Arts enrichment and preschool emotions for low-income children at risk

Associations between early shared music activities in the home and later child outcomes: Findings from the Longitudinal Study of Australian Children

“…Participation in weekly parent-infant active music classes has been associated with enhanced communicative gestures, and distress regulation in 12-month-old children compared to those who participated in passive music experiences (Gerry, Unrau, & Trainor, 2012). Arts-enriched preschool environments that include music have been found to improve school readiness, receptive vocabulary (Brown, Benedett, & Armistead, 2010), literacy (Phillips, Gorton, Pinciotti, & Sachdev, 2010), cognitive reasoning (Portowitz, Lichtenstein, Egorova, & Brand, 2009), and emotional regulation skills in low-income children (Brown & Sax, 2013) when compared to non-arts enriched programs.…”

Literacy as a social practice in the early years and the effects of the arts: a case study

“…Through the relevant empirical evidence, it was confirmed that they can support at-risk children in their cognitive development (Brown and Sax, 2013;Brown et al, 2010). This was attributed to the fact that through the arts, students can have hands-on experiences and thus they gain a better understanding of the topic under investigation.…”

Can the Arts Get Under the Skin? Arts and Cortisol for Economically Disadvantaged Children

“…Additionally, in a prior study of children attending Settlement Music School's Kaleidoscope Preschool Arts Enrichment Program, Brown and Sax () found an advantage in growth in emotion regulation skills across the school year for children attending Settlement's Kaleidoscope Preschool Arts Enrichment Program compared with those attending a matched comparison site. The authors argued that the types of emotion training found in preschool emotions based prevention programs (e.g., Izard, Trentacosta, King, & Mostow, ) can also be found in arts education, which can be used to teach children to demonstrate, label, and compare intensities of emotion expressions; identify causes and consequences of emotions; and practice strategies for regulating emotions.…”

“…Those participating in the creative dance and movement program showed greater improvement with regard to social skills as well as internalizing and externalizing problems as rated by parents and teachers who were blind to children's group membership. Brown and Sax () studied Settlement Music School's Kaleidoscope Preschool, a Head Start site where children participate in music, dance, and visual arts classes each day as well as regular early learning or homeroom. Children at Kaleidoscope showed greater expression of positive emotions in arts versus regular homeroom classes and, compared to peers attending a matched comparison site that was not arts enriched, showed greater growth in emotion regulation skills over the course of the year.…”