If you read our Revised Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS) blog series in August 2021 you will be aware of the many links between music practice and the revised Early Learning Goals (EGLs) and Birth To 5 Matters guidance. But are your parents aware of this?
An area of Boogie Mites’ work that you may not know about is our Family Learning courses across the South East of England. We have been involved with this project for many years now, taking our core programmes to parents and children through partnership work with children’s centres, pre-schools and primary schools via local authority funded courses.
What is Family Learning and why do we do it?
The Learning and Work Institute defines it as referring to “any learning activity that involves both children and adult family members, where learning outcomes are intended for both, and that contributes to a culture of learning in the family.” Which is exactly what Boogie Mites is about! We have always promoted ourselves as being for the benefit of parents as well as the children, so this more formal direction complements our aims of empowering everyone to incorporate the brain-boosting benefits of music into their lives.
Our courses incorporate a short time with the parents each week to give them the theory behind what we are doing, including links to EYFS development, then a joint music-making and craft session with the children and parents, followed by time for reflection where we draw links between the theory and practical and comment on any observations from the session. The parents are always given ideas to try at home to support their children’s learning, and we provide MP3 downloads of all the songs from the particular programme we’re covering, encouraging home practice.
As well as providing education about the EYFS areas of learning and music practice, it can provide valuable support to parents as a way of gaining peer support from other parents in their community. We often see learners forming lasting friendships from attending the course together. With the reduction in children centre’s funding of these groups, it is a valuable service that early years settings might consider providing, sharing their knowledge and supporting parent engagement through music workshops.
Outcomes for parents and children
For the parent/guardians, there are 4 proposed outcomes for a course, which are adapted to the age of the child:
- Participate in shared musical activities with their child supporting personal, social and emotional development
- To gain an overview understanding of the EYFS (differentiated to age of the child)
- Observe their child’s behaviour, modelling good practice and supporting development
- To learn new songs and activities for practice at home during and after the course
The proposed outcomes for the children are mapped against the 3 Prime Areas of Learning in the EYFS and are kept relevant to the age of the child:
- To participate in a shared activity with the parent and group, developing social and emotional skills and social interaction
- To develop physical skills through moving with music and handling instruments
- To develop communication, language and listening skills through tuning into sounds, gaining confidence for self-expression through music
Parent workshops at your settings
Why not try a parent education music workshop at your nursery. We have written a workshop plan for parents and children aged 3-4 years, that you can access via our customer hub. It also gives you a taster of songs from Boogie Mites School Ready Programme.
Sign up to access the taster songs and parent workshop plan here: https://ex246.infusionsoft.app/app/form/school-ready-taster
Signpost parents to Boogie Mites parent shop: http://www.boogiemites.co.uk/product-category/parent-products/
If you are a licensee of one of the Boogie Mites core programmes, we have parent workshop packs, which include; 3 workshops plans and videos of a parent workshops in action. You can find out more by emailing Sue.
You can also enquire about having a Boogie Mites teacher visit your setting to deliver a parent workshop for you, this may be possible if we have a teacher near you. We can also deliver our Babies programme for the nurseries prospective parents.
We have also created a parent information sheet covering music and it’s links to the EYFS. Please print this off and give out at the sessions or share this link: https://bit.ly/parent-information-sheet-3 via email and social media.
