Music Lessons
Enhance your child's intellectual capabilities!
Benefits of Music Lessons
Music lessons leads to higher intelligence scores!
Music builds cognitive skills through learning how to read music, understanding musical structures and focusing attention for long periods of time while practicing. This intellectual growth influences brain development in a way that increases overall intelligence (Berk, 2009). If music activity continues to adulthood, then the area of the brain that responds to sound will be an average of 30% larger than normal (Carter, 2010). This allows a deeper and more active experience of music throughout life.
Musical Notation
Music could help math skills!
Music is fun!
Frequently asked questions
When should lessons begin?
What kind of lessons are most beneficial?
Vocal music has many benefits, the first being that you don't have to buy an instrument! It requires the technical knowledge and dedication to practicing that has been associated with increased IQ, and it is something that children can do anywhere.
As far as instrumental music, piano is the best starting instrument because knowledge of the piano creates a foundation of musical skills that can be translated to any instrument in the future. After at least a year of piano lessons, your child can try a different instrument; the lessons from piano will carry over so that the piano instruction will not be wasted. When orchestra or band is offered as an elective in middle school, transitioning to a flute, violin, trumpet or bass drum will be easier than starting from scratch.
For children just beginning, group lessons would be beneficial. They are less expensive, provide a good musical foundation, and are associated with the same cognitive benefits as individual lessons.
Give your child all the benefits associated with music lessons because:
References
Berk, L. E. (2009). Development Through the Lifespan (5th ed.). Boston, MA: Pearson.
Carter, R. (2010). Mapping the Mind. Los Angeles, CA: University of California Press.
Hetland, L. (2000). Learning to make music enhances spatial reasoning. Journal of Aesthetic Education, 34, 179–238.
Schellenberg, E.G. (2004). Music lessons enhance IQ. Psychological Science, 15, 511-514.