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Who is it for?
Teachers, lecturers and therapists
Early Years
Dalcroze Eurhythmics works well for Early Years children because the games are:
- age-appropriate, and often created by the teacher, who uses his or her own improvisation skills to suit the needs of each individual class.
- child-centred, allowing the children’s creative ideas to develop.
- challenging, increasing in difficulty as skills are learned and remembered.
- memorable and enjoyable, creating a great sense of fun and love of music and movement.
- multi-sensory, encouraging the development of a range of learning styles.
- experiential, encouraging a gentle journey from unconscious learning to cognitive understanding.
Children can often communicate through music and movement even if other means of communication are yet to develop.
During workshops, many of the aims of the Government document “Curriculum guidance for the foundation stage” are fulfilled.
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Key Stages 1-3
Dalcroze readily fulfils many aspects of the National Curriculum. It is an active music educational tool that is exploratory rather than prescriptive.
By understanding the principles of Dalcroze a practitioner can guide children through and into the language of music - the way it is written, the way it works, the way it communicates and the way it moves us.
With a background in Dalcroze a creative teacher can tailor sessions to suit the needs of each individual class, drawing out and developing the children’s own unique ways of communicating through sound and movement and developing their creative ideas and impulses.
Because Dalcroze engages the whole person, classes are memorable and enjoyable, which helps nurture a love of music and movement. Classes are multi-sensory, which encourages a range of learning styles and sensory skills.
Dalcroze proceeds naturally from unconscious learning into cognitive understanding, initially developing skills through activity.
Listening, which is at the core of music, is naturally encouraged through games and exercises. It is great for girls and boys of all ages and temperaments.
For Jaques-Dalcroze the study of music meant the study of man himself. It was the art of human expression and experience. He sought in movement an expansion of the personality.
(Claire-Lise Dutoit)
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Special Needs
In a typical Dalcroze class a variety of senses will be used: visual, aural, verbal and kinaesthetic. Learning is active and it is this multi-sensory approach which makes Dalcroze an ideal method for children with learning difficulties.
For the dyslexic child it can help with:
- literacy and language development
- phonological processing
- ability to control their energy
- ability to sequence
- social development
- emotional development
- memory
For the dyspraxic child it can help them develop:
- body awareness
- muscle tone and strength
- coordination
- awareness of space around them
- motor planning and organisation
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Studio Teachers
Dalcroze offers teachers working one-to-one or in small groups valuable ideas for instrumental students. Students may develop a good technique but still have a limited understanding of the language of music. Games and exercises can be used in lessons to broaden a students understanding of the music. Teaching, using substantial, whole body movement, transfers very potently to the small muscle movements that are essential for playing. Repertoire can be explored through movement leading to a deeper understanding of pieces, a real engagement with feelings and a deeper understanding of the composer’s wishes. Dalcroze was adamant that students should be complete musicians, possessing mastery of their instruments as well as being able to express and communicate fully. The Dalcroze method is a combined approach of the intellect and the senses.
I dreamed of spending my life developing the musical faculties of the child, so as to free him later to study instrumental techniques under conditions which permit him to make this technique a means of self-expression and self-affirmation….instead of employing it slavishly imitating the thoughts and feelings of others (E. Jaques Dalcroze, translated Bachmann 1987)
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Therapists
Music has an important part to play in education because it enables expression of our innermost desires; our desire to move, to withdraw, to escape from, to dream, to forget, to persuade, to console. Music can stimulate us and satisfy our deepest longings (paraphrased from Music & Movement Therapy (1965) by Claire-Lise Dutoit).
Music possesses a vital and therapeutic power; it is language before language, a universal language which, once felt, is understood and loved. It permits liberty of expression beyond normal outlets, and we respond to it with all our sensibility and inner feeling. (Claire-Lise Dutoit)
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