Should Young Children Perform?
“I do not offer performances as part of my early childhood music program. But I keep getting pushed to provide some for the parents. What can I tell my (principle, director, supervisor, etc.)?”
This question, raised at the recent ECMMA convention, is one that many early childhood music professionals encounter. One way to answer is to take a developmental approach. Here is some information that might be helpful.
“Performance” is a rather advanced concept, developmentally speaking. It requires a bounded sense of identity that young children just do not have. This can be hard for us adults to grasp, because we are so used to thinking in terms of “self” as separate from “other.” Iknow that what is in my mind is different from what is inyour mind. But for very young children – really up until the age of about seven – identity is a flexible commodity, and minds swap in and out of one another with a kind of magical malleability.
Remember Piaget’s “conservation” experiments? (See Mirror Neurons I: Meaning and Mirror Neurons V: Altruism).
When children were asked if there was the same amount of water in two identical beakers, they all answered, “Yes.” But when the liquid from one was poured into a taller, thinner, beaker, raising the water level, there was a sharp difference of opinion about what had happened. Children under the age of seven unanimously said that now, there was more water in the taller beaker. They knew that no water had been introduced; they had watched the water pour from one beaker into another. It didn’t matter. You had to be at least seven years old to “get” that it was the same amount of water in a different-sized beaker.
What does this have to do with standing up and singing a song at an appointed time for an audience? Performance requires me to know that I am separate enough from you so that I can perform for you. The water in my beaker doesn’t change whether or not I am on stage. The water in your beaker doesn’t change whether or not you are an audience member. My identity upon the stage remains constant, and your identity out there in the audience remains constant, and together we can maintain that fourth wall.
But before the age of seven, that fourth wall just hasn’t been constructed yet. Very young children can be totally confused by the idea of formal performance; they don’t understand why they can’t just run over and grab Mom by the hand or wave at Grandpa or just leave the stage altogether. The scrutiny can be confusing and alienating. Lacking the concept of performance, young children often perform under stress. It can seem, to them, that they are being made to carry out some inexplicable form of artificial play, and then being judged for it.
Performance that arises spontaneously out of play is another matter. I remember my little brother used to love to put on sequined tights when he was two, and, when my mom put a record on the turntable, he would dance to the laughter and clapping of the surrounding adults. But that was play. It was in our living room. Everyone around was family. And he could stop any time he wanted. There was no fourth wall.
It’s nice for parents to see what their little ones are doing in music. So one alternative to a performance is to have the parents come and participate with the children in one of their music classes. The children usually love “showing” their parents what to do. They may be excited to share their play space with the most important people in their lives. It gives the parents a more intimate and truer sense of what their children are actually doing. And the people in charge can offer the kind of show-and-tell that helps them sell their program.
Sharing class together, the adults will see that it is the same amount of water in the taller beaker. But, for the children, it is magically “more!”
Comments
Well thought out. I just shared your article with a group of piano teachers who were quite upset with the latest article in Clavier Companion about using drugs for performance anxiety. I wonder; if we can keep this sense of magic alive in our children beyond the age of seven and onto the age the seventy could we transform the way we see the role of music in today’s world? I would like to see the “perform” part disappear from music and bring in more “sharing” experiences.
Well said Eve. Thanks for helping to verbalize what we know experientially!
It is astounding to me that in a country where
nearly every public school has a “Say NO to Drugs” sign
posted by the front door, that teachers,
administrators, and just about anybody, it seems, feel
entitled to advise parents to administer drugs to their
children! Medication is a VERY serious and VERY
personal decision - the repercussions on the developing
child, especially, are enormous, and there are no long
term studies to show us what these will be. More and
more, drugs are routinely recommended, not to address
the child’s actual condition, but to mask the symptoms
that arise from it - mostly, it seems, so that we
adults don’t have to address the complex web of
emotional, bio-mechanical, neurological, educational
and sociological factors that create these
problems.
The implications for the next generation seem to be
ones that few people who recommend these “solutions”
are thinking about. Like teaching children that, if you
feel anxious, you automatically take a drug for it.
What kind of society are we building?
Can you imagine, 40 years ago, that a magazine
specializing in the piano would recommend that music
teacher readers make medical suggestions to the parents
of their students? Or even 15 years ago? But the
pressure on parents to put their children on medication
is already great, and growing, from every quarter. For
example, a parent I know was basically bullied into
putting his son on Ritalin by the classroom teacher!
These are very personal medical decisions that parents
need to make according to conscience.
I hope that the group of piano teachers with whom you
shared this post will all write letters to Clavier
Companion. The magazine needs to know what its readers’
expectations are. And feel free to quote me!
Thank you so much, Eve for addressing this question. In addition to the developmental issues that play a large role in why young children should not perform, it often feels like preschool directors would rather music teachers teach young children the same song by rote for 6-8 weeks to guarantee a “grand performance” than to actually teach them developmentally appropriate musical skills through songs, movement, and play. This will be a great resource to have when this situation presents itself, as I know it will! Thank you!
It is a sad comment on our society that children are
seen as advertising opportunities.
A big perceptual shift happened during the Reagan era,
when television advertising for children was
deregulated and children (and parents) were no longer
protected from characters and objects in their programs
appearing as toys for sale in the commercials. Because
young children cannot tell the difference between
programming and advertising, children’s shows began to
devolve into long infomercials. Of course, children had
already been targeted to pester parents to buy
everything from breakfast cereal to bubble gum to
Barbie Dolls. Marketing has superseded education in so
many ways.
But children are not in preschool to create job
security for adults. As parents and teachers, we need
to expect, design, and support developmentally
appropriate programs that are successful FOR THE
CHILDREN. The “selling points” should not be how well
the children entertain the adults in a formalized
situation, but how happy and adjusted they are when
they go home. We need to return to a sense of integrity
and balance in children’s education.
Molly Beiningen Aug 26, 2012
Good stuff, Eve. Thanks!