It’s the first day of “big school” and your child is clinging to your leg at the school gate, bawling their eyes out. You’re perplexed. The weeks leading up to this day were filled with excitement and anticipation; school supplies were sourced and labelled, uniforms were tried on with glee. Your child has been going to daycare for years and is used to the concept of a drop-off. But today something is off, and as you look around to other parents dealing with the same separation woes, you realise you’re not alone.
The transition from daycare to big school is not always a smooth one, no matter how much we plan for it. A recent survey by early learning educators Young Academics revealed that 72% of parents fear their kids aren’t prepared for school, and that 42% of parents found their child struggled in the transition from daycare to big school. To address this, Young Academics partnered with The Wiggles to enhance their curriculum with music-based resources to help children develop confidence, emotional resilience and creative and scholarly skills.
But is this a viable approach, and can it be applied more broadly?
Yes, says Dr Steffen A Herff, the leader of the Sydney Music, Mind, and Body Lab at the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, the University of Sydney. He says there’s “quite a lot” that music can do to help young children transition from daycare to big school, aiding their communication and expression, and acting as a “powerful tool to foster social bonding”.
“Music, dance and other art forms have remarkable abilities in terms of regulating emotions, as well as supporting memory, imagination, and high order cognition,” he says. “Importantly, they also offer an easy pathway towards shared enculturation, which can go a long way in providing a sense of belonging and offering a feeling of kinship with people or places you may have only just met.”
Shared enculturation for kids is a bit like adults making a supportive connection at a new job: they might feel intimidated, anxious and afraid, but a new co-worker might hum their favourite song or like their favourite band, facilitating a sense of kinship and belonging.
The use of music may help to connect kids not just to one another, but also to their new place – if it is well chosen.
“You can use music to provide a sense of positive and calm emotion when talking about the transition to school or when doing initial immersion of children into the new environment,” Herff says. “This does not only work in children: there is a reason you tend to have calming music in places where you want to avoid panic and chaos, such as elevators and public waiting areas of hospitals or airports.”
He says music can affect “higher order cognition”, like one’s imagination. A study Herff co-authored demonstrated that through background music you can shape the vividness or intensity of imagined content as well as its emotional sentiment. In light of this, parents and daycare teachers might utilise children’s already vivid imaginations to help them prepare for the new and unknown environment of big school, and what they might encounter there.
Singing songs at home that reflect a cultural phenomenon that might also hold weight with kids at big school (Herff uses Baby Shark as an example) could also mean an increase in shared opportunities for connection.
Nidhi, a mum whose child attends a Young Academics centre, says the incorporation of music into her child’s daycare curriculum has been a “gift” that Nidhi is trying to build on at home.
“Music has clearly become a cornerstone of her development,” she says. “It’s boosted her confidence and made her more interactive and engaged. At home, we focus on building on what she’s learning. It’s about giving her the tools she needs for what’s ahead, and it’s amazing to see how it all connects.”
Herff is hesitant to “give universal recommendations” because every child (and every parent-child dynamic) is different. He says following your little one’s lead in terms of the music they do and don’t like is a great place to start.
“Music can be an excellent mnemonic to teach new information, for example about crossing streets or the alphabet,” he says. “If you notice some music is great in calming your children down and getting them in a positive spirit, it might be a good idea to use it to set the scene before or during talking about the move to the big school. You can encourage them to imagine what they think the new place might be like, and together explore their expectations.”
Sarah Ayoub is a journalist, academic and author of books for young adults and children