Week 1 of SoftMozart .// Toddler 28 months

Day 2 / Week 1 of SoftMozart

Today we had another productive day.

We played Music Alphabet Song in the background for some time. To be honest with time rap part of it gets annoying to me, though my DD loves it. So I do hope that someone can tell me how I can edit soundtrack to cut off rap part, so like this I will be playing it for a longer periods of time, I love the melody and voice very much.

We did solfeggio line puzzle, but today I did not arrange the second set, just guided DD to pick out notes one by one without skipping any.

We did solfeggio hopscotch, today I modified the game a little. I was taking away notes one by one. My 8 month old baby was also participating in order to keep the game interesting.
Tomorrow I plan to do as Hellene recommended: turn some cards down and jump up and down solfeggio line, pointing out and trying to guess the missing notes.

This one is for you, my fellow Brillkids Moms. I was flashing Solfeggio cards from Do to Do back and forward with corresponding music alphabet chant playing in the background. He loved it!( the first time , then he was trying take the cards from me )

Now about the challenges that we are facing:
My daughter understands the instructions very well, but a lot of times chooses not to follow them. I am yet to convince her to play the notes in order from Do to Ti... But to my opinion it is normal pace for her age group...
So far things that are saving us:
- asking her brother to do it instead of her, most of the time it makes her participate;
- keeping the sessions (even fun ones) short.

Big lifesaver for us became The Guess Key Game. DD got the concept right away that when she sees note on the screen she needs to press corresponding note on the keyboard. She did not get right away why we do not want the Spider to have any fruits. So I made some cut out figures of Papa and Son Gnomes and Spider and explained her that "Boy" picking up the fruit for his "Papa" and if the spider will eat the fruits, "Boy's" basket will be empty and his "Papa" will be hungry and sad. She got it and her efforts and concentration improved.

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I also played couple times throughout the day notes from Do to Do back and forward on the keyboard. Both kids liked it.

We haven't started practicing HC Buns yet... I will try to do it tomorrow. I do not expect my DD advance fast with that.

I am planning to get "The Kingdom of Tune" book. I think my daughter is too little for it, but since I have no musical background it will give me chance to learn new musical concepts and come out with the way to introduce them to her.

I hope tomorrow I will be lucky to get some good videos, so I will update this post with them.



Thi

I also played couple times throughout the day notes from Do to Do back and forward on the keyboard. Both kids liked it.

We haven't started practicing HC Buns yet... I will try to do it tomorrow. I do not expect my DD advance fast with that...

Thank you Nadia for keeping us up to date with your progress! It has given me some great ideas for my DD. I think we will start playing with solfege before even showing her the keyboard (a Christmas present!).

I have heard that in teaching solfege for singing, that children are often taught hand signs to go with each note. I did baby sign with my DD from the age of 4 months, so she is very familiar with signs. I dont know the official solfege signs so I am using British sign language signs that match the images that Hellene uses (e.g. door, rain, mirror, etc). Then when playing the do re mi music tracks, we can also do the sign language. I was thinking that with time, we could also do this to sing along with various nursery rhymes using solfege.

Obviously, you cannot sign at the same time as playing the piano!! But for my DD where I think it will be important to be inventive and have a wide range of learning methods, as she does not always agree to sit down and concentrate, it might be a fun way to keep a focus on solfege. You could also jump between the different notes on the playmat.

Hellene - do you think this is a good idea?

This morning I was lucky to take a video of my DD playing Guess the Key game!