Music is fundamental to human experience. Almost every culture in the world creates music.
In our own personal ways, we create music too and express our relationship with music. Studies show that music is good for our mood, our mental health and our physical health.
Now, there's a book that focuses on how parents can incorporate music into their children's lives. The book’s author says doing so can be transformative for everyone in the family, children and adults alike.
Case Western Reserve University music educator, Lisa Huisman Koops is the author of “A Family Guide to Parenting Musically." She's spent the last 20 years researching how families integrate music into their everyday routines and relationships.
She joined host Jenny Hamel in conversation about the book on Ideastream Public Media’s public affairs radio program, the “Sound of Ideas.”
Koops says that music is an integral part of a healthy life for children just as movement and healthy food are. It’s “one of these aspects of life that is beautiful and life giving and important to children, it can affect their relationships and it can enhance their relationships. It can enhance their learning. It can enhance their expression,” said Koops.
The important thing to stress, the author said, is that everyone is musical regardless of their abilities. “Finding the ways that we enjoy being musical as adults and then showing those ways to children, so that they see that there's so many ways to be musical,” is important Koops said.
You can find the book “A Family Guide to Parenting Musically” at local booksellers and online retailers.
Guest:
-Lisa Huisman Koops, Ph.D, Author, “A Family Guide to Parenting Musically”
