Jingle Bells not just for School Christmas Programs
“Jingle Bells” written by James Lord Pierpont in 1857 is one of the most popular Christmas songs to ever be sung. Everyone remembers singing this song for school events or even home during the holidays but where does it come from and how does it affect our broods’s development. The song “The One Horse Open Sleigh” was a little too racy with its lyrics like “take the girls tonight” and had to be changed along with the title to “Jingle Bells”. The song we know and love today is the result of these lyrics changes. This song brings joy to our hearts and puts us in the Christmas spirit but how exactly does that effect your child’s development?
Brains Running on Jingle Bells
Nourishing our child’s brain is one of the most important tasks we have as parents. We want to give our child the very best that the world has to offer but does the best really include Jingle Bells? We don’t come out of the womb with dictionaries and as much as parents would love for their baby to tell them every need they have, we need to develop language first. Reading, speaking, singing, this is all ways we teach babies to recognize words and learn to speak them themselves. Nursery Rhymes and Songs are one way that young children explore language in a fun filled environment. When we sing to our babies and their little smiles come across their faces we are filled with bonding feelings but inside their little joy filled heads these words are connecting to spark language.
Christmas in July
When you think of Christmas do you think of bathing suits and beach balls? Did you ever think Christmas was anything other than fluffy white snow and sugar plum dreams? How do we learn this knowledge? Nursery Rhymes and Christmas Carols teach us what to expect of certain holidays and seasons. Children who grow up in the desert and kids who grow up in the artic have the same expectations because the act of remembering these expectations is what develops their memory. Repetition, particularly when it comes to things we find enjoyable is a great way we remember things, and this includes young offspring. The alphabet is just on of the most prominent examples of how songs help us remember the basics via repetition.
Wrapping up more than Presents
Every day we are presented with teaching moments for kids. Our biggest teachers in life are our parents and we pass down those lessons in the same way our parents taught us. This seemingly endless loop in the most important part of family. It isn’t the holiday meals we remember or the funny stories we tell later but it’s the little things. We remember the bonding moments we experienced while learning, the jingle bells we sung when the first thought of snow entered our little minds. Enjoy the little teaching moments.