Why NFM
Why Natural Foundations in Music?
It doesn’t take long to discover—maybe skimming a few parenting magazines. Research has proven that exposure to music at a young age is advantageous for children. Evidence has shown that music can enhance skills that children inevitably use in other areas of study. Music helps children, often simultaneously, draw from multiple skill sets. In a typical early childhood music class, a child may engage by listening, watching, analyzing, moving, and singing—all while using both fine and gross motor skills.
It is no wonder that a study by E. Glenn Schellenberg at the University of Toronto at Mississauga, as published in a 2004 issue of Psychological Science, showed that children who participated in just nine months of music lessons demonstrated, on average, an IQ increase of 3 points higher than the other test groups. And a study published in 2007 by a University of Kansas professor of music education and music therapy, Christopher Johnson, concluded that students who attended elementary schools with superior music education programs scored 20 percent higher in math and 22 percent higher in English on standardized tests than schools with low-quality or non-existent music programs.
We developed Natural Foundations in Music around the way we introduced our own children to music—surrounding them with music in such a natural way that it almost became a second language. Because of this, they could transition to playing an instrument with ease. Although our children have experienced the academic benefits of music, this was not our primary motivation. Rather, we wanted to help unlock the creativity deep inside of them while encouraging a profound love of music—producing sensitivity, discipline, and endurance to develop excellence not only in musicianship, but in all God has called them to do.
Our prayer is that Natural Foundations in Music will surround families with music in such a natural way that it becomes part of who they are while unlocking their true identity as creative children of the first Creator—equipping them to offer those gifts back to Him in gratitude for His unending Grace.
Soli Deo Gloria!