if you feel like you cannot carry a tune for anything, you're little baby will be delighted with his personal concert. Sing nursery rhymes or other kid songs to encourage your baby's development.
I often sang to my infant daughter, including singing along with the tunes on her toys. At 20 months, she was able to clearly sing all of the lyrics of "Twinkle, Twinkle." She knew what the words meant because we did hand movements to go along with words. These gestures aided her motor skills. And you don't have to know anything fancy to put with a song. Simple dancing and swaying sharpen a child's motor skills.
At Brigham Young University, researchers studied how music affected 33 premature infants in a Utah intensive care unit. Babies listened to men and women singing lullabies recorded on cassette tape for 40 minutes per day for four days. On the fourth day, doctors discovered that the infants who heard the music had lower blood pressure, gained more weight and had a stronger heartbeat than those who heard no music.
Yes, music can have healing power. When your baby is feeling under the weather, gently sing to him or play soothing songs on CD. Perhaps your little one will be back to his old self faster than he would have been without music.
So, even though you're not coaching the next Mozart, you can encourage the learning process by singing and regularly playing music for your infant.
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