Talent Education Suzuki School, a Fairfield school that offers music education for kids, recently began offering a parent-child Suzuki music class for young children.
In its goal to teach children music skills at a young age, Talent Education Suzuki School in Norwalk began offering Suzuki Babies in mid-2014, a parent-and-child class for children ages 3 weeks to 3 years. After piloting the class last fall, TESS is offering the class again this year.
The class is designed to give children a foundation in music that will carry with them throughout their lives. Children learn to count on a beat, recognize pitch, and sing in key through nursery rhymes, games, and songs. To learn to count on a beat, children play a game where they run faster or slower depending on how fast or slow a drum is hit.
TESS uses the Suzuki method created by Dr. Shinichi Suzuki. The method applies the basic principles of learning a native language to learning music. Parent involvement, early learning, repetition, listening to music, and learning with peers are keys to the method’s success.
“It has a lot to do with listening to music,” director and owner Becki Christopherson says. “We do preschool appropriate activities to build a strong foundation for learning.”
Christopherson says she believes that the earlier children learns music skills, the easier it will be for them to learn more advanced music skills later in life. “Getting an earlier start is more appropriate as it’s easier to learn,” she says. “By the time they are 7 or 8, it may be easier to understand what the teacher is asking, but it takes longer to learn it.”
Registration is available on the website.
Above photo: Children drum on plastic containers to practice counting on the beat.
