Rhythm For Good

Tag Archives | babies

MythBuster Countdown #6: Mozart Makes Your Kid a GENIUS

By Kat Fulton on June 24, 2010 in Kids, Mythbusters

Just after I began the MythBuster Countdown series, a colleague of mine Kimberly Sena Moore published this post in Psychology Today: The Mozart Effect Doesn’t Work… Talk about perfect timing! Now I don’t have to work so hard to prove my point. Check out her post for some really great info!

We’ve known for years that the Mozart Effect is based upon a study that was replicated and refuted several times. In fact, one of the original researchers Rauscher insisted in a subsequent article that the researchers made no claim that music increases IQ. But the media blew it out of proportion, and then came the ever-popular Mozart Effect.

Fortunately, the Mozart Effect brought the topic of music and intelligence into the public eye. Unfortunately, the solution was based upon passively slapping down a mesmerizing CD of Mozart’s music for your kid. What’s missing? Cause/effect relationships and human interaction.

Can you use classical music to support your child’s development? Yes. Here are some tips:

Play Haydn’s Surprise Symphony (No. 94), and do a big PEEK-A-BOO at each surprise. For toddlers, march around in a line and stop suddenly at each surprise note.
Do baby bounces at each four-beat response phrase in Strauss’ Blue Danube Waltz. Do bigger bounces as the volume increases (crescendo). For toddlers, jump on the four-beat responses.
Make up your own exciting interpretive dance to Shostakovich’s String Quartet No. 8. This piece lends itself to creative movement.
Listen to Saint-Saëns’ Carnival of the Animals, and identify each instrument as it coincides with the animals. If you have either professional or toy instruments, then play them along with the music. Otherwise, pretend to play the flutes, violins, pianos, etc. as the music goes on. Do the same for Prokofiev’s Peter and the Wolf, Op. 67 and Britten’s The Young Person’s Guide to the Orchestra.
Listen to any opera and play a game. Assign different actions to different parts of the opera. For instance, every time a lady sings a solo, you can run around with your hands in the air. When the gentleman sings, you can eat grapes. Then when the chorus sings, you can spin around. Try this with Puccini’s La Boheme or Madame Butterfly.
Play Grieg’s Peer Gynt Suite #1 every morning to wake up. Your little one will associate this piece with waking up, and you can use the piece in a cause/effect relationship.
Use Debussy’s Prelude l’apres-midi d’un faune for the “good night song.” Another cause/effect relationship. The more consistent you are, the more effective the relationship.

Have fun and keep me posted on how you interact with your little one!

Check out the other music therapy Mythbusters:

#9 Music Therapy is Therapy for Musicians, Right?
#8 Making Music is Just for Kids and Professionals
#7 Drumming is for Hippies Only

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Music Therapy in the NICU: An RN’s Perspective

By Kat Fulton on March 11, 2010 in NICU Infants

I recently asked Shelley Frazier, RN, BSN, IBCLC, what she thought about music therapy. She is the Lactation Consultant, Discharge Planner, and Education Coordinator for the Newborn ICU at Tallahassee Memorial Hospital in Florida. Shelley also helps facilitate the National Institute for Infant & Child Medical Music Therapy at Florida State University. The research in NICU music therapy program at Shelley’s hospital has been established since the early 1990s.

What do you notice that music therapy does for the infants, and what criteria do you use for referrals?

The babies love the music therapy! We do several different kinds here. They enjoy when we take them out of the isolette and gently touch them and sing softly to them. So often touch in the ICU is harsh and disturbing to the baby. Rolling them over, sticking them for labs, putting nasogastric tubes down their noses. The touch from music therapy is kind, soft and gentle. The babies love it. We also do the music therapy where they suck on a pacifier to turn on the music, and I have found that this is helpful for getting the ready to suck/swallow/and breathe babies ready to eat. They will suck to hear the music and music gives them pleasure and the longer they suck the better it is. It helps to increase their endurance for sucking and in the long run helps them to be ready to feed.

The criteria is not really in hard print. A baby needs to be intermediate care status. In an isolette or open crib. Not having a lot of apneic episodes. Stable on an oxygen source or on room air. Not an irritable BPD baby. Someone that can benefit from suck endurance. Around 31 weeks gestation or more.

Does music therapy overstimulate infants?

We watch the babies closely for when they are physiologically ready for music therapy. Everything kind of has to fall into place for the individual baby to receive Music Therapy….and stay in place. In other words, a baby can qualify one week, start to feel bad the next week, and we will need to postpone the therapy until later. We really don’t start music therapy until the kids are ready to start getting a bit of stimulation. Music therapy is also a way to teach parents about the right kinds of stimulation for their baby (e.g. gentle though, quiet voices).

How does music therapy change the general NICU environment?

I feel that music therapy is very helpful to the parents as a calming tool, something they can do/ be trained to do with their baby. It is something that they can continue to do at home after the baby is discharged. It can lend some “normalcy” to an otherwise very high tech environment. As for the babies, they love it. They respond well to it, and it can also be a continuation of activities at home. It can lower their heart rate and assist them with becoming accustomed to touch and sound in our world.

How does music therapy change parents’ attitudes, visitations, and/or behaviors in the NICU?

Some parents are very receptive to outsiders working with their babies, and some are not. I do find that a very stubborn difficult parent to an NICU nurse/RT/doctor, can be sweet and kind to the music therapist. The parents can have some control with music therapy. I have found that if you prearrange a time with parents, they love to visit during music time. A large percentage of our parents are from out of town and have a lower socioeconomic status and are unable to visit frequently, but if they live in town and have a car they will visit during music time.

For more information about NICU music therapy, please see the following posts:

9 Research-based Effects of Music in the NICU
45 Hospitals around the World that Provide NICU Music Therapy
Does Music Therapy in the NICU Overstimulate Infants?
NICU Music Therapy Overview (video)
Book Review: Bella’s Blessings

Let me know you thoughts, comments, and/or questions about music therapy and babies.

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NICU Music Therapy Overview

By Kat Fulton on January 12, 2010 in NICU Infants

Video, An Overview of NICU Music Therapy

Visit the National Institute for Infant and Child Medical Music Therapy to learn more.

With the NICU MT specialized training, board-certified music therapists assess, develop and implement a treatment plan, document measurements and observations, adjust the treatment plan, and evaluate the effectiveness of services for infants in a neonatal intensive care unit. Using culturally specific, preferred, live music, board-certified music therapists achieve positive behavioral and physiological changes in the babies and reduced stress for the parents. Music therapy techniques may involve recording the mother’s singing voice to play for baby, facilitating song-writing with a sibling, or gently humming lullabies specific to baby’s native language. Multimodal stimulation, a developmental care technique, is the most commonly used technique. Immediate effects of music therapy interventions include increased oxygen saturation levels and decreased distress behaviors. Long-term effects include higher feeding rate, accelerated weight gain, shorter hospital stay, and self-regulated heart and respiration rates. Board-certified music therapists are able to train parents to use this technique in the hospital and eventually the home.

In addition, research shows that music therapy in the NICU reduces the overall decibel level, masking aversive noise. People speak softer, walk more carefully, and keep their voices down. Oxymeter machines beep less often because the live, predictable, structured nature of the music increases all the surrounding babies’ oxygen saturation levels. Research also shows that there is a cumulative decibel level reduction over 7 weeks of live music therapy provided twice per week.

There are approximately 30 hospitals in the world currently providing NICU music therapy. This number has rapidly increased from only 7 hospitals in 2002. The earlier we nurture and promote the neurological development of a preemie, the less likely the baby will have a developmental disability.