Aiden is making a lot of progress when he’s singing. He’s most likely to sing when not in the spotlight. His most common stage is his crib – he often sings before bedtime or in the morning.
Aiden doesn’t sing many songs from start to finish unassisted, but will sing bits on his own. The first two lines are most common before he gets distracted.
Aiden enjoys singing Twinkle Twinkle, Hurry Hurry Drive the Firetruck, Hello Everybody, Zoom Zoom and the Bananas Song. Sometimes a song he’s been thinking about will crop up, like the ABCs or Wheels on The Bus.
Just today, Aiden was in his crib when I hear: “Aiden want to sing The Wheels on the Bus. The wheels on the bus goes round and round. The wheels on the bus go round and round. Awwwww wheels not working. Not working anymore. Probably not working.”
As you can see, easily distracted. He always ends up on a tangent in his pretend world making up stories.
Aiden will also make up songs. “Aiden shoes on. Aiden shoes off. Aiden shoes on. Aiden shoes off.” When he then said: “Mommy, sing Aiden’s shoe song!”, I clued in that he was doing more than just babbling. Super cute.
It’s clear Aiden wants to sing more. He will often move his lips when someone sings, trying to learn the words perhaps. Or lip sync? Cute though. He’s also participating more now that he’s started preschool once a week (my guess).
Aiden is not your typical toddler when it comes to his music preferences. He rarely participates in toddler song times, though he does enjoy them. We attend music classes and Aiden enjoys playing with the instruments and being a part of the songs. He doesn’t participate in actions or songs unless he has an instrument, but that’s ok.
Despite all this, Aiden has a very strong interest in music and very strong music preferences. We almost never listen to the dozens of kids CDs we have in our media library, and it’s been that way for about 6 months or so. Same goes for the car. He enjoys kids music at other kids’ houses (even the same CDs) and loved the CD of kids singing Christmas songs for the holidays. I used to think that perhaps Aiden got tired of kids music, or just wanted to assert himself by negation, but now I think it’s more complicated.
I think Aiden’s musical preferences simply changed. Aiden’s preference first asserted itself in the car, when he’d ask for piano music or guitar music or violin music. When I say ‘ask’, I mean more specifically: would throw a fit if I couldn’t find classical music featuring that instrument. Now, he’s pretty much fine with any kind of classical music. He didn’t want classical music at home for a long time (he spent a month or so arguing every music choice at home), but now he does.
Aiden loves to listen to the music and identify the instruments playing. Just this morning I turned on CBC Radio 2 and Aiden exclaimed:
“Classical music! Louder! Violin music. Flutes too. More louder!”
We have been searching for ways to expand on Aiden’s obvious interest in classical music but it’s been rather challenging. Most toddler-specific or even youth-specific music instruction videos will use cartoons or characters. While I’m sure he’d be fine with that, Ianiv and I are of the opinion that he’d love equally some videos about actual musicians playing and demonstrating their instruments for a younger audience.
It’s been an interesting musical journey with Aiden!
Although we don’t watch tv with Aiden yet, he does watch a few videos on YouTube. I randomly came across this Phonics Alphabet song and it’s been a hit with Aiden. Although he enjoys the video, he definitely enjoys my versions more. He asks me to sing most of the time we’re in the car, and this is a fun (and long) addition.
As just a simple alphabet song, you can replace the examples with any word of your choice, so it’s only the tune that you need to listen to.
Last weekend we took Aiden to a Kindie Music show that was held in Park Royal at GapKids. Think Indie music + kids = Kindie music. Apparently the Kindie scene is HUGE in the states, the fastest growing music market, but it’s a little slower in Canada. As someone who has kids music on for several hours a day, I welcome any opportunity to find new artists!
We sat down to listen to The Board of Education, a 5-member group that reminds me a lot of They Might Be Giants or the fab Snack Time album from Barenaked Ladies. I was a little disappointed that Canadian Kindie artists weren’t featured and that the release focused on only two Canadian Kindie groups. What about artists like Bobs & Lolo, native to Vancouver?
Anyway, it was a very small event (no posters, even, outside the store!), but Aiden enjoyed it. He’s been very cuddly of late, so he adamantly refused to dance and instead sat in my lap sucking his thumb and prompting me to sway with him. Cute.
Aiden has begun to sing along to ‘Old MacDonald’!! He doesn’t know all the words yet, of course, but he chimes in (usually when prompted) for E-I-E-I-O and for the animal sounds. Because he has so many animal sounds, the song can go on for a VERY long time. He knows sounds for: sheep, cats, goats, dogs, birds, crows, cows, chickens, snakes, bees, horses, zebras, donkeys, squirrels, chipmunks, lions, monkeys, gorillas and probably a few others.
Aiden is a huge lover of music. We listen to kids music while he plays (he dances and points as soon as we come downstairs) and sing. A lot. We go to music class, sing at other classes, sing in the bath and in the car. When Aiden doesn’t have a snack and doesn’t feel like talking about what he sees outside the window, we sing.
First, I ask Aiden what he wants to sing. He’ll either say a word or use one of his made-up signs to tell me which song he wants. If he doesn’t, I’ll suggest one. He’ll shake his head or say ‘No’ until I get to one he wants, when he’ll grunt happily. Then we will sing it once or as many times as he wants – or, only partly, if he changes his mind.
Because we’re in the car, Aiden pays attention to his songs a lot more – not much to distract him, right? He is more willing to do hand actions to his songs: he can do all of Roly Poly, Wheels on the Bus and 2 verses of Head and Shoulders, as well as many others.
‘Old MacDonald’, however, is his first “song” attempt. He’s taking part in the words! Yay!! He was SO excited today with each verse, it was so cute!
Aiden has begun to sing along to ‘Old MacDonald’!! He doesn’t know all the words yet, of course, but he chimes in (usually when prompted) for E-I-E-I-O and for the animal sounds. Because he has so many animal sounds, the song can go on for a VERY long time. He knows sounds for: sheep, cats, goats, dogs, birds, crows, cows, chickens, snakes, bees, horses, zebras, donkeys, squirrels, chipmunks, lions, monkeys, gorillas and probably a few others.