Inclusive Fun

13 December 2019

Rebecca Cox

Friday morning Streetlevel Waterloo is full of giggles and energy, there is colour and noise and all different sounds. This is the morning we run a Mini Music program . This means that at 9:30 in the morning about 10-14 kids, ranging in age from about 1 to 5, come through our doors. They first play with toys and each other for half an hour, they then have half an hour of music time where they engage with each other and the adults in the room in a fun, creative learning environment. The kids, who are often bursting with energy, are then provided with morning tea and spend the next half an hour to an hour running around together in our outside space.

This program aims to achieve a couple of different things. We are really keen to have a music program that helps kids learn pitch, rhythm, movements, co-ordination, counting, colours and rhymes all through different musical mediums. We have instruments they get to play, such as bells, triangles and clapping sticks, action songs that they learn and they move their bodies through dance. We make it a priority that most of the music that we do helps the kids engage with their parent or guardian as well as each other.

This kind of music program is really important as it provides a fun way for kids to learn, while also giving parents and guardians a different method of engaging with the children. I am originally musically trained and so providing a program that is fun and engaging but that also has an educational purpose is extremely important to me.

But the thing I love the most about this Mini Music space is that it is all inclusive. We get families from all different walks of life, who speak many different languages and whose family situations are all very different, coming together and becoming a little community. After the class many families continue to a park or café to talk and play together. I have watched, this term, a particular family who has just recently moved to Australia. Their first language isn’t English, therefore communication has been difficult for them, and they don’t have any family supports in Sydney. At mini Music they have been welcomed and loved by the community right from the get-go. Both parents and child started very shy and unsure and they have blossomed into a kid who confidently joins in all the activities and plays with other children and parents who confidently join our community sharing what is happening in their lives with others in the group. This is a special space where each child and adult is loved and valued where they are at and whatever is going on in their lives.