Play, Toy and Children development
Abundant research has shown that play benefits children on numerous aspects such as cognition, physics, social ability and emotional well-being (Ammar, Acevedo, & Cordova, 2013; Caruso, 1988; Goldstein, 2012). According to the play therapist O. Fred Donaldson, allowing children to develop play resources has numerous benefits, for example, developing imagination, creativity, and promoting joy which is fundamental for self-esteem and health. (Goldstein, 2003, 2012; Schellenberg, 2006). Play facilitates brain grow and development, builds new neural connection, and to some extent make the player more intelligent (Goldstein, 2012) In addition, toys, being purpose-built for children’s play, invite play and prolong
…show more content…
Furthermore, effective music instruction is along with instrument playing. As argued by Kraus, “It turns out that playing a musical instrument is important … We don't see these kinds of biological changes in people who are just listening to music, who are not playing an instrument … Because it is only through the active generation and manipulation of sound that music can rewrite the brain…” (Locker, Dec.16, 2014; Toppo, 2014) In other words, kids can’t just sit there and let the sound of music wash over them. They have to be actively engaged in the music(Locker, Dec.16, 2014). Additionally, one study showed that students who actively engaged with sound through the year half of the children had more improved neural processing than the children who attended the music appreciation classes (Kraus et al., …show more content…
Firstly, musical toys build a baby-directed music experience and, in fact, targets several aspects of child development including sensory-motor, language, communication, emotion, social, and cognitive modalities (Sulkin & Brodsky, 2015) .Secondly, music toys provide children with cause-result effect by handling and playing with toys and in this case, the effect is music. Despite a bunch of demonstrations about the effect of formal musical training and instrument playing on children development (Kaviani et al., 2014; Schellenberg, 2006; Schlaug et al., 2005), musical toys, however, as a source of informal musical activities, consist a huge part of the musical experience for the majority of children(Putkinen, Tervaniemi, & Huotilainen, 2013). Researches indicate that young children are well equipped to benefit from a musically enriched home environment (Putkinen et al., 2013). Previous researches showed that the brain has a considerable capacity for neuroplastic changes in childhood (Trainor, 2005). Therefore, brain might well be shaped even by informal exposure to sounds. In addition, Hannon and Trainor (2007) conducted a research showed that the auditory system tunes to musically sounds in childhood through everyday exposure. Also, Putkinen et al. (2013) conducted the research highlight the positive relation of informal musical experiences on enhancing the development of highly important auditory