Somebody's Jumping on the Floor: Incorporating Music into Orientation and Mobility for Preschoolers with Visual Impairments

Abstract

Young children with visual impairments face many challenges as they learn to orient to and move through their environment, the beginnings of orientation and mobility (OM Pogrund & Fazzi, 2002; Skellenger & Sapp, 2010). Somebody's Jumping on the Floor, is a program that uses rhythms and music to develop OM Colwell & Murrless, 2002; Register, 2001, 2004), physical development (Standley, 2003), emotional development (Hilliard, 2001), communication and language development (Trevarthen & Malloch, 2002), and social development (Kern, 2004; Kern & Wolery, 2001). intentional use of sounds was effective in enhancing independent mobility in a preschooler who is totally blind (Kern & Wolery, 2001 ). Despite pervasive myths to the contrary, children with visual impairments do not have enhanced musical abilities (Madsen & Darrow, 1998), but they can benefit from interventions involving music (Bertolami & Martino, 2002; Codding, 2000; Kern & Wolery, 2001; Robb, 2003). Codding (2000) summarized seven years of research and reports in which music and sound were primarily used in three ways to enhance children's learning: as a structured activity for learning developmental skills, as a reward to maintain or increase a desired behavior, and as a prompt for spatial orientation. This article focuses on using music as a structured activity for learning concepts and skills related to O&M. CREATING O&M SONGS Many skills and concepts apply to all children who are learning O&M. Some of these skills and concepts include positional concepts (including in, under, and between), sensory skills (for example, approaching versus retreating sounds and tactile input from the feet), movement skills (such as bending and twisting), cognitive concepts (for instance, toward or away and floor surfaces), and body parts (like face, arms, and wrists). Although many of the skills are similar for all children, each child needs individualized instruction and may require instruction in skills, concepts, or routes that are unique to him or her or to a particular situation. following are six guidelines that can be used by professionals to create music that they can incorporate into O&M instruction. What follows are examples of how these guidelines were applied to develop four songs for teaching O&M to young children with visual impairments. Identify the objective Each song should focus on one or two concepts or skills, because too much information is ineffective. For example, the familiar children's song, The Hokey Pokey could be used to teach several concepts (such as the names of body parts, laterality of the body, and in or out) and several movement patterns (including movement of specific body parts, movement of the entire body, and shaking body parts). Until a child has mastered the majority of these concepts and skills, The Hokey Pokey will be of limited instructional value because the child is being asked to learn and apply too much information at one time. Creating a song that focuses on one or two priority skills for the child will make the song a much more effective instructional tool. Find the natural rhythm Use the natural word rhythms in the key words as the basis for the song. …