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5 Responses to “A piano recital by a 4 years old.”

1. Dan-yel // Apr 26, 2008 at 12:34 am

   Waaahh… Your son’s so cute! Beethoven in the making!

2. Jamy // Apr 26, 2008 at 3:28 pm

   Dan-yel,

   Thank you.
   
   Music and brain cells stimulation.
   In fact, I took the advice of one of our friends who has a Ph.D computer science who specialized in IT animation. This guy works for Disney group in Orlando, Florida. He believes that music enhance/stimulate our brain. I do not know how true is that or if there is any evidence research on that but when I noticed that my son is very ahead of his peers. He knew how to recognized alphabets and letters as young as 18 months, I include Beethoven music in his early learning.

   In view of my friend advice, I decided to enroll him in music class as young as 18 months. One of the reasons is also I realized that piano notes consist of A…F (my piano class is not something I like to talk too much, too embarrassing to even mention), so I took him to a Christian girlfriend who teach piano at home.

   Japanese VS Americans
   She told me she had never took in any student who’s less than 5 years old and that is pretty much the standard here in the US but she told me it’s very interesting that I brought my kid to see her that Monday morning because over the weekend her hubby and her watched a show in Discovery channel about Japanese children started music class as young as 18 months. She and her husband wondered why have Americans kids hot do so ? If Japanese children can do it at that young age , why not Americans kids ? She wondered if it due to the different approach in discipline. Americans emphasized more on letting kids do whatever they want or freedom (they emphasize in creativity) but Japanese emphasized on discipline even at young age.

   She said one of the challenging factors of getting a toddlers to take piano lesson is their attention span. Trying to get a toddler to sit still for more than 10 minutes is quite a challenge !

   I told her there’s no obligation but I liked her to give my 18-month-old a try. She said she would take him in on one condition: ie, if he could sit still for 5 minutes , and if he could, she would increment the piano lesson from 5 minutes a week to 15 minutes a week. She was amazed that he was able to sit still for 5 minutes that first week teaching him about the basic of piano key boards, she did that for 3 months, that is 5 minute per week.

   She started him with these 2 books : Bastein Piano Basics - Piano for the young beginner and Bastein Piano Basic - Theory & Technic for the young beginner.

   Since he already knew all the alphabets when he was 18 months, she started with sticking alphabets on the piano key boards and teaching him about the similarity between piano key alphabets and the alphabets he knew.

   Because I was in school, his classes were interrupted with my schools works. But, I am very glad that I persevere with many set backs over the last 2 years. It was not an easy process to stick with the class over the last 2 years but I am glad I did :).

   Now that he can recognized notes without having alphabets stickers on the piano. He knew how to play at least 5 songs on his own now reading notes.

   I do believe music in one way and another stimulate our brain cells though I do not have any evidence base research on this. My son is very ahead of his peers in other areas of learning such as reading, writing and calculating. A lot of people think he is a prodigy.

   Though he is very ahead of his peers, I want him to have a normal childhood, enjoy the things that normal kids do and be a rounded kids. I do not want him to be under media pressure. He is quite a happy kid and enjoy other kids company but I do believe he has a much higher IQ than most of his peers.

   Jamy

3. ChampDog // Apr 27, 2008 at 9:55 am

   I do believe music especially piano can stimulate our brain cells. A lot of great people or performing people in the corporate world (ya, I’m still a corporate worker), when I ask them “Do you play piano?”. Surprisingly most of them are grade 6 and above.

4. Jamy // Apr 28, 2008 at 2:36 am

   Champdog,
   Interesting observation.
   There was a research done on that subject and as a result there was a series of Baby Einstein musical video etc… But then again a lot of people refute such research was un-founding, so it was never really proof in term of evidence research base. But, it was interesting that you should start your own small research finding.
   I am in a way similar to you in terms of asking questions or observation on what make a gp. of people different than others ( esp. successful people). One of my interest groups is specialty doctors such as neuro and cardiac surgeon on their family up bringing (mothers influence especially), their environments, their likes and etc and find out why make these people interest and excel in such delicate matter :). So far, I found out most of these people moms play a very big part in their lives :):).

   Jamy

5. Kung // May 2, 2008 at 10:41 pm

   Well done JJ
   Uncle kung