Ever since my son was in the womb, he has been exposed to several different sounds. Music though is the number one sound he has heard other than our voices. He's heard guitar and singing. He seems to really love music and musical instruments. I made a video of him exploring the guitar. I thought that this video is worth sharing with the world.
He is very interested in musical sounds and musical instruments. He is really quite drawn to the drums. I have a djembe hand drum he likes to beat on. Whenever I play acoustic guitar I find that I have to sit up high enough for him not to beat on the guitar. He likes to slap the guitar with a beat while I play.
I truly believe his exposure to music actually stimulates his mind in a great way. I'm not saying that he will be a genius because of music and he may not even ever play music, but I am saying at the most early stages of his life his mind is definitely stimulated by all the great sounds music has to offer.
If he wants to play music though, I will not hoard the instruments and not let him develop in whatever area he may want to try. In fact I will go out of my way to provide for him a nice instrument or instruments to play, even if he loses interest a week later. At least I will know I gave him an opportunity to give it a shot. I don't ever want to shut any artistic gift down. In fact I encourage any gift and will do all I can to nurture it along.
In the art department of painting, he's already finger painted. I think he is interested, but the goop on his fingers seems to disturb him. It is quite funny to watch as he finger paints, plays with play doh, and attempts to color. I think we all have the ability to create etched into our DNA. Creating needs to be nurtured and feed as well as allowed, especially in a young person.
It is not expensive to provide items to a child to make noise with or to create with. I say do it to it. Hook a child up and nurture them along. How many kids get their gifts stifled at a young age because us adults think we know what our kids should really be doing? Don't kill artistic abilities at an early age. Allow those kids to create and enjoy life. We were meant for it. I think we all are.
