Innovative program mixes music, movement

By Kenny Keane, Globe staff writer
Posted Oct. 17, 2002

A program designed to enrich the lives of children and parents with innovative music and movement that nurtures the cognitive, emotional, language, social, physical and musical development of children, is now offered at Mercy Medical Center in Sioux City.

Classes in Kindermusik, a world-wide program which has been around for approximately 20 years, convened for the first time on Oct. 2 in the Central Medical Building at 5th and Jackson Streets. The first class, Kindermusik Village, offers instruction for children newborn to 1 1/2 years of age. The eight-week class is held from 10-10:45 a.m., weekly on Wednesdays. A second class, Kindermusik Our Time, is designed for children 1 1/2 to 3 years of age. This class meets from 11-11:45 a.m. each Wednesday for 15 weeks.

Julie Krogh, a certified Kindermusik teacher who leads instruction in Mercy's program, said the classes offer an excellent bonding opportunity for parents and young children.

"The classes use music and movement and a variety of other activities such as singing songs, chants, pretend play, vocal play, dance and playing instruments to get children and adults to interact together and focus on a lot of different activities that will help the child's entire development," she said. "It's not just a music program about music development. It's about the entire child.

"They learn things like different parts of their bodies and how to move their bodies in different ways. It kind of touches on all different areas of brain development."

Kindermusik is used in many countries throughout the world, according to Krogh, who said that the program uses the best practices of different researchers, as well as many philosophies of child development, which are combined with music as the vehicle to enhance children's development.

Learning of the success and popularity of the program is what brought Kindermusik to Mercy, according to Beth Sitzmann, community education coordinator at Mercy.

"It goes along with Mercy's mission to help children and to help the community grow," Sitzmann said. "It just sounded like a wonderful class that children can learn from, and it was a good fit with the other classes we have with our parenting and childbirth programs.

"We feel that there are not enough things for caregivers and children to do. We wanted to provide something for that, to help the children grow."

Helping her own children develop was the main reason Krogh decided to get involved with Kindermusik.

"I had been a Kindermusik mom. I had taken my child to classes before and just was very sold on the program because I could really see the results with my own child," she said. "When I took him to class, I would come home, and he would be singing the songs, saying the chants and doing the actions. I could really see that the learning was taking place."

Since Krogh was sold on the program as a parent, she knew that Kindermusik was going to be a good match for her as a teacher, especially with her strong background in music and education.

"I've been involved in a lot of music in the community. I also have a master's degree in elementary education from Morningside College," Krogh said. "I knew it would be a good fit for me and also a good time to do it being that this was the time I am very focused on young children and their development having two of my own at that age."

One strong component of Kindermusik is the parent involvement. Krogh said there are home materials that go along with the class to help enhance the learning in class by giving parents suggestions for activities they can do to follow up with the learning at home during the week.

"The parents are very, very involved with the child at home as well as attending with the children in class," she said. "The home materials are just wonderful with very high quality music. It's very enjoyable for all age levels to listen to, as opposed to other music CDs that I've heard for young children that I can't wait to turn off.

"There are also books that come along with it, instruments for the Our Time class and for the babies, there's a home journal that parents can use to record their child's progress throughout the week and how they're responding to different activities. It's kind of a nice thing to add to a baby book."

As for the parents' reactions so far, Krogh said she's heard very positive comments.

"Some of the responses I've heard are comments like, 'I've never thought about doing this kind of an activity with my child'. It teaches them so many different ways to interact with their children than maybe what they would think of on their own," she said. "There are things that you can adapt to other activities in your home such as making games and songs out of little everyday things that you do around your home."

Krogh and Sitzmann said they plan to continue with the program throughout this academic year and then will make a decision about extending it based on the response. For more information about Mercy's Kindermusik program, or to register your child, contact the hospital's Community Education Department at (712) 279-2989 or (712) 279-2009.

"Mercy wants to promote children, promote things that are great for the community and meet the needs of the community," Sitzmann said. "If the community shows that they would like to continue it, we would love to provide this class and fun activity for the community."