Music Books

Learning an instrument is a great way to encourage your child's creativity and problem solving development. But how do you know if your child is ready for music lessons? There are three categories to consider: emotional maturity, academic skill and natural ability.

There are a few clues that your child will give you along the way. If you find that your child dances or claps when they hear music, or they sing songs with you using the correct pitch and tone, then they may be naturally drawn to an instrument and want to create music. But if you child is not so naturally musically inclined, the popular opinion is that a child should start learning music when they are at age seven or eight.

The reason for this is that they need to be able to understand the music books they will be learning from. Reading from a music book requires that the child knows the alphabet from A to G and also backwards G, F, E, D, C, B, A. Reading from music books will also require some mathematical skill. Music is divided into measure and these measures are divided into beats. The student must be able to learn the number of beats each written note is worth. For example a quarter note is worth one beat and a dotted half note is worth three. The child needs to be able to add the notes together to make sure there is the correct number of beats in a measure.

It is important for your child to understand their music books and this will require a level of emotional maturity. The child needs to have patience for repetition and concentration. If your child gets easily bored and has a short attention span, it may be advisable to wait until they have matured, because learning music should be a fun and rewarding experience and not a chore.